Toto - Talk It Over (1979)

Before they got together and formed a band, the individual members of Toto were regular players on albums by Steely Dan, Seals and Crofts, Boz Scaggs, Sonny and Cher, and many other artists, contributing to some of the most popular records of the 1970's. Keyboardist David Paich, son of musician and session player/arranger Marty Paich, rose to fame after having co-written much of Scaggs' 'Silk Degrees' album, and he played on many sessions with drummer Jeff Porcaro (the son of session percussionist Joe Porcaro), whom he met while attending Grant High School. There they formed the band Rural Still Life, and Paich began to discuss seriously with Porcaro the possibility of them forming their own band, so they brought in bassist and fellow session veteran David Hungate, having played with him in the backing band for Scaggs. In addition, the duo asked fellow Grant High School students, guitarist Steve Lukather (who also played in Scaggs' band as a replacement for Les Dudek) and Jeff Porcaro's brother Steve Porcaro on keyboards to join the team. With the addition of former S.S. Fools singer Bobby Kimball, the group began to work on their first album in 1977, after signing with Columbia Records. Once the band came together, David Paich began composing what would become the eponymous debut album, 'Toto', and according to popular myth, in order to distinguish their own demo tapes from other bands' in the studio at their first recording sessions, Jeff Porcaro wrote the word "Toto" on them. In the early 1980's, band members told the press that the band was named after Toto the dog from 'The Wizard Of Oz', but in fact their first album was completed by the still un-named band, and after viewing the name on the demo tapes, David Hungate explained to the group that the Latin words "in toto" translated to "all-encompassing", and because the band members played on so many records and in so many musical genres, they adopted the name Toto as their own. Luthaker started his session work in earnest in 1977, and as most of the other players had been active during the early 70's, they started to appear together on various albums from the late 70's onwards, in groups of three, four, or even five on Kiki Dee's 'Stay With Me' album. From 1977, through the 1978 recording of their debut album and ending in 1979 following the release of their 'Hydra' album, they played on literally scores of recordings, and this collection brings together some of the best tracks that they recorded with girl singers in that three year period, making in effect a Toto album with a variety of female guest vocalists. 

Track listing

01 Top Of The World (Diana Ross 1977 SL/DH/JP) 
02 Talk It Over (Even Though My Body's Cold) (Lisa Del Bello 1977 SL/DP/MP/JP) 
03 I Don't Wanna Dance No More (Carole Bayer Sager 1978 SL/DH/SP/JP)
04 No Reason (Juice Newton 1978 SL/DH/MP/JP) 
05 Crazy (Valerie Carter 1978 SL/DH/SP/JP)
06 As We Fall In Love Once More (Evie Sands 1979 SL/DH)
07 Love Is A Crazy Feeling (Kiki Dee 1979 SL/DP/DH/SP/JP)
08 Why Can't We Fall In Love (Deniece Williams 1979 SL/DH/JP)
09 Hollywood (Lauren Wood 1979 SL/DH/JP/BK)
10 Prisoner (Cher 1979 SL/JP/DP co-writer)

SL - Steve Luthaker (guitar)
DP - David Paich (keyboards)
DH - David Hungate (bass)
SP - Steve Porcaro (keyboards)
JP - Jeff Porcaro (drums)
MP - Mike Porcaro (bass)
BK - Bobby Kimball (backing vocals)

Steve Luthaker - ...and on guitar (1979)

Steven Lee Lukather was born on 21 October 1957 in the San Fernando Valley, California, and from an early age he was playing keyboards and drums, teaching himself how to play the guitar starting at age seven. His father had bought him a Kay acoustic guitar and a copy of 'Meet The Beatles', and it was an album which he later said changed his life, being particularly influenced by the guitar playing of George Harrison. At Grant High School he met David Paich, and the Porcaro brothers Jeff, Steve, and Mike, all of whom eventually became members of Toto, but by the early 70's he became interested in the idea of becoming a session musician, a vocation that provided opportunities to play with a variety of famous artists. Jeff Porcaro had been playing drums with Steely Dan since 1973, and became a mentor to Lukather, furthering his interest in session work. His first job in the music industry was studio work with Boz Scaggs, after which Paich and Jeff Porcaro asked Lukather to join them in forming a band with his brother Steve, Bobby Kimball, and David Hungate, naming themselves Toto, either after the dog in 'The Wizard Of Oz', or according to an urban myth, after writing 'toto' on their demo tapes to distinguish them from other bands, they then adopted the name, as 'in toto'  was Latin for "all-encompassing", referring to the band members playing on so many records and in so many musical genres. During the 70' and 80's Lukather achieved notability as one of the most sought-after session guitarists in Los Angeles, reputedly playing guitar tracks on more than 1500 albums in his 36 years as a session musician. Named by Gibson Guitar Corporation as one of the Top 10 session guitarists of all time, he has performed on many notable tracks, including Earth, Wind & Fire's 'Faces' album, soloing on the tracks 'Back On The Road' and 'You Went Away', two tracks from the Lionel Richie album 'Can't Slow Down', and on 'Richard Marx's 'Repeat Offender', as well recording virtually all of Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' with Jeff Porcaro. With such a massive back-catalogue to choose from, compiling a representative album took quite a while, but in the end I decided just to concentrate of the period between the formation of Toto and the release of their first album, so all of these tracks are from just the two years from 1977 to 1978, with a couple from 1979 to flesh out the second disc. While I was collecting these recordings I noticed that he'd played on quite a lot of sessions for female artists, and in the end it was logical to split them into two discs, one for the guys and one for the gals. Most of the male artists were US singer/songwriters, not always well-known, but generally able to knock out a good song, and so while the original track listing also included songs from Alice Cooper, Peter Criss of KISS, and Japanese songsmith Tahao Kisugi, by excising those songs, it ends up a very cohesive, laid-back singer/songwriter album, so much so that it almost sounds like the work on one artist. The female singers are a more diverse bunch, ranging from Diana Ross and Barbara Streisand to Olivia Newton-John and Helen Reddy, and while he isn't always given the chance of a solo on some of the tracks, his work is nevertheless integral to the song. So enjoy this very small selection of the session-work of Steve Luthaker, amounting to less that 1/50th of his total recorded output.  

Track listing

Disc One: The Guys
01 The War Was Over (from 'Terence Boylan' by Terence Boylan 1977)
02 Brother Of Mine (from 'Heart And Soul' by Danny Peck 1977) 
03 A Clue (from 'Down Two Then Left' by Boz Scaggs 1977)
04 But Love Me (from 'A Song Between Us' by Kenny Nolan 1978)
05 Back In Business (from 'Blue Virgin Isles' by Ted Gärdestad 1978)
06 Let The Fire Burn All Night (from 'Craig Fuller & Eric Kaz' by Craig Fuller & Eric Kaz 1978)
07 Can't Be Seen (from 'Dane Donohue' by Dane Donohue 1978)
08 Fly With Me (from 'Single' by Bill Champlin 1978)
09 Lady Of The Night (from 'A Long Time Coming' by David McCluskey 1978) 
10 Change Of Heart (from 'Touch Me' by Cory Wells 1978)
11 Long Time Till The First Time (from 'Yesterdaydreams' by Brian Cadd 1978)
12 Something's Missing (In My Life) From 'Keeping Time' by Paul Jabara 1978)
13 Sons And Daughters (from 'West Coast Confidential' by Steven T. 1978)

Disc Two: The Gals
01 Top Of The World (from 'Baby It's Me' by Diana Ross 1977)
02 Daydream (from 'Lisa Dal Bello' by Lisa Dal Bello 1977)
03 Love Breakdown (from 'Songbird' by Barbra Streisand 1978)
04 It's The Falling In Love (from '...Too' by Carole Bayer Sager 1978)
05 A Little More Love (from 'Totally Hot' by Olivia Newton-John 1978)
06 One After 909 (from 'We'll Sing In The Sunshine' by Helen Reddy 1978)
07 It's Not Impossible (from 'Well Kept Secret' by Juice Newton 1978)
08 Lady In The Dark (from 'Wild Child' by Valerie Carter 1978) 
09 You're The One (from 'Cheryl Lynn' by Cheryl Lynn 1978)
10 Love Is A Crazy Feeling (from 'Kiki Dee' by Kiki Dee 1978)
11 Think It Over (from 'Dance Forever' by Cheryl Ladd 1978)
12 Get Up (from 'Suspended Animations' by Evie Sands 1979)
13 Git Down (Guitar Groupie) (from 'Take Me Home' by Cher 1979)

For MAC users

Press command+shift+period (to show hidden files) and a grayed out folder '...and on guitar" will appear and the mp3s will be inside. Either drag those to another folder OR rename the folder without any periods at the beginning. Press command+shift+period to once again hide the hidden files.

Jeff "Skunk" Baxter - ...and on guitar (1978)

Jeffrey Allen "Skunk" Baxter was born on December 13, 1948, and joined his first band at age 11. While still a high school student, he worked at Manny's Music Shop in Manhattan in 1966, and it was there that he met Jimi Hendrix, who was just beginning his career as a frontman. For a short period during that year, Baxter was the bassist in a Hendrix-led band called Jimmy James and the Blue Flames, along with fellow Manny's employee Randy California. He first reached a wide rock audience in 1968 as a member of the psychedelic rock band Ultimate Spinach, joining them for the third and final album 'Ultimate Spinach III'. After leaving the band, he played with the Holy Modal Rounders, and also backed singer Buzzy Linhart, and it was around this time that he started to use the nickname "Skunk," although its origins are shrouded in mystery to this day. Relocating to Los Angeles, he found work as a session guitarist, playing on Carly Simon's first album among many others, and in 1972 he became a founding member of Steely Dan, along with guitarist Denny Dias, guitarist-bassist Walter Becker, keyboardist-vocalist Donald Fagen, drummer Jim Hodder and vocalist David Palmer. Baxter appeared with Steely Dan on their first three albums, 'Can't Buy a Thrill' in 1972, 'Countdown To Ecstasy' in 1973, and 'Pretzel Logic' in 1974, and contributed the classic guitar solo on their highest charting hit 'Rikki Don’t Lose That Number'. While finishing work on 'Pretzel Logic', he became aware of Becker and Fagen's intentions to retire Steely Dan from touring, and to work almost exclusively with session players, and so with that in mind he left the band in 1974 to join The Doobie Brothers. As a session man, he had contributed pedal steel guitar on the band's fourth album 'What Were Once Vices Are Now Habits', so he fitted in straight away, and is much in evidence on 1975's 'Stampede'. While preparing to tour in support of 'Stampede', Tom Johnston was hospitalized with a stomach ailment, and so to fill in for him on vocals, Baxter suggested bringing in singer-keyboardist Michael McDonald, with whom Baxter had worked in Steely Dan. With Johnston still convalescing, McDonald was invited to join the band full-time, and his songwriting contributions, as well as Baxter's jazzier guitar style, marked a new direction for the band, but after three more albums Baxter left the band. He continued to work as a session guitarist for a diverse group of artists, including Willy DeVille, Bryan Adams, Hoyt Axton, Eric Clapton, Gene Clark, Sheryl Crow, Freddie Hubbard, Ricky Nelson, Dolly Parton, Ringo Starr, Gene Simmons, Rod Stewart, Burton Cummings, Barbra Streisand, and Donna Summer. 
He continues to do studio work, most recently on tribute albums to Pink Floyd and Aerosmith, and occasionally plays in The Coalition Of The Willing, a band comprising Andras Simonyi, Hungarian Ambassador to the United States; Alexander Vershbow, US Ambassador to South Korea; Daniel Poneman, formerly of the United States National Security Council and later the Obama Administration's Deputy Secretary of Energy; and Lincoln Bloomfield, former United States Assistant Secretary of State for Political-Military Affairs. This is linked to a second profession that he fell into almost by accident when, in the mid-80s, his interest in music recording technology led him to wonder about hardware and software originally developed for military use, specifically data compression algorithms and large-capacity storage devices, and after extensive research he wrote a paper on missile defence systems, which he gave to California Republican Congressman Dana Rohrabacher, and his career as a defense consultant began. However, we're more interested in the music here, so this double disc set collects some of those pre-Dan sessions from Carly Simon, Cashman & West, Buzzy Linhart, and Paul Pena, and a few post-Dan recordings from Bob Neuwirth, Wayne Berry, and Tom Rush. The second disc all takes place while he was a member of The Doobie Brothers, and features Cher, Richie Havens, Little Feat, Joni Mitchell, Joan Baez, and John Sebastian. Outside of the timeframe of these two discs he also played on records by Leo Sayer, Judy Collins, Cerrone, Roger Miller, and Nazareth, but the decade from 1970 to 1978 contains arguably his best work, so that's what we have here. 

Track listing

Disc One
01 Once In The Morning (from 'P. J. Colt' by P. J. Colt 1970)
02 The Best Thing (from 'Carly Simon' by Carly Simon 1971)
03 We Let Love Slip Away (from 'A Song Or Two' by Cashman & West 1972)
04 One For The Lonely (from 'Paul Pena' by Paul Pena 1972)
05 Danny's Song (from 'Reunion' by John Henry Kurtz 1972)
06 Tell Me True (from 'Buzzy' by Buzzy Linhart 1972)
07 Come Home Woman (from 'Out Of The Nest' by Swallow 1972)
08 Ole Slew-Foot (from 'Rootin'' by Navasota 1972)
09 Thanks For Nothing (from 'Thomas Jefferson Kaye' by Thomas Jefferson Kaye 1973)
10 We Had It All (from 'Bob Neuwirth' by Bob Neuwirth 1974)
11 Claim On Me (from 'Ladies Love Outlaws' by Tom Rush 1974)
12 All I Needed (from 'Home At Last' by Wayne Berry 1974)

Disc Two
01 Down The Backstairs Of My Life (from 'Eric Mercury' by Eric Mercury 1975)
02 These Days (from 'Stars' by Cher 1975)
03 Hot (from 'Moving Targets' by Flo & Eddie 1976)
04 Dreaming As One (from 'The End Of The Beginning' by Richie Havens 1976)
05 In France They Kiss On Main Street (from 'The Hissing Of Summer Lawns' by 

                                                                                                                      Joni Mitchell 1975)

06 A Song A Day In Nashville (from 'Welcome Back' by John Sebastian 1976)
07 Highly Prized Possession (from 'Word Called Love' by Brian & Brenda Russell 1976)
08 Missin' You (from 'Time Loves A Hero' by Little Feat 1977)
09 A Heartfelt Line Or Two (from 'Blowin' Away' by Joan Baez 1977)
10 Guns Guns Guns (from 'Dream Of A Child' by Burton Cummings 1978)
11 Cry Baby Cry (from 'Flying Dreams' by Commander Cody 1978)
12 He Lives On (Story About The Last Journey Of A Warrior) (from 'Modern Man' by 

                                                                                                                  Stanley Clarke 1978)