Clavinet Songs

[dixonge]

Jeremiah by Michael Omartian (one of the best keyboardists you never heard of).

 

Hey Michael is actually a friend of mine, lives not far from me too. We've called each other "My Armenian Brother" for years.

Anyone who hasn't heard of him should woodshed, 'cause he's a monster player and brilliant mind.

 

And, as for the topic at hand, I'll just say

There's Higher Ground, and then there's everything else!

 

I had his 'The Builder' album back in the day. I also read liner notes obsessively so I knew he was the acoustic piano player on Aja's title track. Did *not* know he worked w/ Loggins and Messina, however!

[Joe Muscara]

Going off list, there's stuff like thisâ¦

 

[SamuelBLupowitz]

There's a song on my new record coming out next week that's built around full-on Clav-that-civilians-will-mistake-for-crunch-guitar. In an act of absolutely shameless self promotion, I will share it here when the record drops.

As threatened...

 

[video:youtube]

 

The left channel "guitar" is a clav that I just slammed through a Fender amp with a wah pedal. Aside from managing to get a nice two-guitar rock band vibe with only one guitar on the track, I got some nice feedback effects out of the deal!

[Joe Muscara]

The left channel "guitar" is a clav that I just slammed through a Fender amp with a wah pedal. Aside from managing to get a nice two-guitar rock band vibe with only one guitar on the track, I got some nice feedback effects out of the deal!

I had forgotten you mentioned that, and when I spun the track after the album dropped, I wondered if it was a Clav.

[stoken6]

Am I right that "Stir It Up" features a clavinet with masses of wah? (I don't use Spotify so haven't checked Joe's playlist)

 

Cheers, Mike.

[Joe Muscara]

On 2/6/2021 at 7:21 AM, Joe Muscara said:

Based on the "Notable Songs" list on the Wikipedia page for Clavinet

Since I created this thread a year ago, Wikipedia edited that page to remove the list of Notable Songs. I'm guessing it's because Wikipedia has a thing against lists (seriously, for some reason even though in some cases it makes sense, they don't want them. They don't like when a page about a song includes a list of who covered the song, for example).

 

However, you can go into the history of the page and find the old version. So I did, and I believe this was the most recent list of songs before they nuked it. It's what my playlist was based on. I wanted to include it here for completeness. As I have stated above, I've added other songs as I've come across them including "Fool Yourself" and "Spanish Moon" by Little Feat (I just saw a live video of Feat from the other week and Billy is playing a Clav sound on Fool Yourself).

 

Again, if anyone wants to check out my playlist on Apple Music it's here. I set it up to be in chronological order, but songs might be mixed up within their year. I'm not going to dive into album release dates to figure that much out!  

 

1960s

• Michael Brown, "Let Go of You Girl" (1967) by the Left Banke[17]
• Stevie Wonder, "I Was Made to Love Her" (1967), "Shoo-Be-Doo-Be-Doo-Da-Day" (1968), "I Don't Know Why" (1969)
• "I Thank You" (1968) by Sam & Dave
• Garth Hudson, "Up on Cripple Creek" (1969) by the Band

1970s

• Billy Preston, "Outa-Space" (1972)[18]
• "Doo Doo Doo Doo Doo (Heartbreaker)" (1973), "Ain't Too Proud to Beg" (1974) by the Rolling Stones
• "War" (1970) by Edwin Starr
• Stevie Wonder, "Superstition" (1972), "Higher Ground" (1973) (through a Mu-Tron III[19][20][21]), "You Haven't Done Nothin'" (1974).
• Leonard Caston Jr. (Motown), "Keep On Truckin'" (1973), "Boogie Down" (1974) by Eddie Kendricks[22]
• Milan Williams, "Machine Gun",[23] "The Bump" (1974) by The Commodores[24]
• "Finders Keepers" by Chairmen of the Board[25](1973)
• Raymond Jackson, "Use Me" (1972) by Bill Withers
• Bernie Worrell, "Up for the Down Stroke" and "Testify" (1974) by Parliament, America Eats Its Young" (1972), "A Joyful Process" by Funkadelic
• Earl Lindo (the Wailers), "Burnin'", by Bob Marley & the Wailers (1973)
• "I've Got to Use My Imagination" (1974) by Gladys Knight & the Pips
• Ricky West (Kool and The Gang), "Jungle Boogie", by Kool and The Gang (1974)
• "Nutbush City Limits" by Ike & Tina Turner (1973)
• Kenneth Ascher, "Whatever Gets You thru the Night", "#9 Dream" (1974) by John Lennon
• George Harrison, "Ding Dong, Ding Dong" (1974)
• Ronnie Barron, "Take Your Pleasure Where You Find It" (1973), "It's Getting Harder To Survive" (1973) by Paul Butterfield's Better Days
• Keith Emerson, "Nut Rocker" by Emerson, Lake & Palmer (1971)
• Benny Andersson, "Dancing Queen", by ABBA
• Paul Griffin, "Kid Charlemagne" (1976) by Steely Dan
• "A Fifth of Beethoven" by Walter Murphy & the Big Apple Band (1976)
• George Bitzer, "Shadow Dancing" by Andy Gibb (1978)
• Herbie Hancock, "Chameleon" (1973)
• Gerry Thomas, "Burtha Butt Boogie", by Jimmy Castor Bunch (1975)
• Chris Jasper, "Live It Up" (1974) by The Isley Brothers
• Robert Lamm, "Life Saver", "Women Don't Want to Love Me" by Chicago, "Skinny Boy" by Robert Lamm(1974)
• Pete Sears (Jefferson Starship), "Play on Love" (1975) by Jefferson Starship
• Rick Wright, "Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Part 8)" (1975), "Pigs (Three Different Ones)" (1977) by Pink Floyd
• Rick Davies (Supertramp), "Give a Little Bit" (1977), "The Logical Song" (1979) by Supertramp
• Clarence McDonald, "Best of My Love" (1977) by the Emotions
• Kerry Minnear (Gentle Giant), "Experience" (1973), "Cogs in Cogs", "So Sincere" by Gentle Giant (1974)
• Richard Tandy (ELO), "Evil Woman" (1976), "Last Train to London" (1979), "Showdown" (1973) by the Electric Light Orchestra
• George Duke, "I'm the Slime" (1973) and "Zombie Woof" by Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention
• Christine McVie, "You Make Loving Fun" by Fleetwood Mac (1977)
• Daryl Dragon, "Love Will Keep Us Together" by Captain and Tennille (1975)
• Edgar Winter, "Free Ride" by Edgar Winter Group (1973)
• Cory Lerios, "Whatcha Gonna Do?" (1977), Pablo Cruise
• John Paul Jones, "Trampled Under Foot" , "Custard Pie" (1975) by Led Zeppelin[26]
• Peter Hammill, "The Undercover Man" by Van der Graaf Generator, featured on their 1975 album Godbluff
• Glenn Frey, "Life in the Fast Lane" (1977) by the Eagles[27]
• Terry Adams, "Green Lights" (1978) by NRBQ
• Bill Oddie, "The Funky Gibbon" (1975) by The Goodies, in which keyboardist Dave MacRae plays the clavinet.[28]

1980s–2010s

• Dan Hartman, "Living in America" (1985) by James Brown
• Greg Phillinganes, "I Keep Forgettin' (Every Time You're Near)" (1982) by Michael McDonald
• Paul McCartney, "Free as a Bird" (1995) by the Beatles
• Ian McDonald, "Urgent" by Foreigner(1981)
• Grace Potter, "Never Go Back" (2012) by Grace Potter and the Nocturnals
• Gary Phillips, "Jeopardy" by The Greg Kihn Band (1983)
• "Could You Be Loved" (1980) by Bob Marley and the Wailers[29]
• Kevin Hearn, "Too Little Too Late" (2001) by the Barenaked Ladies
• Gabrial McNair, "Underneath It All" (2002) by No Doubt
• Tríona Ní Dhomhnaill, "An Seanduine Dóite" by Relativity (1985)
• Garth Porter, "Howzat" by Sherbet
• Scott Litt, "Ignoreland" by R.E.M. (Automatic For The People, 1992)
• "Get em Goin'" by Euge Groove

[Doerfler]

Interesting (for lack of a better word) to see "Chameleon" and "Bertha Butt Boogie" on the same list. 

 

Notably missing are the many Talking Heads songs with Bernie Worrell playing clavinet, the intro of Life During Wartime is the first that comes to mind.

 

 

[16251]

KC and Sunshine band?

[Stokely]

That Lachey Doley video is great.  He does a great live-in-studio version of Foreplay/Longtime as well with him on b3.

Not quite exactly on topic, but I found this video entertaining and actually educational 

Apologies if already been posted
 

 

[MuzikTeechur]

On 2/8/2022 at 3:01 PM, Doerfler said:

Interesting (for lack of a better word) to see "Chameleon" and "Bertha Butt Boogie" on the same list. 

 

Notably missing are the many Talking Heads songs with Bernie Worrell playing clavinet, the intro of Life During Wartime is the first that comes to mind.

 

 

Yes!  I was listening to "Burnin' Down the House" and that song is heavily reliant on the Clavinet!

 

[BenWaB3]

That's a great list!! Do you by chance have the info on Fencewalk by Mandrill?

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aTsw3u6g5YI

 

That was one of THE most nasty/funky clav tracks in existence. One person who has managed to capture that essence is Ivan Neville in a lot of the Dumpstaphunk recordings.

[Joe Muscara]

4 hours ago, MuzikTeechur said:

On 2/8/2022 at 2:01 PM, Doerfler said:

Notably missing are the many Talking Heads songs with Bernie Worrell playing clavinet, the intro of Life During Wartime is the first that comes to mind.

 

 

Yes!  I was listening to "Burnin' Down the House" and that song is heavily reliant on the Clavinet!

Thanks for these! I've added them to my playlist. Keep 'em coming!

 

On 2/8/2022 at 8:50 PM, 16251 said:

KC and Sunshine band?

Which tracks?

[16251]

6 minutes ago, Joe Muscara said:

Thanks for these! I've added them to my playlist. Keep 'em coming!

 

Which tracks?

Many videos of KC has him standing playing clavinet. Get down tonight, That's the way I like it are a few. I laughed at KC back in the day when I was playing dance music, but I think their groove and most songs have aged well (not that I'm listening to them anymore.)

[Joe Muscara]

3 hours ago, 16251 said:

Get down tonight

I have this one on my playlist. 👍

[mpn_user7629]

The Lovin' Spoonful - Six O'clock

 

Peppermint Trolley Company - I Remember Long Ago

 

🙂

[Ivan May]

The Song You Make Loving Fun by Fleetwood Mac features a clavinet played through a phaser by Christine McVie. I think she used a Fender Rhodes on that song too.

[niacin]

 

Willie Tee on clavinet.

 

 

 

[niacin]

On 2/11/2022 at 4:25 AM, 16251 said:

Many videos of KC has him standing playing clavinet. Get down tonight, That's the way I like it are a few. I laughed at KC back in the day when I was playing dance music, but I think their groove and most songs have aged well (not that I'm listening to them anymore.)

 

And if you ever have to play Get Down Tonight you'll find yourself playing that solo - originally a guitar recorded at half speed  - on clav.

[niacin]

 

clav from the top, fantastic first rhodes solo from 2:18, second solo from 4:10, hell just listen through the whole track, often overlooked I'd rate her up there with George Duke, this whole album is just outstanding, she was 22 or 23 years old when she recorded this.

[dongna]