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Started by kastelfan, August 14, 2008, 09:34:20 AM

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kastelfan

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America is a rock band formed in England in 1970 by Dewey Bunnell, Dan Peek, and Gerry Beckley. The trio met as sons of U.S. Air Force personnel stationed in London, where they began performing live.

America achieved significant popularity in the 1970s and was famous for the trio's close vocal harmonies and light acoustic folk rock sound. The band released a string of hit albums and singles, many of which found airplay on pop/soft rock stations.

The band came together shortly after the members' graduation from high school, and a record deal with Warner Bros. Records followed. Their debut 1971 album, America, included the transatlantic hits "A Horse with No Name" and "I Need You"; Homecoming (1972) included the single "Ventura Highway"; and Hat Trick (1973), a modest success on the charts which fared poorly in sales, included one minor hit song "Muskrat Love". 1974's Holiday featured the hits "Tin Man" and "Lonely People"; and 1975's Hearts generated the number one single "Sister Golden Hair" alongside "Daisy Jane." History: America's Greatest Hits, a compilation of hit singles, was released the same year and was certified multi-platinum in the United States and Australia. Peek left the group in 1977, and their commercial fortunes declined, despite a brief return to the top in 1982 with the single "You Can Do Magic".

The group continues to record material and tour with regularity. Their 2007 album Here & Now was a collaboration with a new generation of musicians who credited the band as an influence. America won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist at the 15th Annual Grammy Awards. The group has been inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
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admin

#1
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America is a rock band formed in England in 1970 by Dewey Bunnell, Dan Peek, and Gerry Beckley. The trio met as sons of U.S. Air Force personnel stationed in London, where they began performing live.

America achieved significant popularity in the 1970s and was famous for the trio's close vocal harmonies and light acoustic folk rock sound. The band released a string of hit albums and singles, many of which found airplay on pop/soft rock stations.

The band came together shortly after the members' graduation from high school, and a record deal with Warner Bros. Records followed. Their debut 1971 album, America, included the transatlantic hits "A Horse with No Name" and "I Need You"; Homecoming (1972) included the single "Ventura Highway"; and Hat Trick (1973), a modest success on the charts which fared poorly in sales, included one minor hit song "Muskrat Love". 1974's Holiday featured the hits "Tin Man" and "Lonely People"; and 1975's Hearts generated the number one single "Sister Golden Hair" alongside "Daisy Jane." History: America's Greatest Hits, a compilation of hit singles, was released the same year and was certified multi-platinum in the United States and Australia. Peek left the group in 1977, and their commercial fortunes declined, despite a brief return to the top in 1982 with the single "You Can Do Magic".

The group continues to record material and tour with regularity. Their 2007 album Here & Now was a collaboration with a new generation of musicians who credited the band as an influence. America won a Grammy Award for Best New Artist at the 15th Annual Grammy Awards. The group has been inducted into the Vocal Group Hall of Fame and received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame.
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admin

#2
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IRDnEqW1vAc

"Lonely People" is a song written by the husband-and-wife team of Dan and Catherine Peek and recorded by America.

"Lonely People" was the second single release from America's 1974 album Holiday. "Lonely People" reached number five on the Billboard Hot 100,[1] Dan Peek's only credited song to reach that chart's top 10,  and was America's second number one on the Easy Listening chart, where it stayed for one week in February 1975.

"Lonely People" was not automatically earmarked for the Holiday album: Peek unsuccessfully submitted a demo of the song for John Sebastian to consider recording.

"Lonely People" was written as an optimistic response to the Beatles' song "Eleanor Rigby". Peek considered "Eleanor Rigby" an "overwhelming" "picture...of the masses of lost humanity, drowning in grey oblivion" and would recall being "lacerated" on first hearing the lyrics of its chorus which run "All the lonely people: where do they all come from...where do they all belong".  "Lonely People" was written within a few weeks of Peek's 1973 marriage to Catherine Mayberry: Peek- "I always felt like a melancholy, lonely person. And now [upon getting married] I felt like I'd won."  The lyrics of "Lonely People" advise "all the lonely people": "Don't give up until you drink from the silver cup", a metaphor which Peek thus explains: "It's possible to drink from another's well of experience...and be refreshed."

Dan Peek would recall that in his post-America solo career he would utilize "Lonely People" to close his concerts, introducing the song "with words to the effect" "that Jesus is the answer to loneliness". On the advice of a fan Peek began amending the actual lyrics of the song to convey this pro-Christian message and Peek recorded a lyrically revised version of "Lonely People" for his 1986 album Electro Voice. This revised version amended the original lyrics "And ride that highway in the sky" and "You never know until you try" to "And give your heart to Jesus Christ."
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admin

#3
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XIycEe59Auc

T5

"Sister Golden Hair" is a song written by Gerry Beckley and recorded by the band America for their fifth album Hearts (1975). It was their second single to reach number one on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100, remaining in the top position for just one week.

The lyrics were largely inspired by the works of Jackson Browne. Beckley commented, "[Jackson Browne] has a knack, an ability to put words to music, that is much more like the L.A. approach to just genuine observation as opposed to simplifying it down to its bare essentials... I find Jackson can depress me a little bit, but only through his honesty; and it was that style of his which led to a song of mine, 'Sister Golden Hair', which is probably the more L.A. of my lyrics... [It] was one of the first times I used 'ain't' in a song, but I wasn't making an effort to. I was just putting myself in that frame of mind and I got those kind of lyrics out of it."

Although the song is a message from a man to his lover, explaining that he still loves her despite being not ready for marriage, the title was initially inspired by the mothers of all three members of the group, all of whom were blondes.

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admin

#4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSAJ0l4OBHM

"A Horse with No Name" is a song written by Dewey Bunnell, and originally recorded by the soft rock band America.

It was the band's first and most successful single, released in late-1971 in Europe and early-1972 in the US, and topped the charts in several countries.  It was certified gold by the Recording Industry Association of America.

America's self-titled debut album was released initially in Europe, without "A Horse with No Name," and achieved only moderate success. Originally called "Desert Song", "Horse" was written while the band was staying at the home studio of Arthur Brown (a different person from the British singer), in Puddletown, Dorset. The first two demos were recorded there, by Jeff Dexter and Dennis Elliott, and were intended to capture the feel of the hot, dry desert that had been depicted at the studio from a Salvador DalĂ­ painting, and the strange horse that had ridden out of an M.C. Escher picture. Writer Dewey Bunnell also says he remembered his childhood travels through the Arizona and New Mexico desert when his family lived at Vandenberg Air Force Base.

Trying to find a song that would be popular in both the United States and Europe, Warner Brothers was reluctant to release Beckley's "I Need You" ballad as the first single from America. The label asked the band if it had any other material, then arranged for America to record four more songs at Morgan Studios, Willesden in London.  "A Horse with No Name" was released as the featured song on a three-track single in the UK, Ireland, France, Italy and the Netherlands in late 1971.

On the release "A Horse with No Name" shared the A-side with "Everyone I Meet Is from California"; "Sandman" featured on the B-side. However, its early-1972 two-track US release did not include "Sandman", with "Everyone I Meet Is from California" appearing on the B-side.
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Organplayer

#5
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tm4BrZjY_Sg

a ubgrade for this great song
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