Classic Rock: What Are Your Cat Stevens Music Memories?
No discussion of classic rock (especially among aging female baby boomers) can be complete without mentioning Yusuf Islam or “the artist formerly known as Cat Stevens.”
(We all need to thank Prince for that phrase commonly used after he changed his name to a symbol.)
If you need your memory refreshed after over four decades, here is what Wiki says about Cat Stevens:
Yusuf Islam (born Steven Demetre Georgiou, 21 July 1948), commonly known by his former stage name Cat Stevens, is a British singer-songwriter, multi-instrumentalist, educator, philanthropist, and prominent convert to Islam.[4]
His early 1970s record albums Tea for the Tillerman and Teaser and the Firecat were both certified triple platinum in the United States by the RIAA.[5] His 1972 album Catch Bull at Four sold half a million copies in the first two weeks of release alone and was Billboard‘s number-one LP for three consecutive weeks.[6] He has also earned two ASCAP songwriting awards in consecutive years for “The First Cut Is the Deepest“, which has been a hit single for four different artists.[7]
Stevens converted to Islam in December 1977 and adopted the name Yusuf Islam the following year. In 1979, he auctioned all his guitars for charity and left his music career to devote himself to educational and philanthropic causes in the Muslim community.
Now that you have been reminded of the pertinent Cat facts, it is time recall all the memories and emotions attached to his songs. Here are mine.
Besides Led Zeppelin, (which I have discussed ad nauseum) Cat Stevens, representing the mellow side of life, was also a sound track of my 1970 – 1973 years at Needham High School. (Needham is close – in a suburb of Boston, MA.)
During those years, Cat Stevens music consumed numerous hours of my time when I was alone in my room avoiding my parents or with my friends.
Four decades later two particular memories are invoked — lost teenage love and lost teenage job.
First the lost love.
It was during my junior year, when a song from the album Teaser and the Firecat, called “How Can I Tell You,” exemplified my dilemma as it related to the secret love I had for my friend who lived across the street.
(This is the same young man whose car my girlfriends and I “stole” as chronicled in the Three Dog Night, Joy to the World installment of this series.)
Now the lost job.
Sometime during my senior year I visited Cape Cod with some friends and did things kids in the ’70s used to do on weekends. Cat Stevens albums were playing non-stop, when as an irresponsible 17-year-old, I called my boss at the local drugstore where I worked part-time to inform him that I was at the Cape and was not planning to make it to work on Sunday. He told me this meant I would be fired and I told him I understood.
What is it about music that imprints moments like that in your memory bank for decades?
That is the question of the week and one about which you can ponder and comment as you recall your own Cat Stevens music memories. (Sometimes I get the impression this weekly series is turning into a therapy session on lost youth. But that is OK because there is no charge for occupying my virtual couch.)
Now, out of respect for Yusuf Islam, and his Muslim faith which abstains from alcohol, there will be no cheap wine recommendation this week.
Instead, here is a novel idea — why not conger up old Cat Stevens memories without any help from the “fruit of the vine?” Or try the fruit of the vine in another form, as in a nice warm glass of prune juice. Get a head start on a drink all aging baby boomers can look forward to imbibing in the coming decades while you listen to Cat Stevens singing, “Morning Has Broken.”
Cat Stevens converted to a decrepit ideology that oppresses women, hates Jews as official policy, and he has been a vocal supporter of Salman Rushdie’s assassination and the persecution of Israel. Whatever meager contributions he has made to pop music are rather inconsequential to me.
I’ll take Led Zeppelin over that swine any day.
He’s no improvement over silence.
If you want to hear something breathtaking, pick up “Wave” by Antonio Carlos Jobim. Bossa Nova (Brazilian Jazz) from the 60s. It’s epic!
Just to adde to that, also Aqua De Beber by Antonio Carlos Jobim, and sung by Astrud Gilberto (she of the “Girl from Ipaneme” fame). Magnificent.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sT2BloTgw7k&feature=fvwrel
Agua de Beber (Water to Drink) is one of the greatest and most recorded bossa nova songs ever. Astrud Gilberto’s voice is as soft and feminine as the petals on an orchid. I have every one of her CDs. I like Enya and Sade, but Gilberto’s my favey-fave female vocalist.
Kinda odd, really. I have everything by Led Zeppelin and Astrud Gilberto. What a concert line-up!
The period you refer to, 1970 – 1973 was just a glorious time for music. I, too, found Cat Stevens at this time and was instantly drawn to his incredible melodies and soothing songs. Like you, I was discovering Led Zeppelin and other British artists that really had a genius that is not evident today, artists such as The Who, Pink Floyd, Yes, etc. My memories from that time period are best summed up this way – while my friends were listening to all the Top 40 pop on WABC in NY, I was transfixed by Jethro Tull and the Aqualung album which really opened my awareness to the power of what an artist had to say and how it could affect me. That is when I realized that music leaves indelible impressions on your life. Alas, not many have much to say now. Thanks for the article.
I don’t drink alcohol at any time, so I won’t have to avoid it in this case. I like my wits about me when I listen to music. (In fact, I like my wits about me when I do ANYTHING.)
“Harold & Maude” – that’s my Cat Stevens memory. But I quit listening to him when he went crazy.
Pointless trivia: The piano on “Morning Has Broken” is played by the astounding Mr. Rick Wakeman.
i recall as a tenn going to a midnight movie show…could not tell you the name or anything in it…but there was an animated sequence of some totally white animated character floating around while “Moonshadow” was playing. Felt very at peace. Still remeber that.
My chief musical memory of Cat Stevens is his endorsement of the murder of SalmanRushdie.
My final memories of this idiot was drawing swatstikas on his albums and throwing them in the garbage.
His songs were clever and catchy and well written, but they had no depth to them, and I never bought any. His music was just as redneck in that regard as Okie From Muskogee. If his music HAD had any depth behind it, he wouldn’t have turned into a soft-spoken mental case. He may as well have signed up for the UFOs that are due to land.
My memories of Cat Stevens songs come complete with the stutter and pause that came as the 8-track player switched tracks, mid-song.
ROFL!!! I remember that happened during The Immigrant Song on Led Zeppelin III.
Speaking of Celebration Day… Have you fellow Zep heads seen this?
http://www.amazon.com/Celebration-Deluxe-Edition-Blu-Ray-digipak/dp/B009E3EY38/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1352578301&sr=8-1&keywords=celebration+day+zeppelin
12/10/07 London’s O2 Arena: The Led Zeppelin Reunion on DVD/Blu-Ray
Ahhhh, yes. I remember Cat Stevens. Whenever I hear songs from “Tea for the Tillerman” or the next (whatever-it-was-called) album, it brings back memories of first love and good times. And sad times too.
It’s funny what you remember, though. When I got Whatever-It-Was-Called and played it, I was delighted to hear “Morning Has Broken,” a song my grandmother used to play on the piano when I was very, very young. It was in an old songbook of hers.
I looked on the album to see who wrote it since I knew Stevens had not. No attribution. Indeed, I read “All songs written by Cat Stevens.” This disturbed me. And I remember getting snitty whenever anyone praised Stevens for that song.
Cat Stevens was rock? Who knew?
– Train?
That’s the present Cat Stevens. If you purchase any of his music now, you will be supporting his brand of Islamic jihad, including the murder of innocent civilians.
My sisters and I enjoyed, “Ruby, My Love,” both for the bouzouki (hope that’s right) and for the fun of trying to sing the Greek part. Holy cow, I just remembered the strangest memory. I was in college, in the late 70s, and one evening a student I didn’t know sat down at our table and told us that she had slept with Cat Stevens. I don’t remember feeling anything like envy, I just thought how sad that for the rest of her life, this might be her claim to fame.
I guess it’s “Ruby Love,” and it was probably on the same album with that gorgeous head shot. *sigh* Pity he’s gone to the dark side!
Right now am playing “Wishfulness Waltz” from Fairport Convention. Next, I think I want to listen to the 11-minute version of the Asylum Street Spankers’ immortal “Scrotum Song.”
Can you tell I’m upset about the election?
Few people are aware of the brief period in the early 1970s when Stevens experimented with Judaism, compiling several albums of Klezmer music under the name Steven Katz.
I heard Cat Stevens’ real masterpiece, 1972′s Catch Bull at Four, from about age 11 and studied it closely, having some musical background and much passion for it. The work’s might has only grown larger over the years. For me, Cat Stevens’ poetic majesty, lyrical suave and thematic power on Catch Bull at Four matches or possibly exceeds the greatest works of the age, not excluding the best of John Lennon and Paul McCartney— it’s that good. His mighty, mellifluous baritone carries a song collection of staggering significance, from the joyous exuberance of “Angelsea” and “Can’t Keep It In” through the whimsical and beauteous “Boy With a Moon and Star On His Head,” through the haunting and dramatic “Kansas City Nightmare,” and finally, possibly THE greatest single art work ever: the epochal, magisterial “O Caritas,” delivered in Latin (!) with an end-of-the-world portrayal so monumental it can only be classified as eschatological. “I see all things… burning… I hear men… shouting… Now is the light of the world and the stars going out… Now does the blame for the disaster fall upon men… Grief is heavy with sadness and tears…Great is the noise from the earth and seas… O love, be with us always. We who must perish salute death; life alone goes on.” Unspeakably good, beautiful and meaningful art, from one of our greatest—before he went bonkers and endorsed murder. What a world.
I loved Cat Stevens back in the day. What I still enjoy: “Ruins”, “18th Avenue”, and the tracks from Mona Bone Jakon from “Katmandu” through “Fill My Eyes” and “Lily White”. Sublime!
I spent most of 1970-73 in Viet Nam with the Marines. I remember Wild World. It played right before a VC attack on the firebase. My favorite songs of his are “Father and Son”, “Where Do the Children Play” and “Cats in the Cradle”.
My mom got the Firecat album when I was still in junior high school, so I wound up unintentionally memorizing it. I soon dubbed him “Crap” Stevens for no definite reason. Perhaps my most specific memory is of “Moon Shadow” playing (on the radio?) during a lunar eclipse in 1972.
In what universe is Cat Stevens’ insipid pop mewlings “classic rock?”