THE DIFFERENT STAGES MUSIC PROJECT

THE REVIEW CORNER: The Allman Brothers Band's first four studio recordings

2012-02-11T01:20:00.000-08:00

Many of you born after 1970 probably never had this band on your radar, but The Allman Brothers Band is totally worth your time and money to check out -- and their first four studio albums in particular. I'm going outside of Live at the Fillmore East 1971, their classic live album....that, of course, goes without saying.

The cover of The Allman Brothers Band's self-titled debut recording from 1969

Their first four recordings go as follows: The Allman Brothers Band (1969), Idlewild South (1970), Eat a Peach (1972), and Brothers and Sisters (1973). The growth of the band over the span of these recordings is a fascinating study....with the hard blues of the first album to the explorations, instrumentals, and extended jams of each later recording.

While their eponymous debut doesn't carry a long string of hits except for "Whippin Post," there's lots of wonderful bluesy numbers on this album that are substantive, resonating, and feature some fantastic guitar from Duane Allman. Highlights include "Black Hearted Woman," "Trouble No More," and my personal favorite on the album, "Dreams," with some of Duane Allman's more experimental picking -- almost like an early effort at tapping or hammer-ons. "Whippin Post," the album's last number, is the perfect closer and hints at the band finding its true voice....a mere sign of things to come.

With the next three albums, things just keep progressing....the band solidifies its sound through each successive recording. I find the music from this band to have a very soulful and almost wistful edge to their blues explorations....tunes from Idlewild South like "Midnight Rider," the instrumental "In Memory of Elizabeth Reed," and the funk-tinged "Leave My Blues at Home" -- with some killer drumming grooves.

Eat a Peach kicks off with "Ain't Wastin Time No More," and features highlights such as "Les Brers in A Minor" (with an almost Santana-infused approach), "Melissa" and my personal favorite "Blue Sky" while Brothers and Sisters highlights "Wasted Words," "Rambin Man," "Southbound," and the popular instrumental "Jessica."

You can't go wrong with any of these recordings.....but I believe to get a full perspective of them all, and to give yourself the best possible listening experience, you need to listen to them in succession. That's where the development of the band reveals itself.

What's even more amazing -- and not necessarily evident in the recordings (unless you're a student of Duane Allman & Dickey Betts' styles and can differentiate them) -- is that the band suffered not one, but two casualties during the span of these recordings. Duane Allman, their lead guitarist, was killed in a motorcycle accident during the recording sessions to Eat a Peach, and their bass player Berry Oakley during the sessions to Brothers and Sisters -- also killed from head injuries sustained from a motorcycle accident a mere three blocks from the location of Allman's fatal accident. Spooky stuff.

Still, the music speaks for itself. Yes, I'm sure this is technically considered "Southern Rock," however that definition might be stretched....but when I listen to these boys, I just hear some killer blues by one of the all-time great jam bands. I hear more shades of The Paul Butterfield Blues Band, The Grateful Dead, The Band, and Santana before I hear anything "southern."

The CD version to their first four studio albums are available at Amazon for around five bucks apiece, with the exception of Eat a Peach, which is a double album featuring selected live cuts from the Fillmore East recording....you should be able to get outfitted with all four works for under $30.

My Theory on the Cover of 'Who's Next'

2011-09-09T11:08:00.000-07:00

If you interpret this as the band pissing on the progress of society, then let's beg the question again....who really is next?

As one of the greatest "monoliths" in rock history (pun intended), Who's Next hits home on several levels.

It's arguably the best work the band ever did....but the argument ends very quickly for most. It's a collection of some of the greatest songs by The Who, and the band is playing in top form....which shouldn't be any surprise, if one spends an evening with the band's live predecessor, Live at Leeds (DEFINITELY get your hands the remastered & expanded edition, with the live material from Tommy).

1969-73 is a period where the band is rehearsed, on their A-game as players, and at their creative peak -- and Who's Next is the sweet spot in the middle of a succession of classic albums that changed rock music -- Tommy (1969), Live at Leeds (1970), Who's Next (1971), and Quadrophenia (1973).

The album also boasts innovations with the use of synthesizers....and what's so mind-blowing about this is the fact that it was the first use of their kind on a rock album, and they don't sound dated or kitschy. Townsend's use of them in a more textural sense is part of what makes the whole experiment successful. It was a very ballsy move for its time, especially for a band as rocking as The Who. If you want to read up on this a bit more, read this insightful and passionate article over at Ben Pringle's blog for added perspectives.

Then there's the bass acrobatics of John Entwistle (a.k.a. "The Ox" or "Thunderfingers"), who I highly respect and regard as the best on the planet at his instrument. Here's a post on him from a few years ago....we'll revisit The Ox again in the future, and more on the electric bass, as there are some new developments in my life with that instrument.

But why are we here? Let's talk about this most intriguing album cover.

Here's what Wikipedia has to say regarding some background of the cover.

Cover artwork shows a photograph, taken at Easington Colliery, of the band apparently having just urinated on a large concrete piling protruding from a slag heap. According to photographer Ethan Russell, most of the members were unable to urinate, so rainwater was tipped from an empty film canister to achieve the desired effect. The photograph is often seen to be a reference to the monolith discovered on the moon in the film 2001: A Space Odyssey, which had been released only about three years earlier.^[8] In 2003, the United States cable television channel VH1 named Who's Next's cover one of the greatest album covers of all time.

That's all fine and factual, but let me give you my take....because I know Pete Townsend's approach to music, as an artist in the truest sense, to understand that there's symbolism and deeper meaning behind all his ideas and in everything he does. For God's sake, the man has written nearly a half dozen concept albums in his lifetime....so you're going to tell me the album cover of Who's Next was just some random occurrence?

I see the wasteland of the slab heap, and the monolith, representing the ugliness of modern society and progress in all its forms -- the stupidity and narrow thinking of humanity, desecration of the planet to mine for ores, results from the ravages of human consumption, war, a lack of regard (or advancements, being that it was 1971) for sustainability practices, and all that goes with it -- or perhaps it's just the twisted logic, upper stupidity, and lack of imagination involved with an engineer's decision to construct a useless monolith in a goddam coal dump.

I believe the band is urinating on that monolith as a protest to the ugliness of progress as I've just described it, as that is their right....as it should be within all of our rights to protest what we perceive as the evils (deemed necessary or not) of humanity and society.

Of course, the album title Who's Next carries multiple meanings and reveals the band's humor, to include what I see as:

It's announcing that it's the band's next album. Duh.
Who's next to urinate on this ugly thing?
Who's next to stand up, make yourself heard, be counted, and fight these injustices? (per my rambling theory)

Heck, for that matter, why stop with pissing? They should have vomited and defecated on the fucking thing too. If you follow my sentiments, then hopefully you appreciate that as well. Now THAT would be rock 'n' roll.

Wanna know how I really feel?

Even if a societal commentary wasn't Townsend or the band's primary intention, I will go as far as saying that it at least served as an undercurrent or primal projection out of the reptilian part of Townsend's brain.

I welcome any additional thoughts or insights into my theory on the Who's Next album cover.

Song "Caravan" Out June 1, Name of New Rush Album Revealed

2010-05-28T00:56:00.000-07:00

Heads up!: Spoiler alert involving title of Rush album slated for release in 2011!

With two new tunes available for download next Tuesday and their Time Machine Tour starting in June, more information from the Rush camp keeps getting revealed.

The band has been recording a handful of songs through the spring, with the intention of releasing a couple of them as MP3 downloads and limited edition CD singles, then taking the material out on the tour to road test it.

The new songs "Caravan" and "BU2B" will be available on June 1, next Tuesday, for download through Amazon and other sources.

The plan following this short 2010 summer tour is to go back into the studio and record the remaining songs (and perhaps even re-recording the two songs if they evolve on the tour) for completing a forthcoming album in 2011.

So that being said, the last thing folks in the Rush camp were expecting was a leak of the album name...but that's what's so beautiful about surprises...they're so, well, unexpected...right?

It turns out that the new album will be called Clockwork Angels. This is the source, which appears to be legit...so that's the latest and greatest.

FYI: the image you see here is the CD single for "Caravan"...which appears to have song lyrics as part of the background.

'Rush: Beyond the Lighted Stage' premiers in less than two weeks

2010-04-15T00:06:00.000-07:00

The much anticipated documentary movie on the Canadian rock band Rush will premier at the Tribeca Film Festival in New York City.

Cool movie poster!

I can't help but noticing on the poster the mention that the film's slated for a release in theaters in the summer...it should be interesting to see what the response to it is and how widespread the release ends up being.

Now that I think about it, there's a remote possibility that I may have a cameo in it...being that when I was at RushCon7 three years ago, Sam Dunn was there filming the event.

At any rate, the Rush machine is revving up again...this new documentary, new material being recorded, and the Time Machine Tour this coming summer.

Jacob Moon steals Rush's "Subdivisions" and makes it all his own

2010-04-06T17:09:00.000-07:00

I'm not typically a fan of the cover tune. At first glance, it's always seemed like a cheap cop-out or a shortcut to getting your foot in the door as a musician...like you're not being authentic or something...I don't know, I'm sure I'm being way to critical of the idea.

There are exceptions to the rule, however...and from a cursory all-encompassing arc in my head (with eyes squinted shut), I can think of three sets of circumstances.

The first circumstance would be when an artist is really able to outshine the original version if it because it was subpar...or, dare we say, it completely sucked. Examples (arguable, as many might disagree) might include Van Halen covering "You Really Got Me" by the Kinks. All respect for Ray Davies & Co., but VH simply blows their version into the 4th Dimension.
The second circumstance would involve the cover of a song, from an original version that's simply unknown...to the effect that the cover becomes the famous version. The perfect example here is Jimi Hendrix covering Bob Dylan's "All Along the Watchtower." Even for some of you reading this for the first time, that may be news to you...if you're wondering: "You mean Dylan originally sang that? Really?" I've even known Hendrix fans to be unaware of that little factoid...so sorry everyone, Jimi didn't write that. He just did a killer version of it.
Then there's the third instance, which to me is the most special...it's where the original version is a classic ingrained in the pantheon of music...YET an artist, perhaps many years later, is able to come along and morph it into something new and engaging. This post is about that instance.

Canadian artist Jacob Moon, out of Hamilton, Ontario, accomplished that in 2008 when he shot this video covering "Subdivisions" by Rush -- a very, very difficult act to follow -- and he pulled it off all by himself.

Moon reinvigorates the song in a way that I could have never imagined. Through his tinkering with it and use of acoustic guitars, he makes "Subdivisions" even more engaging, tender, and emotional. For those who understand the significance of the lyrics, it's as if he's "us" -- an audience of Rush fans going back decades with the band -- and representing a real perspective and emotional interpretation of it. It's like he was the guy you knew in the neighborhood who went through all those things with you.

Not to mention this video of him, a performance taking place on the rooftop of a house in a subdivision...that's a suburb of Toronto...in Canada. It adds even more to the effect and aesthetic of the song. Whoever thought of that is an absolute genius.

So watch Jacob Moon pull off what I never thought I'd witness in my lifetime: someone taking a classic from the Rush cannon and reworking it into something all their own. This is great, great stuff. Thank you Jacob Moon!

News, Weather, and Sports: Neil Peart & the Canadian Hockey Theme

2010-02-08T14:28:00.000-08:00

For those of you who aren't aware, Neil Peart (drummer of Rush) is now the face of the new Canadian Hockey Theme. You can probably catch him at the beginning of hockey broadcasts on channels like ESPN or others.

Actually, I'm only guessing that...I really don't know when it's on, as I personally haven't seen it on a live broadcast yet. You can get a flavor for it at the end of this post.

Meanwhile, Neil has written about his connection to hockey and how he got involved with this latest project, which can be read at his website.

Here's the you tube video of Neil drumming in the hockey theme song.

Dive into Britain's underground with the 'Mixtaped' DVD by No-Man

2010-02-05T19:48:00.000-08:00

The following is a preview to No-Man, the Steven Wilson /Steven Bowness collaboration. Last fall they released Mixtaped, their first live video DVD, available on Amazon as a 2-disc set (includes an 84 minute documentary about the band). If you want some insight into the progressive pop underground of Britain over the last 20 years, this band is an excellent example and Mixtaped is the prime place to start with No-Man.

No-Man - Mixtaped 2DVD trailer from Kscope on Vimeo.

Two weeks left to vote in the "Insanity Poll!"

2010-02-02T16:59:00.000-08:00

We've got several votes so far...but with less than two weeks left, we need several more! If you haven't voted already, please do so in the margin to the right and let us know what you think.

The ultimate edition of Cash at Folsom Prison appears!

2009-12-25T20:18:00.000-08:00

Something very, very special appeared under the tree in the last 24 hours...the Legacy Edition of Johnny Cash At Folsom Prison. It had been on my Amazon list since it came out in October 2008.

This is the ultimate edition of Folsom Prison...it has the complete unadulterated, unedited versions of both shows that he did there when he visited the prison in January 1968 -- so you can hear how it played out that day, as if you're a fly on the wall watching the whole thing.

It also contains a bonus DVD with a fascinating 90-minute documentary on everything surrounding the Folsom Prison concerts and what happened in the aftermath of it.

I'm not usually a fan of these sorts of reissued expanded editions of old recordings, but this appears to be an exception to the rule since it appears to be a comprehensive document of his Folsom Prison shows, and the experience is further amplified with the DVD documentary.

I want to perform due diligence and give the discs a thorough listen, and study the documentary before I go into too much detail...so look for a review on this in the near future.

FROM THE VAULT -- A Li'l Screamin' Ted Nugent for You Adrenaline Junkies

2009-12-25T19:58:00.000-08:00

You gotta dig Ted Nugent live in 1977.

Oh the sweaty long hair. Oh those red spandex pants. Oh the blood-curling screams at the end of every other line. Oh the "look at me, I'm a crazy rock star who's lost his mind" faces. Jumping off speakers and landing on your ass, but never missing a beat...and while Nugent claims he was never "on" anything, he still leaves some of us wondering.

Most of it, if not all of it, is more or less acting the rock 'n' roll part and a silly, campy fo' show...but it's also still jammin' rock 'n' roll for its time.

See a clip of Nugent here...it wouldn't let me embed it but at this link you can check out the Live rendition of Motor City Madhouse from 1977. DON'T MISS HIS DISPLAY OF INSANITY AND BLOOD-CURLING SCREAM AT THE 6 MINUTE MARK!

The Secret to the Greatness of Sonny Rollins

2009-12-22T10:34:00.000-08:00

Typically my interest in jazz has been driven and inspired by piano players.

Andrew Hill, McCoy Tyner, Cecil Taylor, and Herbie Hancock are some of the classic fellas I really like...more contemporary artists would include Matthew Shipp and Jason Moran; pianists who are really pushing the envelope and jazz into new directions these days.

My interest has also involved trumpet players...Miles Davis, Louis Armstrong, Dizzy Gillespie, and Lee Morgan, to name a few...plus my all-time personal favorite, Clifford Brown.

However, I've never really embraced the saxophone players...and I've never really figured out why.

I think it might be partly John Coltrane's fault...and I say that with unequivocal acknowledgement and respect at how Coltrane influenced jazz and how he's one of the all-time jazz giants.

While I love Coltran's earlier work such as Blue Train and his work in the 1950s Miles Davis Quintet, his latter material takes some getting used to...sorta like getting used to the idea of liking it when the baby wails ceaselessly. I understand with Coltrane it's a spirituality thing that's going on...and while I can appreciate that, I find it really difficult to make it work for me.

Unfortunately, my hit and miss explorations of Coltrane's work made me run from saxophone players for awhile there...and especially the sax players out of the 60s, where I'd have the preconceived notion if they were even distantly associated with the avante gard style that was typical at the time, I'd be getting something you'd hear from the sax that was akin to the styles of Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, or Albert Ayler...again, I love these guys, but only if I'm in the right mood. Wayne Shorter even skirts the precipice, even though he's more accessible.

The problem for me is that once you start going outside of this group, there doesn't seem to be much in the way of a launching pad when it comes to saxophone players. That's not to say non-avante gard sax players aren't out there, I know they are...but they just seem fewer and farther between and less accessible than, say, piano players or trumpeters. It seems like you have to go back to the big band material of Lester Young, however you start getting into sound quality issues there.

However, there's one fella in my mind who stands apart from the rest...who has the most interesting and accessible sound of any saxphone player out there and has endured for nearly 60 years -- all the way from the early 1950s to this very day.

Enter Sonny Rollins.

Sonny is the sax player who romanticized the instrument. He's the player who created the iconic image of the lone sax player practicing under the bridge because he, well, at one time DID practice under a bridge in NYC after being banned from the local circuit (can't recall why - see the Ken Burns documentary on jazz for those details).

Sonny can do it all...he can play soft cool sounds to relax to, or he can jam...but he never wails like a baby, thank God...or he can even be silly, as he is with his deliberate repeated stops at the beginning of Freedom Suite...and I've never heard a recording where he does something like that.

Most of all, Sonny Rollins has an AMAZING sense of melody, and I believe that's where his greatness lies.

If you want to explore Sonny Rollins, start with Saxophone Colossus, and then move onto Newk's Time or Tenor Madness...but, many of you might already have him on record and you don't realize it. If you own Tattoo You by the Rolling Stones, you can hear him solo on the sentimental classic "Waiting on a Friend," the last track on the recording.

If you find a liking to him, the bulk of Sonny's extensive cannon can be found through his Prestige, Blue Note, and Riverside/Contemporary box set collections -- two of three of which are very reasonably priced, and all worth getting for this iconic saxphone player. I'd then work through his Milestone recordings, and work your way from there chronologically up to the present day.

Shucky darns...foiled again! No Vince Neil for us.

2009-12-05T18:29:00.000-08:00

Well, my 80s metal-loving buddy dragged me to another one...to the same casino up I-90...this time in freezing rain rather than a torrential downpour.

This time, however, the mission was to see Mr. Vince Neil, the frontman for Motley Crue, touring with his own band.

Uhhh...uhhh...mission failed, sir.

Problem was, the show began at 8:00PM, and an assumption was made that there would be an opening band, and that he wouldn't go onstage for an hour or so -- as basically 9 times out of 10 such a thing typically happens with a rock 'n' roll concert.

We arrived at about 9:15, just as the show was getting out. I thought this shot of Neil is fitting, as he seems to be waving at us from afar with an annoyed expression like, "You missed the friggin' show, you idiots."

Yep, that's us.

Needless to say, my buddy was disappointed...and then insult was further added to injury in a comedy of several ways.

First off, all we could do was just stand there as the show was JUST getting out -- literally inches away from the counter where we would have purchased our tickets -- which also happens to be at the bottlenecked route to and from the entrance to the ballroom where the gig took place. So, as we stood in that choice location, we got to hear from all the attendees shuffling past on how great the show was. Apparently he not only played all the Motley Crue stuff, but did a few covers -- including "Heaven and Hell" by Black Sabbath!

If that wasn't bad enough, several folks shuffling by us took notice of my buddy's Ratt tour shirt showcasing the band's name with "Ratt and Roll" underneath, which he had worn on top of a thermal layer. So, needless to say, the typical pro-80s metal fanatical comments were dropped here and there when they saw the shirt...comments such as......

"Wow, cool dude! Ratt rules!"

"Rock on, man!" (hand showing Dio "devil fingers" sign -- \m/)

\m/ "Hey look, it's Ratt...didn't they play last month?!?!" Editor's note: Yes, they most certainly did...and you can read aaaaaaaaaallllllllllllll about it here.

\m/ "Wooooooooooooooooooooooooo!!!" (from very inebriated and flirty rocker chick showing off cleavage and tiny metal skull necklass)

\m/ "Cool dude." (cigarette smoke exhaling in face)

\m/ "Hey man, I thought you were the drummer."

Yep, not kidding...my buddy's long blonde locks -- coupled with his getup -- somehow had a few of the metalheads convinced he was the drummer in the Vince Neil concert (the drummer which, ironically, we were unable to lay our eyes on ourselves to verify the apparent likeness since we missed the goddamn show in the first place). So my buddy had these random rockers coming up to him to give him high fives and so forth...someone may have even tried to have their picture taken with him.

So, despite the dissapointment of missing the show, there was a humorous ending to the whole thing, and we laughed it off...AND as we were driving back toward civilization, I mused on how this was going to be an interesting blog post and in the process realized a new category for live performance had been created -- "live performance (barely missed)."

The category appears due to the fact that as I thought about it this show, believe it or not, wasn't the first one that I had barely missed -- I also ran into a similar, and in some ways more humorous situation with a Dio-led Black Sabbath tour from the early 90s (a story for another day).

So how do we end the night? By nothing other than making our way to a theater in town to catch 2012, the latest CG uber disaster film...laughing through the specter of the world ending two years from now, of course.

I guess anything pales in comparison to barely missing a $15 Vince Neil performance.

The BEST and WORST Holiday Albums EVER

2009-11-30T17:50:00.000-08:00

There are a ton of holiday albums out there, with more and more coming out every year...everything from the cool and kid-friendly Burl Ives singing "Frosty the Snow Man" to something obscure and horrific, I'm sure.

That being said, I don't seek out many "new" holiday albums, as I tend to cling to childhood memories or old familiar ways.

But I do have a definite favorite that I throw on...and also one that I loathe beyond words.

So then, let's start with the good stuff first.

The award for "The BEST holiday album of all-time" goes to Merry Axemas: A Guitar Christmas, put out in the 1997 by various rock artists.

This album has some great quality tunes on it, and provides a potpourri of variety; from rocking renditions to acoustic layered compositions. It features some classic guitarists from Jeff Beck and Eric Johnson to Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Joe Satriani, and Steve Vai.

It also showcases my favorite Canadian son, Alex Lifeson, in a somber and moving acoustic version of "The Little Drummer Boy" that builds in layers to a beautiful spectrum of acoustic guitars. I remember thinking at the time that the song was as interesting of a choice as the way it was played with delicate sensitivity, and couldn't help but notice how it was chosen and arranged on the heels of Neil Peart losing his daughter Selena in a car accident the summer before. All said, the song showcases Lifeson's acoustic guitar work as good -- if not better -- than any Rush project.

Now, let's let the freak show begin...the award for "The Most Annoying Holiday Music EVER" goes to Manheim Steamroller's Christmas Celebration, which came out in the early 1980s (ya think?) and has since been reissued.

This thing is so ridiculously dated it's embarrassing to write about, let alone throw on in the CD changer. It's a bloodbath of synthesizer cheese, to say the least.

I believe the 80s revival of elevator music can be traced back to the release of this album, because all the elevator music lovers went running in screams of horror back to their favorite section after hearing this abonimation of Christmas music.

In particular, "Deck the Halls," the one that was popular on the radio (and still can be heard, unfortunately) is especially annoying. I believe the last time I heard it, cheese bled from my ears...literally.

To add to the annoyance, I have a family member who loves the stuff. Relishes in it. Friggin' bathes in it...so I just tolerate it and enjoy the "fest o' cheddar."

Happy holiday shopping, everyone!

The Unknown Legend in Rock Today -- Part 1

2009-11-25T07:45:00.000-08:00

As a kid who grew up listening to hard rock, and more or less always rejected music with pop sensibilities, I've spent the better part of the last decade trying to expand my palate with different genres of music.

The effort mostly stemmed from curiosity, but it was also partly driven by my picky tendencies with rock and a degree of boredom with the genre. I knew as I began this "quest of expansion" that I had lots of work ahead of me as I sifted through tons of material -- some rented from the library, and some purchased -- in search of lost or forgotten gems in the form of songs, albums, and artists.

I've expanded very deeply into jazz to establish certain tastes and preferences in that genre...I've also investigated some country, some bluegrass, some classical, some opera, world music, and noodled a bit into the blues. For the most part, I've been willing to dive into almost anything; and in the process I've uncovered a TON of gems ranging from lost Johnny Cash songs to seeing Allison Krauss & Union Station perform in person twice, to a love for Andrew Hill's spellbinding jazz piano work and Clifford Brown's mastery of the trumpet. In the process I also circled around and bit deeply into the catalogs of Radiohead and Neil Young.

However, through it all, perhaps one the biggest gem I've uncovered has been out of the rock genre -- and specifically more of the progressive type -- interestingly enough, where I start and was trying to get away from in the first place. Odd, yet somewhat predictable.

In 2007, as I was anticipating the upcoming release of Snakes & Arrows, I read somewhere in one of the pre-release interviews that Neil Peart was endorsing a band called Porcupine Tree and their new CD Fear of a Blank Planet (a band on the same label as Rush, Atlantic, so I don't know if the record company had anything to do with that -- I'm sure if he didn't like them he wouldn't have said anything). Porcupine Tree was a complete mystery to me at the time, but I decided to take a chance and pick it up...something I don't do very often. I usually like to have a flavor for what the goods are before I dive in...but Neil recommended it, and Alex Lifeson was making a cameo with a guitar solo on it, so there had to be something decent happening with Porcupine Tree.

Needless to say, it was a decision I would not regret.

The album didn't take right away, even though I liked it. I may have been distracted with other things at the time, but through an initial listen I liked what I heard. I could also tell that this was something new and different, so I wanted to sit down and give it a diligent listen when I was in the right frame of mind.

When I did give Fear of a Blank Planet it's deserved time, I was totally blown away with the musicianship and songwriting. In terms of sound and studio wizardry, it's unlike anything I've ever heard before...the sonic textures of Pink Floyd being the closest thing that comes to mind (surprisingly, something few bands have tried to recapture since the Floyd) with some of Radiohead's modern day studio tricks to boot. Those passages are interspersed with the hard rocking and jamming tightness of Rush...and I catch other influences in there too such as Kraftwerk, and maybe a little Beatles...and maybe a little U2.

At some point, typical of my curiosity, I decided to find out who was behind all this...and who I ended up uncovering is a total anomaly in music: Steven Wilson. He's an ultra-talented one-man show who can do everything -- AND does everything very, very well.

Outside of being a songwriter and lyricist, he owns his own home studio in north London, called "No Man's Land," and manages an online distribution of his rarer material through Headphone Dust.

He has all the latest equipment in his studio to noodle with and produce albums. He's a modern-day Renaissance man, serving in no particular order as the writer, arranger, acoustic and electric guitarist, performing multi-instrumentalist, singer, technician, equipment manager, recording engineer, audio mixer, and producer all rolled into one. In addition to being involved in some of the distribution, he works through another independent UK distributor Burning Shed, begun by a longtime collaborator of Wilson's Tim Bowness (more on that partnership in this series -- it's very significant).

It wouldn't surprise me if Wilson was revealed to be the airline pilot who flew the latest copies of his releases over the Atlantic. Seriously...I'd probably shrug my shoulders and say, "Sure, why not? No surprise there."

This talent as a one-man entity also has, in some ways, contributed in part to why he's not very well known. After all, the only reason I found about Steven Wilson was through something Neil Peart said one time in a random interview a couple years back...otherwise I'd have no idea. As a small act, it's difficult to get exposure. Sure, there's the internet, but with so many artists competing for the listener's ear, how does one tap into it deeply enough to be successful and maintain artistic autonomy, let alone simply survive and make a living?

While word of mouth is a slow process and bears a slow trickle of fruit -- there's another way -- which is right out of the rock 'n' roll textbook: touring.

Touring is essential, IMO, to being seen and taken seriously as a real act...and that being said, that can be a full-time job for a man or woman involved with ONE band...but what if you're touring in more than one band?

Now here's the brainmelter about this guy. Wilson has SIX different bands he's in. SIX...and he's the leader and initiator (or co-initiator in the case of 2) for of all of them. SIX bands, and they all make albums and put out material. Out of those six, five of them are touring acts as real living, breathing entities. I don't know if my brain can fully absorb that, let alone understand how it's logistically possible -- but all of it is dead-on and completely true. To add, Wilson has even revealed that he loses money when he tours. That's how dedicated this guy is to his art.

All the bands are completely different and have their own unique motif. Wilson's first, No-Man, began in 1987 and has lasted as a collaboration with singer/songwriter Tim Bowness to this day...and they just released their very first DVD Mixedtape, which serves as the perfect introduction to the band. After No-Man began, Wilson started to take on other projects that began as essentially studio experiments...one of which, oddly enough, formed into his most successful band Porcupine Tree. We'll get to them later.

One experiment he formed out of the krautrock/avant garde jazz genre, I.E.M. (short for the Incredible Expanding Mindfuck), put out music in the mid-late 90s, much of which is difficult to find copies of these days.

Another experiment of more of the ambient/electronica genre is Bass Communion, also formed in the mid-90s -- and he's performed live with this act, which is captured in a recent concert in Mexico City and has tracks available for download. Bass Communion has several albums, many of which take on a an ambient drone feel...one of the more acclaimed being Ghosts on Magnetic Tape, which may soon become a rare recording (I believe I just got my hands on one of the last 2CD issues through Headphone Dust).

Blackfield, Wilson's collaboration with Israeli musician Aviv Geffen, formed in the early part of the decade and they have since created two albums of original material, in addition to performing as a worldwide touring act. Check out their DVD Blackfield - NYC (Live in New York) (also just released as a CD/DVD set), which captures the energy and depth of this songwriting collaboration...Geffen's involvement puts a really interesting spin on the love song/melancholy thing. The textures, songwriting, melody, and live presentation of Blackfield is new, fresh, and exciting. I hope we see more material from this band soon!

There's also Wilson's blossoming solo career and Porcupine Tree, which need their own post. We'll talk about those bands in the next post on Steven Wilson's career -- and continue more in-depth discussions of Blackfield and No-Man -- in addition to his other experiments and collaborations.

No-Man live -- after 20 years as a band

2009-11-21T12:40:00.000-08:00

I've mentioned before in this blog that the best-kept secret in the rock format today is Steven Wilson out of Britain, and all the incarnations of his artistry in the form of various bands such as Blackfield, Bass Communion, IEM, and as a solo artist...all very different from one another.

Frankly, it's very puzzling how Wilson isn't better known; almost to the effect that the scenario drums up large label conspiracy theories. This argument could be validated by the way Wilson works out of his home studio dubbed "No Man's Land" and purposefully avoids the big labels by conducting as an independent songwriter, arranger, musician, recording engineer, and through many of the other album production roles typically segmented and spread out among various individuals under the guise of a large label.

It appears that about the only thing Wilson doesn't handle is distribution. He's as much of a one-man show in music as you'll ever find. If one considers the variety of talent Wilson brings to the table, there could even be an argument for Rock Hall accolades...but unfortunately he just isn't that well known.

Most who are familiar with Wilson's work know him as the brains behind Porcupine Tree...but few realize that he was in a band called No-Man back when PT was merely an idea. No-Man has evolved over the years as a progressive pop/electronica/rock act, and is a living breathing entity to this day.

The band just released their first live DVD Mixtaped, which can be ordered through the band's independent distributor Burning Shed. The DVD features a second disc with an interesting documentary on the band, and some videos you might recall from late night MTV or VH1 in the mid-90s.

Here's a cut from it. If after some time it gets pulled off the web or something, check out the personal videos from the Savoy Theater by You Tube poster 'lahemi.' It appears this individual personally recorded the whole gig.

Of course Steven Wilson is the lead guitarist fella (wearing glasses) to the left. The singer Tim Bowness, who comes across as a breathy cross between Brian Ferry and Rick Astley, might take a little getting used to -- but he grows on you...as long as you don't get Rickroll'd (or even better, Barackroll'd!!!)

The Greatness of the Gin Blossoms Goes Beyond the Music

2009-11-13T22:59:00.000-08:00

What you see here is the set list from tonight's live performance, courtesy of the Gin Blossoms. I grabbed it at the end of the gig, much to the amazement of 20 onlookers with the "I didn't know you could do that!" look on their face.

Grabbing the set list is the ultimate souvenir in many ways. It's hand-crafted by the band for just that show (printed from a computer, but you know what I mean), and typically reveals quirks or things they were considering playing that they didn't, such as the "Cajun Song" that you see on the list...and if you're lucky, and it was on the ground, you might get the guitarist's shoe print on it...or someone's spit. Or worse.

I'm always amazed how many other attendees don't think to ask, as tonight I was the only one inquiring to a roadie about it. He nodded, knelt down in front of where guitarist Jesse Valenzuela had been playing on stage right, removed the tape, and handed it over. No problem. I think that's the fourth set list I've been part of grabbing...there was Live in 1994, Matthew Sweet in 1996, Ratt a couple weeks ago, and now the Gin Blossoms.

Now let's talk about the band.

They might be touring the casino circuit these days, and they might be leaning heavily on material from their signature album, 1992's New Miserable Experience, for their live set...but this band from Tempe, Arizona -- now going on 20 years strong -- are survivors.

The sound of the Gin Blossoms is timeless in some ways, but also heavily rooted in the Tempe bar scene of the late 1980s & early 90s around the Arizona State campus. I should know, as I was attending ASU during those exact years that the Blossoms flourished from bars like Long Wong's, which has sadly since been demolished as Mill Avenue literally erased any sign of its history block after block (when Tempe whored out what remained of its soul to development interests in the late 90s -- Long Wong's...Bandersnatch...Cannery Row...the list goes on -- but that's a long story for another day). They'd also play local frat houses until they turned into a worldwide touring act. I had the pleasure of seeing them perform at several parties back in the day.

Seeing them live tonight conjured up many of the influences from back in the day that one might overlook, but are rather obvious if you know their music. The Stones and R.E.M. seemed to be the most obvious...the interplay between the two guitarists, Jesse Valenzuela and Scotty Johnson, echoed elements of the duo of Keith Richards and Ronnie Wood. Lead singer Robin Wilson seemed to have a mic & stage style in the likeness of Michael Stype. He handed his tambourine to someone in the audience to play along, and sang into someone's cell phone on a couple of occasions. It was amazing how much he sounded like Elton John when they played "Rocket Man" in the encore.

The Blossoms are one of those bands born to play live. They shine and thrive in the live setting, and very much have a live sound even in their studio recordings.

In their early days, there were years of hiccups, false starts, and the difficulty of getting known beyond the Tempe scene. Between the long frustration of trying to get on with a major record label, losing their co-founder /guitarist /main songwriter Nicky Hopkins to alcohol and eventually a suicide in 1993 (as the melancholy lyrics and feel of Experience reveals much of his illness), and after surviving a breakup in the late 90s, these guys appear to be back and stronger than ever. A new album is due out in 2010.

The most impressive thing about this band, however, is their character and heroism...which comes from an incident that occurred in 1994. Every August, when students start the fall semester at ASU, a popular activity is to raft down the Salt River. Unfortunately there can be lots of accidents on the river, and to/from the river, caused by drinking or recklessness. That fall, a female student was severely injured in a motorcycle accident enroute to the river and didn't have medical insurance...so while she lay recovering in a local hospital, the band got together to put on a benefit concert at Long Wong's bar in Tempe. The result was thousands of dollars raised through donations to help pay for the girl's medical bills...and remember, this is 1994...interesting context to current times.

If that isn't the mark of greatness, I don't know what is. The music of the Gin Blossoms is timeless and a personal sentiment, as they are part of the soundtrack to some incredible and memorable college years...but I believe it's that single act of thoughtfulness and heroism that defines them.

FROM THE VAULT -- Neil Young & Pearl Jam Rockin' the Free World

2009-11-12T23:34:00.000-08:00

With Neil Young just celebrating his 64th birthday, here's a little ditty of him with Pearl Jam. I'd guess this took place in the mid-90s, around the time of Young's Mirror Ball collaboration with Vedder & Co.

Remember to put the music machine at the top of the page on pause...and as a prize for doing so, you get to witness some instrument destruction at the end of the video.

Falling Victim to a Ruse to See...Ratt? Yep!

2009-11-05T19:06:00.000-08:00

I got dragged to it, I swear!

Yep, I ate my 80s hair metal on Halloween night with Ratt...at the Snoqualmie Casino up I-90. A casino for Ratt, huh? How appropriate.

I really shouldn't complain, as I did get to see them for free...as my buddy needed someone to go with and covered the $30 ticket...but here I am.

Still complaining about it.

It actually ended up being three of us, as a third fella (a former co-worker of my buddy's) suddenly showed up and drove to it in a torrential downpour...I guess he was the backup plan in case I couldn't get talked into going, but I didn't put much thought into it until the day after when I was recalling the series of events.

Ratt is one of my buddy's favorite bands...but you must know something's out of place with the appeal of your band when you have to:

Use trickery and deception to get your friend to go to it with you.
Have a backup person to fall into the ruse if your first person fails to fall for it or bails on you.
Pay for both friends to attend the gig you designed the ruse around.

Anyway.

I'm not a bubble gum rocker, but the show was pretty good...at least they seemed like they'd rehearsed a bit and they weren't out of tune. It was of course Stephen Pearcy and the original guitarist, whose name doesn't come to mind. K.K. Downing? No, that's Judas Priest...Robbie Robertson? No, that's The Band (wow, I'm really out of it)...I guess I could look it up right now, here on the computer, but I'm too lazy to right now. Pathetic, huh?

So I'm trying to think who I listen to regularly who comes the closest to this band...hmm...Kiss maybe? And I'm not a super big fan of them either. Maybe Aerosmith? Not a big fan either.

I guess I don't really listen regularly to anything remotely close to Ratt. Oh well.

I tried to keep an open mind...yet here I am, apologetically putting up a post about the damn thing, as if I've been a bad doggie who pooped in the corner of the living room, and I'm expecting to get swatted at any moment.

They played all their "classics," if you want to call 80s bubble gum rock "classic." They went through their whole Out of the Cellar album from the early 80s with hits like "Round and Round" and "Come On Feel the Noise." Kidding! That's Quiet Riot...I was just seeing if you were paying attention.

There was lots of leather there, but unfortunately no screaming girls on the shoulders of their boyfriends showing off their shaking breasts to the band...no panties thrown onstage, either. Oh well...but Pearcy did seem to be bragging about how he's had his share of women over the years, and thought that he saw some out in the audience...or some with kids, whom he also seemed to take responsibility for.

Uh, can you say ick? ...and why would you brag about that when you're a burnout 80s rocker in your 50s, is that all you have to hold onto in the way of amusement? Your slutty rocker seed being sent spawning into random countless netherregions? God, I hope not.

That was pretty much the highlight of the evening...besides the man who won the women's sexiest Halloween costume contest, and the drunk girl at the beer line who seemed to be hitting on me...uh, no thanks rocker Betty. What else was a highlight...oh, the fact that I couldn't stop recalling the first time I heard a Ratt tune on the radio in 1984, and thought for the longest time it was a Judas Priest song. Goes to show you how much I know.

Trust me...I'll be sticking mainly to what I know on this blog...but just wanted to chime in with this random complaint about 80s hair metal live in 2009. I realize I'm probably coming across as a metal uppity.

Guilty as charged.

I will bathe, swim, and be drunk in my sea of 80s metal snobbery...because usually I find this 3 minute cheesefest 80s metal singles crap to be cheaper than the stank of Hello Kitty girl's perfume you find in the young women's section of Macy's. On most days I'd rather bloodlet my ears with leaches...don't believe me? Watch me do it.

Every now and then, however, I'll tolerate it...and consider even slightly indulging in it for one night...but only for a good friend, and only after a few beers...BUT then don't bug me with it until the NEXT TIME it's the 80s...as in the 2080s.

But, you ask, "Won't you be dead by then?"

God I hope so...my point exactly.

Alex on the Rick Mercer Report

2009-10-29T11:18:00.000-07:00

Oh, look out...it's Big Al up to the usual silly antics. This is actually one of his better TV moments, which he doesn't get alot of.

Al's the "founder" of Rush? Uh huh, sure, I knew that. He's also an ace at messing up his own song on Guitar Hero. Funny stuff.

FYI, The Orbit Room (a Toronto bar Alex co-owns), which I visited a couple years ago, is TINY...like really, really narrow...just worth mentioning, as that doesn't really translate on the video.

The Top 10 All-time List of Rock Concept Projects

2009-10-21T08:45:00.000-07:00

With Porcupine Tree's latest concept album offering The Incident, the idea came to mind about the strongest and most influential concept albums of all-time...and I like lists...and I don't list things that often, so if I do I:

Had better be interested in the subject matter (check), and
Had better know something about the subject matter (check too, although I can always learn more).

That being said, I'm hoping I have something to contribute here, and that it might start some discussion.

Here's the list, in countdown format.

#10. ~ Fear of a Blank Planet by Porcupine Tree (2007).

Totally effective in its subject matter, PT originator and songwriting mastermind Steven Wilson grabs the listener by the throat and doesn't let go.

The project tackles a societal issue that has risen into the forefront in recent years, but flies under the radar in many respects -- very serious matters effecting every household in America with children, and the Western World for that matter -- to what extent we medicate our children.

Wilson's take on the subject weave to and fro throughout a bleak urban landscape, creating the imagery of doped up child-zombies walking around with nothing to do, no hope, and no future. After having it on for awhile, if you really listen to the lyrics, the story will put you into the mind of a doped up child and you'll forget who you're listening to.

The whole project is amazing...from the thematically shocking in-your-face opening of the title track, to the beautiful melancholia of "My Ashes," to the winding journey of "Anithetize," every song holds up on its own, yet they all weave together perfectly. "Sentimental" is the strongest track on the album, and while the guitar work might echo something from David Gilmour on The Wall for many, it doesn't lack originality. The album's closer, "Sleep Together," gives the whole experience of Fear of a Blank Planet the necessary dramatic finish.

If you're a parent or guardian dealing with medicating your child during critical years of development (and we're talking about more than aspirin), this piece of art will probably conjure up more questions than answers...but sometimes answering those hard questions can lead to a better result. I believe that's part of what Wilson's up to here...a wake-up call.

In retrospect -- after listening to this project repeatedly over the last two years -- Wilson's story and themes on this album end up suggesting a symptom of a much larger and serious issue, which should immediately come to mind for those of us who have read books such as The Geography of Nowhere by James Howard Kunstler. However, Wilson and Porcupine Tree hint at that too, as the album's title suggests.

While they're not mainstream or very well known, this band and Wilson's focused artistic vision -- with the exception of probably Radiohead -- are pushing the rock format in new directions in the early part of this century while reprocessing and giving a refreshing twist to musical ideas originally spawned by the likes of Pink Floyd (soundscapes), Rush (tight jamming), Kraftwerk (innovative synth layers), and the 2nd wave of the 60s British invasion.

It's really too bad they're not more popular and commercially successful, as they're catalog is full of unique and amazing gems...and despite being limited in scope, they actually LOSE money when they tour...plus Wilson has hinted at wrapping things up soon to focus on other projects such as Blackfield and No-Man, and wants to get into more of the production end. It would be very, very sad and a tremendous loss to music to see these guys go away.

#9. ~ "Cygnus X-1" and "Cygnus X-1 Book II: Hemispheres" from A Farewell to Kings (1977) and Hemispheres (1978) by Rush.

Okay...I know this looks strange, try to follow the logic here. After their 1976 magnum opus 2112 (see #6 on this list), Rush decided to do what I don't believe any other band has managed to pull off: a concept piece that spans two successive albums.

Hence, the mention of two albums...it's more about the Cygnus suite than anything else, and if you were to listen to the two albums in succession on your MP3 (in a most exquisite Rush marathon of 20+ albums, like I do sometimes - not kidding), you'll notice they're linked since Kings ends with "Cygnus Part 1" and Hemispheres starts with "Part 2" (um, excuse me, that would be "BOOK II")

...and who in the hell refers to an 18 minute album side as a "book?" If nothing else, Rush gets on the list with this project for creativity and placing a totally interesting and original spin on how to tinker with the album format.

It's also worth mentioning that they would later do a "Fear Trilogy" over the span of three successive albums from 1981-84 -- in reverse order.

#8. ~ Quadrophenia by The Who.

Arguably the band's last great effort, then the creative juices suddenly seemed to stop flowing, as a listen to this album's follow-up Who By Numbers might reveal.

Another interesting take on British society, this project bleeds more gritty reality and less in the way of bubbly fiction, opposed to Tommy. It's commentary on what many Americans like myself interpret as a bizarre landscape of 1950s James Dean-ish street gang fighting is both obscure and fascinating all at once, which I believe adds to its appeal...probably due in part to a lack of understanding of Brit streetgang history in the 20th Century.

The Mods and Rockers are having it out on the English coastline! Say that again? Uh, I guess you had to be there.

Sonically, this album is also really strong in its mixing and studio wizardry...that sound of a crashing ocean at the beginning, with the solo trumpet and rainfall. The hints of tunes to come...then the band explodes into an all-out jam. Fucking awesome stuff.

In terms of playing, the band's in top form and Daltry's voice has never sounded edgier or better. Another high point about this album to note, in addition to the strong storyline; Entwistle's bass acrobatics are a total brainmelter. He's all over place in this recording. Easily his stongest Who album in terms of showcasing his talents on mastering the bass...which he did in his classic pose near Moon's drumkit with an expressionless face while his hands moved everywhere liked a blurred Bugs Bunny cartoon.

It's too bad we never had the chance to experience Townsend's Lifehouse project in its full entirety (rejected by the rest of the band, and what eventually became 1971's Who's Next); based on what that project manifested into, for all we know it very well could have been the best concept piece ever by The Who, putting Quadrophenia and Tommy to bed (hardy har har, pun intended). The indicators are there in the form of "Baba O'Rielly," "Bargain," "Behind Blue Eyes," and "Won't Get Fooled Again." I guess we'll never really know.

#7. ~ Operation: Mindcrime by Queensryche (1988).

The most ambitious concept effort of the 1980s by any rock band, during a time when it was anything but cool to put one out. At this time hair metal was the deal, with a never-ending assault of 3-4 minute cheeseball singles to go with it. The 70s during this time were being dissed, and up to this point concept pieces were relegated to only a mere handful of classic bands. By the late 80s, it all seemed like a bygone era, and not the cool thing to do anymore.

This album by Queensryche is what made it "okay" for bands to dive back into the concept project, as it was essentially the first successful project since The Wall from Pink Floyd (see #5 on this list) in 1979...if there were other concept projects put out in that 10 year period, I can't think of any -- and either they weren't successful, or taken seriously.

Not only did Queensryche reopen a door to a room that appeared to have been forbidden and locked shut, they packaged it in the form of an edgy, raw, and downright shocking political manifesto.

Coming out of the heels of the Reagan Era and it's trickle down policies, this project embraces much of the frustration felt by the mid to left politicos as the 80s approached its end.

#6. ~ 2112 by Rush (1976)

I once read somewhere that this album had a big influence on Marilyn Manson, and that it scared him to death. It scared Marilyn Manson.

He must have been talking about it from a conceptual standpoint. Drummer Neil Peart takes the readings of the controversial Ayn Rand, from books such as The Fountainhead and Anthem (from which the band's record label is named)...subject matter which has been interpreted and accused of touching on fascism, among other things. Moreover, an odd author like Rand isn't typically the sort of influence you hear rock bands citing.

However with Rand's influence on Rush, you need to look deeper. What Peart, and ultimately the rest of the band adopt from Rand's writings lean more towards her artistic manifesto.

It's that element that ultimately gives shape to the story in the title track of "2112;" a sci-fi tale about a futuristic society where individualism has been decimated in the complete interest of "the average" -- that is, until the character in the song discovers an old guitar hidden behind a waterfall, and...well, you know...all hell breaks loose with "the priests." Yep, priests are involved.

I hate it when that happens. Seriously now.

It's also Rand's artistic manifesto that gives shape to the bands drive to succeed on their own terms, as they have discussed in numerous interviews over the years.

2112 was the band's mid-70s breakthrough, and at the time they recorded it, EVERYTHING was on the line...their record deal hung in the balance due to the lack of commercial success from their previous work, Caress of Steel. Very few believed they would find success; even folks close to the band doubted it and suggested they fall back on the conventional ways of rock. Ironically, it was the artistic approach to Caress, their development as songwriters on it (notably with the piece "The Fountain of Lamneth"), and it's LACK of success that actually set up their success for 2112. Despite the commercial failure, they hadn't failed as artists.

The band collectively understanding the difference between those two factors was essential to how they approached this project.

So now what do they do? They say f**k it. If we're going to go down, we're going down with the guns ablaze. Against pressure from their label, they write a 20+ minute piece with seven movements and place it as the first track of the album (side 1 at the time of vinyl issues).

It proves successful...and the band never looked back. The body of work Rush has put out since, and their insistence to tour off every single album to present it -- an effort now spanning nearly 40 years -- speaks for itself...and another project of new material is due out in 2010.

On 2112, you can hear them playing on it with a furious edge. If the band sounds like they're playing pissed off, it's because they are. Don't screw with these well-mannered Canadian gents, you'll unleash the beast.

In my opinion, 2112 isn't just an album, it's a way of life...for the band, and for it's dedicated fan base. 2112 is a lifestyle and a creed. It's about having a backbone in the face of adversity, sticking up for yourself or what you believe in, and not compromising your principles -- in much the way the band was feeling at the time they recorded this. It's about putting your fist in the air and telling THE MAN where to stick it! (Something I personally enjoy doing on a repeated basis in a variety of ways, both creative and stupid.)

If you're ever angry after a tough day at the office, put this on and F'N CRANK IT!!! You'll feel much better.

*Special note: the live version of "2112" on the live album Different Stages is also amazing and worth checking out...and it's the only time the band ever performed it live in its entirety...this time in 1996-97.

#5. ~ The Wall by Pink Floyd (1979)

The last classic work by this band, but unfortunately it's also the project that tore the Waters-era Floyd apart -- and as a result deprived a whole generation of Pink Floyd fans of seeing a Waters-era Floyd perform live -- until a select few saw the band come together for one magical night in 2005 (see my post about this event).

The Wall is an undisputed masterpiece on several levels...while of course there's the MOVIE of The Wall, the LIVE PERFORMANCE of The Wall (probably the most interesting component -- and least known), and now PLAYS of The Wall performed around the world (mainly in schools, with Waters' exclusive permission, of course), this of course is speaking to the original ALBUM of the same work.

The album, a sonic tour de force, spans nearly every identifiable form of music and seems to throw every conceivable piece of ear candy at the listeners. There's some great tunes on this project that turned into staple Floyd classics that can be heard on the radio today; notably "Another Brick in the Wall Part 2," "Comfortably Numb," and "Run Like Hell." While every track is memorable and has a role in the larger work of the album, other highlights include the beauty of the under-your-skin emotive "Mother," the horror of WWII German buzz bombs and innocence lost in "Goodbye Blue Sky," the freefalling horndog-on-the-town element of "Young Lust," the hopeless sorrow of "Hey You," arguably Waters' best-ever singing performance (if not his most interesting in terms of dynamic effect) in "Nobody Home," and the originality of the scary/humorous/poking-at-authority's ass of "The Trial." I think the kitchen sink is somewhere in there too.

However, look closer at those song titles...what sort of mood do they convey?

What they suggest are merely the tip of a massive iceberg of a downer...and that's actually intended as a compliment rather than a diss...but a compliment with a HUGE warning label.

This project lends itself to that classic Floyd motif -- in a most in-your-face manner, unlike the graceful and interpretable Dark Side of the Moon (see the end of this listing). With all its incredible sonic attributes, textured features, and hooks, The Wall won't leave you smiling and feeling positive...frankly, it will probably leave you depressed and confused -- if not wondering "how you can have any pudding if you don't eat your meat."

...but, as I suggest in other parts of this post, that's the beauty of a true and raw artistic statement. It makes you feel something, good or bad...but isn't that part of what's involved with living a meaningful life anyway?

I'd say that's part of what Roger Waters was thinking when he wrote this. Not all of this project is autobiographical -- as there's some Syd Barrett and other reflections on the world of rock stardom thrown in -- however I think it's obvious that the guy obviously had some things to work through, notably the fact that he lost his father in WW2.

I'd imagine part of his therapy was to put it out there. It manifested in this project, and on its successor, The Final Cut. The Wall (notably the movie), along with other fantastically inventive and outside-the-box projects, morphs into the area where Pink Floyd is heavily misunderstood as a druggie band...and barring Syd Barrett's issues with LSD in late 60s, they're NOT a druggie band. The Wall is about Waters baring his soul to the world, and I admire the man for his bravery. I wish other musicians could be as real and creative at expression as he is.

The faint of heart or those damaged by horrible childhood experiences should be warned...The Wall will either be your therapy or drive you insane...but either way, you're probably doing yourself a favor and can find help -- for the sake of you and everyone around you. All being said, The Wall commands a close and meaningful study. There's nothing else like it out there.

#4. ~ Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles (1967)

The seed for the concept album was planted here...and while Sgt. Pepper isn't whole-heartedly a concept album, many of the ideas that led to projects by other bands down the road would point back to this.

This CD just recently got better, being released this year in its remastered version! You can also get it as part of a comprehensive Beatles box set.

Of course, there's no denying the opening track, which is reprised at the end with "A Day in the Life," one of the all-time greatest rock tunes ever.

An interesting back-story to Sgt. Pepper is how the Beatles received their influence from The Beach Boys' Pet Sounds album (didn't make this list - however it might make a Top 20 list). It goes to show how our most inspiring and influential musicians, and artists in general, definitely don't live in a vacuum.

#3. ~ Tales from Topographic Oceans by Yes (1973)

First thing, I'll admit that I'm more of a Trevor Rabin-era Yes fan (i.e. projects such as 90125, Big Generator, and Talk), and have had a tough time absorbing the more obscure portions of their earlier catalog from the 70s. However, that doesn't make me lose any less respect for their art.

Still, this is rock at its proggiest, in a fashion that might make the boldest listener's head explode...or if you're not on drugs, it might drive you to use them...or to throw the next mini-moog synthesizer you see ceremoniously off the top of a skyscraper just to prove a point.

Seriously...I've had enough conversations with hardcore Yes fans to know the significance of this album, Tales from Topographic Oceans, which stands out in a long line of Yes concept projects. This is the concept album not just taken to a whole new level, but into the realm of otherworldly. While the spiritual level of the album, and Jon Anderson's shtick, is in a motif that I personally don't quite grasp, that doesn't make it any less effective and meaningful. It commands our respect and praise.

There's deep, deep stuff going on here. Hardcore Yes fans "get it" the way I "get it" with 2112 by Rush...so, in the interest of all due respect to Yes fans, I will defer to one of them.

An Amazon reviewer writes:

"Tales" is a deeply philosophical album that is not for the meditative faint of heart. While much music is created to be toe-tapping and easy to sing to, "Tales" is in that genre usually called progressive rock, in a sub-genre that requires intense analysis to understand. The result is an album that is inaccessible and incomprehensible to a casual listener. In order to understand this music you must read the lyrics and listen, and listen, and then listen some more. Even then you might fail to gain a glimmer of Yes' intent.

"Tales from Topographic Oceans" would have to qualify as one of the most if not the most deeply complicated rock music ever created. Again, if you are a casual listener the complexity of the music can be frustrating or boring. However, if you consider that classical music is often complex, and to be understood requires extended focused listening, it should be of little surprise that Yes took that complexity for its own in the development of this music, creating a symphony in four movements.

Whoa! Enough said, I already have a headache and I haven't even put the thing on yet. Seriously, I look forward to sitting down with this project one day, when I have the time and patience to give it the required due diligence to explore it further.

I gave it the high ranking because of its artistic boldness and depth unlike any other concept album, and how it serves the diehard Yes fan in spades...and while I've given it a few listens and walked away wondering and not totally getting it, that's MY issue. I can still appreciate the boldness of the statement and the uncompromising artistry.

#2. ~ Tommy by The Who (1969)

The ranking is high because of the originality...Tommy is THE original rock opera.

With this project, The Who gave birth to the first bona-fide concept piece.

Tommy is structured as the perfect double album, with an interesting story line...and like The Wall, it formed into a movie, live performance, and has made it to the stage -- and in the case of the latter, I had the opportunity to see one of those live stage performances -- and loved it.

I highly recommend seeing any rock album performed as a play, it gives the original work a wonderfully fresh twist.

#1. ~ The Dark Side of the Moon by Pink Floyd (1973).

Hands down, IMO, it's the best rock album of all time, and therefore also the best concept album. Pure bliss and perfection; both compositional, sonically, and in the band's playing. The album cover evokes the feel and vibe of the album in its power, mystery, and simplicity.

Less is more.

See? Just when you read that, didn't the idea of that just mushroom out into lots of things? Sure it did. Shut up.

Dark Side of the Moon is a graceful, timeless, and perfect ride wrapped in the power and mystery of the whole Floyd thing. If the definition of the "power of music" was in the dictionary, this album cover would be next to it.

I see this album as a bold statement about modern life. It has a mellow vibe, offers variety, and unlike The Wall is more accessible and interpretive. However some are generally turned off by the often dark motif of Pink Floyd, and this project has it's share through Water's songwriting...but isn't that the beauty of art? Sometimes sad or dark music revealing the pain of real life can be healing -- and can be the most beautiful. It rejuvenates our soul.

Any idiot can write songs about sex, drugs, and rock and roll. This is the rock format at its deepest and most artistic. Even if you don't really like anything about Pink Floyd, this is the exception to that rule...and while it's Floyd, it's really not...there's Divine Intervention at work here. This album has the power to resonate with you forever and change your outlook on life.

Simply put, nothing touches it...nothing. I can't say that anything else in the rock genre even comes close -- Dark Side is in a higher league on its own. 'Nuff said...again, less is more.

If you don't know, just listen to the damn thing! Seriously, if you haven't heard it before, then find a killer stereo system and set aside some time...light a candle and turn down the lights...it's a moment you'll never forget.

If you're not a rock person -- and could only own one rock project in your lifetime -- this is it.

So that's a wrap!

As a final note here...it's about time that I post something meaningful up here...sorry for how I've been putting off posting something decent on this site for awhile.

I believe this blog space is more meaningful when I put something together that involves a deeper level of thought, and that requires some time and insight...so when time is short with other things, the beefier postings can fall off. Blame it on life stuff I guess.

I realize there are only 10 works mentioned here, with no honorable mentions to boot either...so I apologize if something glaring and obvious was left off! Part of it could be due to bands I'm not a big fan of -- the Genesis and ELP camps come to mind, for example...and there's lots of new stuff out there I might not be aware of. So please chime in and leave a comment on who should be added, as I'd consider expanding this to a Top 20 or Top 25 list...but you need to bring forth a compelling reason!

Pissed...no, ENRAGED. Another favorite band flies under the radar.

2009-10-20T08:13:00.001-07:00

Good morning, bitch central here.

Porcupine Tree passed through Seattle on 9/15. It's more than a month later, AND I'M JUST HEARING ABOUT IT NOW...and that's only happening because I happened to walk by a record store last week, where I saw this promo poster in the window saying: "PORCUPINE TREE ~ THE INCIDENT."

...so I thought: "Oh. P.T. must have a new one out. Strange that I was on the Burning Shed website two months ago and didn't hear anything about a new album."

I have a question for all of you...the world, whatever. How is it that two bands, that I've never seen before, simply fly under the radar when they come through town, and I HEAR ABSOLUTELY NOTHING ABOUT IT?

Hey, don't mind me and my angst over this...P.T.'s only in my Top 5 of favorite rock bands, along names in the likes of Neil Young, Pink Floyd, and Rush...so yes. In my mind, this was like missing Pink Floyd on tour and not hearing about it.

It's not like I'm a casual fan either...I RUN A FRIGGIN MUSIC BLOG, for Christ's sake. I also make it a point to pick up a copy of the Seattle Weekly at least once a month, but can't always peter through their detailed music pages. It's information overload, and I don't like getting the newsprint on my fingers.

If it's not a major band, they're probably really limited on having a P.R. budget...so how does a person who's running their own business and being a caretaker to aging parents keep on top of it without driving themselves nuts? Even if you go to a band's website, something can change two months later and suddenly "poof" they've come and gone. Steven Wilson in particular is hard to keep up with, as the guy seems like he has literally a dozen projects going on at once. I can sit here on the P.T. website and stare at the "alerts" list, but what good is the goddam thing going to do me now, besides alerting me to stops on a tour that I've already missed? No thanks.

This is the second time this has happened to me this year...this happened before with The Church last spring.

Did anyone out there catch Porcupine Tree on their latest U.S. leg? How did you hear about it? Did anyone actually show up and attend the shows? I'm dying to know how you found out about it.

The insane CD I could never dump...now put in a new light

2009-09-16T00:13:00.000-07:00

Being the traditional classic rock fella that I am, along with my tendencies to noodle into obscure bands and albums of original work, "IT" still ended up in my collection.

A pop album...but not just ANY pop album... ...a music soundtack! What? Really? A soundtrack of various songs throw together by different artists?

Nooooooooooooo............really?

...but...it wasn't JUST ANY soundtrack either!!!

It was DIRTY DANCING!

!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

That was my EXACT thought when I couldn't recall how it had ended up in my collection in the late 80s...and NOOOOOOO, I refuse to speculate on what that was about...or what inspired me to pick it up.

Needless to say, by the early 90s I was horrified that I owned it and was ready to get rid of it. Friends and roommates who took the time to whittle through my modest CD collection at the time would point and laugh at me...the sort of thing where you emerge from the bathroom, and they're there waiting for you with baited breath as they hold it in their hand---demanding an explanation---and it better be a damn good one!

Yup, I knew I deserved it all...all of the pointing and laughing...but it kept on going and getting more and more amplified.

So I finally tried, in earnest, to dump the thing...I just didn't expect it to be an impossible task.

Living in Tempe, Arizona at the time, there were record stores all around the ASU campus who sold used music. I tried all of them. Whenever I brought it in, it was usually with a couple other CDs I was selling...but it would get rejected EVERY TIME.

It came to the point where I'd try to put it by different staff on various shifts, but I think the word got out...soon enough I found myself running into: "Oh, that again. No man. No can do."

So now I had to think. Ah ha! The next step involved the pawn shops, which were in abundance in the city of Mesa just a few miles east of Tempe. Granted, I'd only get a buck for it, but I was determined to get something for it.

It was becoming a mission.

But, no...the friggin pawn shops wouldn't take it either...not even for $1...NOT EVEN FOR FREE!!! Apparently they not only didn't have any use for it, they didn't even want to handle it. Period.

So conspiracy theories started to pop into my head...perhaps they had Jennifer Grey envy and didn't like Patrick Swayze? Who knows. The whole thing was starting to border on the insane.

I was beyond perplexed.

So...to my ongoing and repeated shock and surprise of several years, getting rid of Dirty Dancing presented a bit of an issue, you might say. It was the thorn in my side...and, as I mentioned before, my buddies thought the dilemma was the most amusing thing they'd ever heard of.

Now my friends were following me around town pointing and laughing...along with a traveling circus of late 80s mulletheads, men dressed in modern dance outfits, and Swayze look-alikes.

Hey, just another normal day in my life.

So I had to think up something new...and I decided to play what I considered to be a little strategy, coupled with "a little karma trick." I decided to go out and purchase the More Dirty Dancing soundtrack which I---ironically---purchased from a discount rack in a used record store in Tempe, Arizona.

I don't believe I actually ever played the damn thing.

Here was my brainiac strategy: I was hoping that if I paired it with the first Dirty Dancing CD, I could sell them back to a used record store or pawn shop as a pair.

Well, as you can guess, it didn't happen...and as a result, I STILL own them to this day. They've became such a fable; such a point of lore and personal history now, that I can't part with them...that's just the way it is. Some things you simply aren't meant to fight.

The weight of my history with this movie soundtrack was brought to bear with the passing of Patrick Swayze this last week. Sadly, he died before the age of 60 from pancreatic cancer. It's interesting how something so annoying and embarrassing can turn into something beautiful and meaningful, even if it took over 20 years to evolve as such.

...but isn't that life, in many ways? R.I.P. Mr. Swayze. You had guts wearing that mullet and those outfits...and you weren't a bad dancer...or singer, as one of the songs on my two Dirty Dancing soundtracks reveals.

So I guess it's time to buy the remastered Dirty Dancing box set now? Where do I place my bid? I'll pay top dollar, baby!

The T.O.E.C.F.U.E. Project

2009-07-13T10:52:00.000-07:00

A new project has been borne.

It's dubbed the TOECFUE Project...an acronym standing for "Tricked Out Entertainment Center Featuring Used Equipment."

The idea came the other day as I was perusing through a second hand store in Idaho, and ran into a piece of stereo equipment that I would have paid $150 for 10 years ago...but now it's available for a mere $20!

Granted, it's a Sony dual cassette deck, and nobody uses cassette players anymore...but it fits into an idea of a grandiose entertainment center concept that I've had for quite some time...here's the details.

The TOECFUE Project lends itself to both hi-fi and classic lo-fi equipment. Here's what's on the list:

HDTV (min. 40")
stereo receiver (acquired via donation)
Blu-ray player
DVD /DVD-A /SACD player
CD carousel or bundle changer
dual cassette deck (acquired via purchase...1990s Sony TC-W411...cost = $20)
direct drive turntable
8-track player (acquired via donation...1976 Lloyd's)
5.1 surround sound system
traditional front speaker system (acquired via donation...early 90s)

Total cost toward the budget so far: $20

In addition to the list, there's some criteria to this project that will make it both interesting, challenging, and requiring some patience:

Work with a budget of $500.
Gifts and donated hand-me-downs (fully operating...please?) are graciously accepted.
Acquire all items on aforementioned equipment list.
Find a way for the components to operate carbon-neutral.
There are no time constraints.

It's assumed that most of the acquired components will be used equipment...and that being said, it's expected that some (hopefully a small percentage) of the equipment picked up at second-hand stores or yard sales will possibly need fixing, won't always work as expected, or operate at all.

In terms of the green element of trying to make the equipment operate carbon-neutral, I guess you can look at such a challenge along the lines of Neil Young's LincVolt Project, where he's trying to convert a 1959 Lincoln Continental into a vehicle from using less than 10 MPG to over 100 MPG...except, of course, this is stereo equipment.

So that's it...the million dollar question being whether or not I can attain the equipment under a $500 budget. Should be interesting to see!

Thoughts on Michael Jackson's memorial: You can't fake genuineness

2009-07-07T18:24:00.000-07:00

Wow, what an emotional day.

You can't fake genuineness. That's what came to mind today as I was watching events unfold at pop icon Micheal Jackson's memorial service in the L.A. Staples Center.

More on that later in this post.

I have to admit that my R&B/Motown leanings fall on only a handful of artists; Jackson 5, Michael Jackson, Marvin Gaye, Bill Withers, Stevie Wonder (of whom I own no albums...yet), and...and...well, there you go...and of those artists, I've only experienced certain albums and shapshots of their careers at best. I have some Smokey Robinson and James Brown explorations in my sights.

I dropped in on the Michael Jackson thing in the early 80s right after Off the Wall came out (his first post-Jackson 5 solo album, a disco-influenced pop extravaganza that appeared under the tree Christmas 1979), and followed his career through the Thriller album along with everyone else at the time, as it's the greatest-selling music project of all time with over 100 million units sold...

...but then I took off through high school with completely different forms of music and immersed myself in bands like Rush, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, The Who, and the Rolling Stones.

In college and over time, I was exposed to many other forms of music...and eventually started circling around to Motown again in the late 90s...then I dove heavily into jazz in 2003, where I realized the reach of Quincy Jones' talent as a songwriter and producer.

Then, a couple years ago as I was passing through a magazine shop in an airport, and my eyes fell on a CD rack displaying the two Michael Jackson albums I was familiar with; this time in a reissued and remastered special edition CD, and I decided to pick them up...and I was beautifully reunited with my 10-year old music self. What a treat that was rediscovering that music again.

In these special issue CDs, Quincy Jones interviews were peppered throughout extra tracks on those projects...and having slightly more interest in CD liner notes in my late 30s than I did as a pre-teen, I learned some stories behind the recordings.

While the events of his personal life brought up questions, and while his changing appearance seemed like something along the likes of what's witnessed on Halloween, Michael Jackson's talent and influence can't be ignored.

As a child star with the Jackson 5, he had the voice, the dance moves, and the stage presence at an incredibly young age. He then morphed into an adult performer and blew everyone away as a creative innovator. He was a songwriter and performed his own material with incredible flair. He broke racial barriers. He set the world of MTV on its ear with the "Thriller" video. He invented the moonwalk. He co-wrote "We Are the World," the first philanthropic project of it's kind.

How he transformed pop culture as we know it cannot be denied.

While his personal life came across as slightly bizarre (politely speaking), the man didn't have to die on June 25. It's not like he was going downhill like Elvis...HE WAS REHEARSING FOR AN UPCOMING TOUR THE NIGHT BEFORE HIS DEATH. We'll learn more about those details in the coming weeks.

Today's memorial events were very emotional, and many performers gave their tearful tributes to him through words and song. Some of them barely kept it together, and some of them didn't.

Jackson's influence was cited and obvious in the memorial performances we saw today...his influence is all around us. Through it all, all these tributes were genuine and from the heart. Today helped to humanize the Michael Jackson mystery.

You can't fake that. You can't fake genuineness.

Bubba's Bar 'n' Grill...GRAND OPENING!

2009-07-04T19:58:00.000-07:00

It's finally here! Get out your kitchen utensils!

Bubba's Bar 'n' Grill, from Neil Peart's personal website, will impress and astound you with a variety of menu items...along with some rather amusing anecdotes to go along with the culinary stuff.

For Rush fans, just make sure you give some attention to the ads on the perimeter of the menu when you first go to the link...you may notice some colorful characters there from your readings and concert viewings of yore.

FILLER FOR AUDIOPHILES -- Blu-ray.com is your site

2009-06-18T23:26:00.000-07:00

I actually spend lots of time at Blu-ray.com, and I don't even own a Blu-ray player yet.

That probably sounds silly, but my first purchase of one is probably not that far off (with new formats and technologies, I typically like to wait for a couple generations of players to cycle through before diving in).

I do tons of research in advance of such an investment, and of course that means the media too.

I really like the reviews of Blu-ray discs on this site...after all, it's the top-of-the-line format out there right now, with the high def craze that's going on and everyone upgrading their equipment.

I go here to review music discs, and have found every review I've read so far to be really helpful. They get into a high degree of technical jargon without losing you, and focus on both the video and audio portions.

This site is also a cataloger of sorts, helpfully indicating what's actually available out there in the Blu-ray format. Since we're less than 2 years removed from the format war with HD DVD, it's going to take time to get through older movies and videos...I'm guessing part of it will involve how high the demand is...otherwise there doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason to it.

For example, The Band The Last Waltz from 1978 has been out on Blu-ray for over a year now, but none of the Star Wars movies are available, so forget logic.

In the case of my personal amusement; when I went there and couldn't find Pink Floyd Pulse on Blu-ray (a concert from 1994 that I wasn't expecting to find on the format, but I thought I'd check anyway), I was treated to a review of David Gilmour Remember that Night instead, and found it had some features and extras that are more appealing to me anyway, such as ancient Floyd bits. There was another excellent review of Rush Snakes & Arrows Live at the site.

I'm scoping all this stuff out in anticipation of picking up a few titles to augment the collection.

It's not just music, there's reviews of movies as well...and anything else, for that matter, that's out on our most recent and illustrious media format, Blu-ray.

Paying attention when you're busy

2009-06-16T22:21:00.000-07:00

I've been completely and utterly out of the loop on the live acts coming to town this year. Life's priorities have taken over...like, for example, starting a new business.

I'm starting to feel the effects of what the demands of time and treasure have brought to bear on other parts of my life, especially music...especially LIVE music.

Just the other day, I found out that Phish will be playing the Gorge for two straight days this coming August 7 & 8...and the shows have been sold out...uh, since March. That's right. It took approximately THREE MONTHS after tickets went on sale for my finding out that the band has plans to come through town...and I thought I was keeping up on them. Crap.

It's amazing how sidetracked one can get with other things.

I'm missing the smaller acts coming through town too...earlier today, I opened up the weekly freebee, the Seattle Weekly, which I usually pickup over lunch at Taco del Mar...only to find out that an Australian band I like called The Church, who seldom ever pass though Seattle (let alone tour), played last night at a small venue in downtown Seattle called the Triple Door.

My first reaction was: You're kidding me, right?

Ouch...that one hurt. I would have LOVED to see that band...and it probably wasn't very expensive, either.

This is a sign that I need to stop what I'm doing every now and then, and pay more attention to stay in tune with one of the things I still love to do: see my favorite bands play live.

Hour long Rush interview with CBC's Radio Q

2009-06-16T22:05:00.000-07:00

CBC Radio Q just posted this to You Tube...for fans of the band out there, there's some really fascinating and insightful stuff to chew on here. Highlights involve perspectives on Ayn Rand's influence on the band, Ged and Alex recalling how they first met, and a fascinating analysis of the song "Subdivisions."

Obscure album artwork

2009-05-19T21:09:00.000-07:00

Here's something new...a site worth visiting for really weird album artwork.

Check out this list of the 100 most obscure and remarkable album covers of all time.

Your bound to run into a few things that you've never seen before...such as this sample from a band named Orca Survive, who I've never heard of before.

It's a testament to the power of a picture...it's one of those cases where the artwork gets you interested in what the band sounds like.

It's the "Synth Kitty!" Applause! Encore!

2009-05-09T13:08:00.000-07:00

This has to be the coolest cat EVER!!! It looks like a tabby, so I guess that's no surprise, lol!

Rush: A great interview every time

2009-04-27T09:25:00.000-07:00

The release of Retrospective 3 has generated much interest in the Rush camp lately.

The band is a major plot point to the recent movie I Love You Man. It seems like the band is in one of it's "hip periods" with the general public, something that doesn't happen often.

Like, uh, ever...except for perhaps the period from 1980-82, over the succession of the releases Permanent Waves, Moving Pictures, Exit...Stage Left, and Signals.

It should dissipate soon, I can hear Rush fans hoping...and it would be nice if it was before the next tour, so I can get front row seats for under $500, lol.

After listening in on interviews by the band over the last 25 years, I'm amazed very time Ged, Alex, and Neil ~ individually, collectively, or in some combination thereof ~ present a fascinating interview for the listener.

It seems that each member brings in a different spin and insight of the band, and has something fresh to present. Maybe that's why they're interviewed so much.

Not only is the band Rush fascinating, but what its members have to say is of great interest...and I'm sure I'm not biased.

Here's yet another great interview from In the Studio with Redbeard, on the 35th Anniversary of the debut album...with more interesting insights.

The Dark Side of Pink Floyd

2009-04-06T18:53:00.000-07:00

From The Sunday Times

March 22, 2009

The dark side of Pink Floyd

It’s rock music’s most complicated saga, involving ego wars, madness and death. Robert Sandall explains why nothing — not even $250m — can put the pieces of Pink Floyd together again

Pink Floyd fans are an optimistic lot. A year ago the band’s blogging followers were talking up a putative tour in 2009 that would reunite the so-called “classic” 1970s line-up — the one responsible for their 40m-selling magnum opus The Dark Side of the Moon — for their first proper concert since 1980.

To a large extent, this represented the triumph of hope over experience. Of the many attempts to get the four members of Pink Floyd back on stage together, only Bob Geldof’s had come off. After the fractious foursome re-convened for an historic 18-minute slot at Live 8 in 2005, the world’s largest concert promoters, Live Nation, offered them a record $250m — pure profit, net of all production expenses, which the promoters would cover separately — to tour North America. This figure valued Pink Floyd as a bigger live draw than the Rolling Stones, and was more than twice what Live Nation shelled out to sign Madonna to an inclusive concert-and-albums deal in 2007.

True to form, the Floyd declined, mainly at the behest of David Gilmour. The band’s guitarist, who compared their Live 8 performance to “sleeping with your ex-wife”, was planning his most ambitious solo tour yet, to run from 2006 until the end of 2008. Prominent in Gilmour’s band was the Floyd’s keyboard player, Rick Wright, whose ejection from the group in 1979 led to years of discord in which the three remaining squabbled over who owned the band’s name.

It was Wright’s rehabilitation as Gilmour’s new buddy —coupled with the conciliatory noises emanating from drummer, Nick Mason, and the previously hostile bassist, Roger Waters — that helped to raise hopes of a 2009 Floyd tour. Once Gilmour’s solo tour had wrapped at Gdansk in November 2008, the feeling among the Floyd faithful was that the long-awaited reunion might be back on the cards.

Sadly, it wasn’t. Rick Wright died of cancer last September, a tragic loss which, like the death of Pink Floyd’s prime mover, Syd Barrett, in 2006, inspired an avalanche of obituaries unusual for the passing of a pop musician. It also brought to light aspects of the shifting alliances that have characterised the career of Pink Floyd, one of rock’s most complicated soaps.

Tellingly, none of his bandmates seemed to have known how ill Wright was, a fact that confirms how the members of Pink Floyd have long kept each other at a distance socially. Waters, who now lives mainly in the Hamptons, New York, hadn’t spoken to Wright all year. A fortnight before Wright’s death, Gilmour received a message that his keyboard player would not be able to take part in an upcoming TV broadcast for Jools Holland’s Later. When I spoke to Mason in Islington, the day before Wright died, he had no inkling of what was unfolding in the organist’s Kensington home. Mason was talking about “the faint possibility” of a Floyd reunion. “My bags are packed,” he said.

The public tributes the other three paid to Wright after his death revealed as much about their view of the group as they did about him. Waters, the former self-appointed leader who kicked Wright out of the band in 1979, said his “thoughts were with his family”. Conventional enough, but the family Waters named was the one Wright broke up when he divorced his first wife in 1982, shortly before Waters himself left the group. The subtext made it clear that Waters was hankering for the Floyd’s heyday in the 1970s and early ’80s. This was the period when he effectively ran the group — a situation flagged on the last record he made with them, The Final Cut, subtitle A Requiem for the Post War Dream, by Roger Waters, performed by Pink Floyd. Twenty-five years on, and following a so-so solo career during which he often resorted to billing himself as “the creative genius behind Pink Floyd”, Waters clearly wanted his old band back. After expressing gratitude “for the opportunity that Live 8 afforded me to engage with him [Wright] and David and Nick that one last time”, Waters’ farewell to Wright ended: “I wish there had been more.”

Mason’s tribute told another story. He praised Wright as “the underrated one”, adding that his swirling, layered keyboards were the band’s true hallmark sound, which “tended to get forgotten among the welter of guitar solos”. This less-than-flattering reference to the Floyd’s guitarist was in keeping with Mason’s recent memoir, Inside Out, a book whose jaunty and disrespectful tone greatly annoyed the serious-minded Gilmour and disrupted an alliance dating back to 1985, when Mason and Gilmour fought Waters for the right to carry on as a duo after he walked out and tried to prevent them from using the name Pink Floyd.

At that point they could have reinstated Rick Wright, but chose not to. Although they recalled him to play in their squad of backing musicians and to co-write some songs — “because I thought it would make us stronger legally and musically”, Gilmour once said — Wright’s days as a full band member were over. To the end he remained, in effect, a paid employee of Pink Floyd. Notwithstanding Wright’s technical status, nobody could doubt the sincerity of the tribute Gilmour posted on his website. Of the three, it was the most personal and heartfelt. “No-one can rep

lace Richard Wright. He was my musical partner and my friend. He was such a lovely, gentle, genuine man.” This was followed with a belated apology for having deprived this lovely character of his membership of the band he loyally served for over 40 years: “In the welter of arguments about who or what was Pink Floyd, Rick’s enormous input was frequently forgotten.”

Like most issues relating to the band, the “forgetting” of Rick Wright’s contribution boils down to a personality clash. Sensitive, fragile and, according to the Floyd’s first manager, Peter Jenner, “dithery”, Wright was ill-equipped for the ego wars that came to dominate Pink Floyd after the departure of Syd Barrett in 1968. A self-taught multi-instrumentalist who grew up in thrall to classical music and modern jazz — “I never liked R&B very much,” he said — Wright was the one most in tune with Barrett’s maverick, improvising talent.

Finding he had little in common with his Regent Street Polytechnic bandmates, Mason and Waters, Wright bonded with Barrett; and once the Floyd’s psychedelic poster boy began to lose his mind to LSD, Wright stuck by him. While the rest of the group plotted to remove their increasingly unreliable leader from the touring band — swiftly replacing him with his Cambridge college-mate, David Gilmour — Wright moved into a flat with Barrett in Richmond to try to hold him together. When he would disappear in the evening to play gigs, leaving the addled Barrett behind staring at the wall, Wright would tell him he was popping out to buy cigarettes. “It was awful,” he later said of this deception.

Believing Barrett and Wright to be the more musically gifted half of a disintegrating group, Pink Floyd’s management contemplated forming a breakaway band to rescue Barrett from his demons. But it never happened. Wright, who said he “would have left with him like a shot if I had thought Syd could do it”, stayed on with Pink Floyd where, like new recruit Gilmour, he came under fire from the band’s emerging bossy-boots ideologue, Roger Waters.

Jenner ascribes this to simple jealousy: “Rick was Roger’s real rival. He was better looking and he had a better voice.” Having lost his musical foil, and his friend, Wright became progressively isolated. He made a decisive contribution to the 1973 breakthrough album, The Dark Side of the Moon, whose subtle balancing of soft and loud passages owed much, Wright believed, to his “being brought up on classical music, in which the symphonies have huge dynamics”. But he argued with Waters over the subject of their next album, 1975’s extended elegy for Syd Barrett, Wish You Were Here, taking issue with Waters’ preoccupation with madness “something I didn’t feel so strongly about”. He was spooked by an incident at the end of the Abbey Road recording sessions when Barrett turned up, unrecognisably overweight, brandishing a toothbrush and demanding to play guitar on the track Shine On You Crazy Diamond.

Wright’s natural diffidence made the acclaim that accompanied the Floyd’s meteoric ascent after Dark Side — soon to become the biggest-selling album of the 1970s — difficult for him to deal with. His bandmates didn’t help. Persistently ragged for his alleged stinginess — “Rick wasn’t really a skinflint,” Mason admitted later, “we just decided to turn him into the Jack Benny of the group” — Wright found touring an increasingly lonely experience. To counter the stress, he took up ocean sailing, a hobby that put even more distance between him and his fellow Floyders.

By the late 1970s Wright was in trouble. His marriage was on the rocks, and, having written classics such as The Great Gig in the Sky, he now had writer’s block. Word within the Floyd camp had it that Wright’s failure to come up with any new material was not helped by his increasing consumption of cocaine — a habit frowned upon by a group that, unlike the rest of planet rock at the time, steered clear of all drugs.

Things came to a head in 1979 while recording The Wall at the Super Bear studio in the south of France. The band’s recent loss of £2m with the investment company Norton Warburg had left them heavily in debt and forced them into tax exile. It also put pressure on their next recording sessions, a tense situation made worse by a growing feud between Waters — who had devised the album’s storyline and written most of the songs — and Gilmour, who complained that Waters’ music was “incredibly naff”. Wright sided with Gilmour, who asked him to help improve it. Wright, however, failed to deliver. “We’d all go home at night,” Gilmour recalled, “and we’d say to Rick, ‘Do what you like, here are these tracks, write something, play a solo, put something down. You’ve got all evening, every evening, to do it.’ But he wasn’t capable of playing anything.”

Wright blamed the overbearing personality of Waters: “He was making it impossible for me to do anything.” Others blamed the drugs. With a deadline looming, Waters summoned Wright to LA where the band had relocated, to finish his keyboard parts. When Wright refused to interrupt his sailing holiday around the Greek islands, Waters called a band meeting at which he demanded his dismissal. At first Wright refused to leave, but after Waters threatened to walk out, binning the unfinished album, he panicked. “That meant there would be no money to pay off our huge debts. I was terrified. I had two kids to support. So I agreed to go.”

Wright later regretted the decision. “It was Roger’s bluff. But I really didn’t want to work with this guy any more.”

Wright’s dismissal marked the end of Pink Floyd as a mutual creative force — for the next five years they were the Roger Waters band — and the beginning of a struggle for control of the brand. As the individual members have long since discovered in their less successful solo careers, there is a commercial magic in the name Pink Floyd that transcends the performers it describes. This is partly down to the faceless nature of their son et lumière presentation. The vast light show, the visual stunts such as the inflatable pig, and the sound effects — clanking cash registers and all — tend to take precedence over the musicians on stage. As Mason puts it, “We’re lucky in that we don’t have to promote a Bono or a Mick Jagger.”

But names can be tricky to manage too. In his typically self-deprecating fashion, Mason said recently of the sacking of their organist: “Dave and I decided to gang up with the school bully rather than fight for truth and justice.” But slack as they might have been in resisting the expulsion of Wright, when in 1985 Mason and Gilmour fought Waters in the High Court for the right to call themselves Pink Floyd, record an album and set out on a four-year tour (the longest of their career to date), they won. And so it came to pass that the only people currently entitled to use the name Pink Floyd are David Gilmour and Nick Mason, when both are together on stage or in the studio. Aside from Live 8, the last time that happened was in 1995, on the tour for what is, and may well remain, the final Pink Floyd album, The Division Bell. When Gilmour toured his recent solo album, On an Island, it was noted that he didn’t invite Mason to play drums. The simmering row over the drummer’s memoir wasn’t the half of it. With Mason present, Gilmour would have reconstituted the legal entity known as Pink Floyd.

The tenacity with which the members of Pink Floyd have remained at loggerheads is remarkable. At its heart lies the fraught relationship between Waters and Gilmour, two men who are often called “arrogant” and “obstinate”. Creatively, this conflict has been summarised by Mason as “a tension between Roger’s wanting to make a show, and Dave’s desire to make music” — a reference to the fact that Waters is stronger on album “concepts” while Gilmour is the more talented singer and technician.

Its roots, however, go back to their shared upbringing in Cambridge. As teenagers, Gilmour and Waters were on nodding terms, but their connection was forged after both, separately, became friends of a magnetic boho character, Roger “Syd” Barrett. Gilmour and Barrett spent a summer busking in France. Waters, two years older, attended the same grammar school as Barrett and sought him out after they both moved to London to study. It was apparent in the first incarnation of Pink Floyd that Waters hero-worshipped Barrett, the band’s leader and main songwriter. According to Peter Jenner, “Syd was the only person Roger Waters has ever really liked and looked up to.” At a Barrett tribute concert held after his death at the Barbican in 2006,

Waters made the surprise announcement: “Without Syd I’d probably have been a property developer or something.”

Though Gilmour’s Cambridge background made him the obvious choice to replace Barrett — and he soon became a key player in repositioning Pink Floyd as a mainstream, rather than an “underground” act — Waters often treated him like a junior. “It’s that old playground thing,” Gilmour once said. “If you’re a couple of years younger, that’s the way you stay.” Others have speculated that Gilmour’s teenage friendship with Barrett and his family made Waters jealous. Surveying 40 years of internecine wrangling, the juvenile nature of much of it is what strikes Mason: “If any of our children behaved in the way we have to each other, we would be very cross with them.”

As things stand, their lives barely cross, personally or professionally. Mason recently got back on speaking terms with his old pal from Regent Street Poly, Roger Waters, for whom he has occasionally played drums on his solo shows. But none of them needs to set foot on a stage again. The most recent Sunday Times Rich List estimates that Waters, Gilmour and Mason have fortunes of £95m, £85m and £55m respectively. Former band member Wright didn’t feature on the list, but with houses in Kensington and the south of France and a large yacht in the Bahamas, he was clearly surviving comfortably on the royalty cheques from Pink Floyd’s glory years in the 1970s.

In fact, money is about the only thing this contentious combo haven’t argued about. Waters never went to war over it during his legal moves to stymie Mason and Gilmour. Whatever arrangement they came to with Wright, he never uttered a word of complaint about his treatment financially. In a gesture that helped to earn him a CBE in 2003, Gilmour donated the £3.6m he got from the sale of his London home in Little Venice — which was bought by Earl Spencer — to a charity for the homeless. “I don’t need that money, I have more than enough,” he commented, grandly.

Their lifestyles are — by the standards of most 60-something squillionaire rock stars — impeccably haut bourgeois. They each own tasteful country piles. Mason’s Wiltshire pad previously belonged to Camilla Parker Bowles. Gilmour’s farm in West Sussex is one of the most substantial spreads in what is informally known as “the rockbroker belt” — near Keith Richards’s infamous old haunt of Redlands. Waters’ main residence is in one of America’s toniest addresses, the Hamptons on Long Island.

The yachtsman Rick Wright wasn’t the only Floyder to favour posh pastimes. Mason loves collecting and racing vintage sports cars — his Ferrari GTO is his pride and joy — and most days he runs a company, Ten Tenths, that rents them out to film-makers. Waters spends much of his spare time over here shooting pheasant in the Welsh borders and deerstalking in Scotland. Gilmour is often seen out and about at London book launches with his wife, the former Sunday Times journalist Polly Samson.

The chances that these wealthy musicians of leisure will join forces again under the Pink Floyd banner seem remote for three reasons. First they are, as Mason says, demonstrably unbribable. “Bob Geldof and a good cause could make it happen whereas $250m couldn’t.” Then there are the musical differences, which were glimpsed in the rehearsals for Live 8. “At this point, to get Roger and David to play each other’s songs,” says Mason, “is unspeakably difficult.”

Finally, and decisively, there is the implacable hostility of David Gilmour to a plan that now enjoys the full support of Roger Waters. Having spent years denigrating the contributions of his old bandmates, Waters is now a born-again team player. “David doesn’t get how important the symbiosis between us was,” he commented recently.

A close associate of Gilmour’s takes a different view. “David has spent half his life fighting over Pink Floyd. Nothing will ever make him go back there.”

RUSH GETS INTO THE ROCK HALL!!!

2009-04-01T10:31:00.000-07:00

APRIL FOOL!

Happy April Fools Day.

New article about the ongoing snubbing of Rush & the proggers in the Rock Hall

2009-04-01T09:57:00.000-07:00

The ongoing snubbing of Rush being inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame has started to become an annual tradition that's only gaining steam and raising more and more eyebrows.

Clearly the band should be in there.

This is not to give credibility to the Rock Hall, because it has very little to begin with...but when you see other inductees ~ who were influenced by Rush ~ raising questions again and again on why they're not in there, you really start to wonder.

Here's an interesting article on this subject from MSNBC.

Why the Rock Hall says: No Rush for you!

Prog rock gets ignored by the selection committee every year

By Tony Sclafani

msnbc.com contributor

updated 3:50 p.m. PT, Mon., March. 30, 2009

When the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame holds its annual induction ceremony April 4, there once again won’t be any progressive rock artists amongst its five honorees. The Rock Hall’s snubbing of the once-popular genre hasn’t gone unnoticed by its supporters.

In the past few years, fans of Yes and the Moody Blues have started online petitions to get those groups a nod. Blogs and Web sites question the Hall’s choices, as did Stephen Colbert when he interviewed Rush (who also have a campaign petition).

Decades ago, these groups packed thousands into stadiums and sold tons of vinyl by pushing the boundaries of rock. But evidence suggests their elaborate concept albums, impeccable musicianship and oblique lyrics might have pushed things too far for the Hall’s tastemakers.

The Hall began honoring performers in 1986, starting with pioneers like Chuck Berry, Little Richard and Elvis Presley. More recently, pop acts like Billy Joel, the Bee Gees and Madonna have made the cut, but Rush, Yes, the Moody Blues, Jethro Tull, the Electric Light Orchestra, Genesis, Emerson, Lake and Palmer and Soft Machine have not. Beyond Pink Floyd, the closest the Hall gets to prog is Queen (who flirted with the genre) and Police drummer Stuart Copeland, who played in Curved Air.

Prog rock (as it’s colloquially known) will especially be conspicuous in its absence at this year’s induction. Jeff Beck was already inducted with the Yardbirds (the Rock Hall has honored over a dozen musicians twice), while Little Anthony and Bobby Womack are artists with limited influence. Metallica and Run-DMC have leapfrogged over the classic prog bands with their nominations, since members of both groups were still in school when progressive rock ruled.

The nomination situation
So who picked Run-DMC over Rush? Well, it’s a secret. Sort of.

According to Joel Peresman, president and CEO of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Foundation, Inc., the initial selections are made by a committee of 30 to 35 music business people — who Peresman won’t name (although Fox News purportedly revealed a few names in 2007).

Peresman does say, though, that the committee is made up of people from all different parts of the business: “There’s musicians, there’s writers, there’s critics, there’s people from the live end, (there’s) managers. (There’s) a wide selection of people who have all been selected because we feel that they have a good, solid connection to a wide variety of music. Everybody knows a lot about different things, which is what the idea is.”

When that committee gets together every September, all the members submit the names of three potential inductees. They then have to defend their choices, Peresman explains.

“It’s not really that this one sold this many albums or this many tickets,” explains Peresman. “It’s really ‘What’s the significance of that artist? And why should they be inducted?’”

After a lot of discussion, committee members take a vote and pick the top 20 favored artists. That list is then trimmed to nine — the names that get announced each year as nominees. From there the list gets sent out to a much larger group, which Peresman says is made up of “around 500 to 600 people,” including “past inductees and other people within the music business.” Their top five choices are the artists who are ultimately inducted.

Monster issues and critics
Rock critics, who comprise a portion of the nominating committee, have historically held prog rock in low regard, as Chicago Sun-Times music critic and author Jim DeRogatis noted in a 1998 Guitar World essay. Critics used to complain that prog’s grand-scale flourishes and European influences were too far removed from early rock ’n’ roll’s immediacy. But as DeRogatis presciently notes, prog is now ignored instead of insulted.

That seems to be what’s happening with the Rock Hall. Have they noticed?

“That’s something that’s actually been addressed, especially at this past meeting,” Peresman admits. “We look at things and see where there are some areas that we feel were kind of blighted — things that should be addressed. Last year was the first year that they did something different. They actually created some subcommittees within the major committee to say ‘Come up with a recommendation of a progressive act. Come up with a recommendation of some of the older R&B groups.’

“Besides Pink Floyd, we really don’t have much (progressive rock) in the Hall of Fame,” Peresman continues. “We realize that. And we’re taking a look to try and address some of those holes that we have in our place. So we just have to take a look at are we doing something right, wrong or indifferent.”

The Rock Hall’s very first choices for inductees sent the message that they wanted to set the record straight about rock ’n’ roll; specifically, that it was a genre shaped and founded by African-American artists. But now the Hall is creating its own misconceptions about what rock evolved into, suggests Scott Rowley, the editor of the U.K.-based magazine Classic Rock.

Click for related content

Vote: Do bands like Rush belong in the Rock Hall?

“Rush and Yes and ELO are as good and as loved and as worthy as most of the acts in the Hall,” noted Rowley via e-mail. “I think it’s very damaging to the Hall of Fame’s credibility to continually ignore bands that they perceive to be on ‘the fringes,’ whether they’re prog, punk or metal acts. It makes you wonder if the selection committee is actually run by music fans.

“We’re at a weird place in rock history where things aren’t as compartmentalized as they used to be — where people used to define themselves as mods or rockers or punks or metalheads. Nowadays people have access to everything and pick what they like. The idea of ‘a canon of rock music’ — established and defined by a musical elite — seems more and more ridiculous and untenable.”

Tony Sclafani is a regular MSNBC contributor and would nominate ELO and founder Roy Wood to the Rock Hall, if asked.

A discussion with Geddy Lee about "Retrospective 3"

2009-03-07T08:34:00.000-08:00

Rush fans out there are probably aware that Retrospective 3, the band's Atlantic era compilation, came out earlier this week.

The tracks on the CD; ranging from 1989's Presto to the latest studio offering, 2007's Snakes & Arrows, are shuffled and intended to play as its own CD. For that, I give it high marks. Those who pick up the double disc set with the DVD, however, are in for a real treat.

On the DVD, you get all their Atlantic-era videos, some of which are dated and others that are nothing too spectacular...however, DON'T MISS the video of "Malignant Narcissism," a TOTAL mind bender. There's also clips of the band on The Colbert Report, where the host interviews all three members of Rush with amusing questions, and they perform "Tom Sawyer" on the show (but not free of the host's musings, of course).

Here's an interesting interview with Geddy Lee on Jim Ladd's show (scroll down a bit) discussing Retrospective 3...it's pretty funny and has all sorts of anecdotes and new information...and you might, uh, learn something about Margaret Cho you never wanted to know.

"Malignant Narcissism" video from Retrospective 3 DVD

2009-03-07T08:20:00.000-08:00

For those of you who enjoy a good brainmelter, this should blow your hair back. Awesome, awesome stuff!

I can't figure out if the band put this together, or if this was from a fan on you tube and the band adopted it for their Retrospective 3 DVD set. I'd be curious to know more about the creation of it; I'll try to dig around when I have a chance.

I guess you might call this a lyrical analysis of sorts without actual lyrics...maybe a first of its kind in that regard? Anyway, enjoy it.

THE REVIEW CORNER -- Rush: Counterparts (1993, Atlantic)

2009-01-28T23:54:00.000-08:00

I'm way overdue for a review of a Rush CD...so here we go.

When I think of Rush in the 90s, I keep coming back to Counterparts. I find it to be their best work of that decade by a long shot...and there's several reasons why, which I'll get to in a minute.

I want to talk more about what influenced Rush to make Counterparts the way they did, rather than breaking down the songs on it.

Yes, I will touch on the tunes, but only briefly...go here to Amazon to read music reviews there if you want in-depth reviews of each song.

To fully understand the creation of Counterparts, it's helpful to know how the band built up to this project, and the world of music that was around them at the time. It lends weight to this fantastic album in the band's massive cannon.

When I refer to "90s Rush," four of the band's Atlantic era studio albums come to mind: Presto (1989), Roll the Bones (1991), Counterparts (1993) and Test for Echo (1996)...and, of course, those four studio albums were capped off by the band's 4th live album, Different Stages (1998), for which this blog is named. That ended the 4th (and last) cycle in which the band would follow four studio albums with a live project.

Even though Presto technically came out in November of 1989 (the day I turned 21, actually...and a happy birthday it was...I was ecstatic, actually...woohoo!), it's still very much a work of the early 90s and the first baby of the band's gradual return to an edgier sound (and the band toured on it in 1990, so songs from it evolved onstage that year).

While the 80s produced some incredible work from the band and served as a period where the band advanced its songwriting ~ rather than concentrating on chops, like it did in the 70s ~ the decade involved an unconscionable Omaha Beach caliber attack of synthesizers. While much of it added substance to the music, much of it is very dated...actually, it was dated even back then, LOL.

Presto marked the band's slow (and sometimes painful) return to guitar-driven rock. After all, you have one of the most dynamic and talented rock guitarists, instrumental songwriters, and live performers of all time in the band, Alex Lifeson...uh, it might be a good idea to unleash him a little more. It's widely agreed in Rush circles that the crunch of Alex's guitar was stifled by the 80s synth period...it doesn't take much listening to Presto's two studio predecessors, Power Windows and Hold Your Fire, to figure that out.

While 1991's Roll the Bones built on the new pattern of edgier guitar work started by Presto, it meandered a bit; featured a modest comeback with instrumental work, and even experimented with a little rap...but the band would soon get a BIG push in the direction of edgier music. After inspiring and mentoring countless younger bands, a music scene ~ and a new bass player on the scene ~ would inspire Rush and the band's evolution.

The advent of grunge and the Seattle Sound in 1991-92 would lay the groundwork for Counterparts. It was merely weeks after the release of Roll the Bones that Nevermind, Nirvana's classic, hit the airwaves. By 1992 the grunge scene was literally evolving week to week, and sky-rocketing with bands like Pearl Jam, Soundgarden, Alice in Chains, and Nirvana at the helm while Rush was on tour that year. Edgier alternative bands such as Smashing Pumpkins and Green Day, which essentially provided an advanced version of punk rock, were also tearing up the scene.

While this new music revolution out of Seattle caught the eye of Geddy, Alex and Neil ~ giving them ideas for the material in their next project ~ it's their opening band in 1991-92 that would prove to have equal if not more significant influence on several levels.

The opening band on the Roll the Bones tour, Primus, was out of the Bay Area and featured singer /bass player Les Claypool. While Primus was known for its silly onstage antics, goofy song themes, and album names like Sailing the Seas of Cheese and Pork Soda helped to loosen up the members of Rush on tour, it was Claypool's bass acrobatics that would inspire Geddy Lee (already a member of the bass hall of fame years before that time, if there's such a thing).

The thick trunk of Primus' sound is Claypool's dynamic bass work, which can only be described as a brainmelter. He experiments with many different methods on the instument, notably chord work, which by 1991 wasn't very widely utilized or known in the rock world. While Geddy had noodled around with bass chords and voiced them live onstage (see "By-Tor and the Snow Dog" on the Exit...Stage Left DVD), he hadn't explored them to the level of Claypool's experimentation.

Claypool's influence revolutionized Geddy Lee's approach to the bass. He was now attacking the instrument with more fervor, and getting more into bass chord voicings. Further study of the styles used by both bass players will reveal Claypool's "herky jerky" approach, while Ged tends to exhibit a smoother style that floats like a knife through butter ~ even when he advances his methodology to the bass like he did in 1991-92.

While Ged's bass work represents only one of several dynamic compononts in Rush, it can be argued that it was the driving force behind the edgier approach to the Counterparts sessions when they began. Recalling reading in music magazines at the time, Alex also came into the sessions with grunge CDs such as Dirt by Alice in Chains in his CD player; so he was ready for a more aggresive approach too.

The Counterparts sessions began like most other Rush projects, with Ged & Al jamming about on guitar and bass. This set them on track with songs such as "Stick it Out," "Animate" (the project's high-on-speed, opening assault), and "Cut to the Chase." Legend has it that Lifeson "banned" synthesizers from entering the studio, which caused some heated disagreements between he and Lee, and even some hot tempers, if recollections from my research at the time are accurate...but never fear, the band isn't breaking up, these guys are lifelong pals...so eventually they found some compromise, which I'll get to in a minute.

So the sessions continued in the manner they usually do with Rush, which the band had down like clockwork since this was their 15th studio project. Al & Ged jammed, wrote and experimented, Ged did some arranging while Al probably took a nap, drummer /lyricist Neil Peart soon came in with his contributions, everyone collaborated in polishing off the songwriting, then the album was recorded...and before long we had a CD that clocked in 11 tracks and about an hour's worth of music. Yep, that's how it happened in one short paragraph.

While the crown jewels of Counterparts are widely regarded to be "Animate" and "Nobody's Hero," the CD also contains some hidden gems; some of the most experimental music Rush put out between 1982's Signals and 2007's Snakes & Arrows.

Four "lost gems" come to mind from Counterparts, which are "Between Sun & Moon," "Alien Shore," "Double Agent," and "Leave that Thing Alone."

"Between Sun & Moon" finds Alex tweaking his sound to echo something one might expect from the likes of Mark Knopfler of Dire Straits. It also features interesting voicings from Geddy's singing, which seem to replace what would have been keyboards/synthesizers on an earlier project. It seems the band had found a way to keep everyone happy as the band continued on a track toward a less synth-driven, edgier rock sound.

"Alien Shore," from a lyrical standpoint, is arguably be the most sophisticated love song ever written. It also highlights the bass playing advancements of Ged, featuring one of the greatest bass solos in the history of recorded music. The solo does an excellent job of bringing out the influences and enhanced chops that Ged perfected prior to the Counterparts sessions...and when one considers that he's singing while doing it, it comes off as even more impressive.

"Double Agent" is the most interesting and experimental track on Counterparts, and to the delight of fans was performed live on the tour in 1993-94. In a successful attempt to articulate a dream sequence, Ged speaks poetry intermittent with singing lines to capture the essence of a mystical state of mind.

"Leave that Thing Alone" is the dark horse of Counterparts, and winds its way from soaring guitar motifs to almost amusing passages that sound like something out of a spy movie (I don't know if that's what the band intended, but that's how many fans interpreted it). "Leave That Thing Alone" is one of a handful of instrumentals in the band's catalog, and was on par with old instrumental classics "La Villa Strangiato" from Hemispheres (1978) and "YYZ" from Moving Pictures (1981) before "The Main Monkey Business," "Hope," and "Malignant Narcissism" appeared on Snakes & Arrows (2007) in a most shocking 1-2-3 punch.

Unique within the many studio works of Rush, this project thematically approached the issue of love and human relationships...so you get a few "love songs," if you will (Rush style, of course) on Counterparts. Just be warned, this is a little different from the love song styles of Sinatra, Perry Como, and Celine Dion.

Initally one wouldn't think "love song" themes wouldn't jive with Rush's sound, but the formula produces surprising and often very satisfying results on the second half of the disc in tunes such as "Alien Shore," "The Speed of Love," and "Cold Fire".

The project's closer, "Everyday Glory," boasts some Peart's most passionate and inspiring lyric writing to date, and he's almost prophetic...remember this was 1993:

"If the future's looking dark,
we're the ones who have to shine.
If there's no one in control,
we're the ones who draw the line.
Though we know we live in trying times,
we're the ones who have to try.
Though we know that time has wings,
we're the ones who have to fly."

So, that's it...that's Counterparts for you...definitely worth your time and money if you're not familiar with it. It's the stongest effort by Rush from the 1990s, and unleashes great songwriting with top-notch chops from the beginning to the very last track.

I know...I know...METAL hasn't been represented here

2009-01-14T09:43:00.000-08:00

Metal, in it's many forms and splendor, hasn't been represented on this blog.

Sorry to those metal fans out there. Maybe that will change and we can spice things up a bit around here soon.

If you can forgive me, it's been lost a bit for a combination of reasons. First, when it comes to the ballpark if you will of hard rock and heavy metal, I tend to gravitate toward the bands I really like.

While some of the bands I've covered ~ such as Rush and Porcupine Tree ~ can be interpreted as a sort of metal (some of those bands which appear in that metal documentary I mentioned some time back), I realize in the eyes of a true metal fan it's seen as something different, and that Rush, for example, probably doesn't qualify.

My other excuse would be that when I'm not talking about my favorite bands, my mind is occupied with other genres of music such as jazz, classical, blues, opera, etc.

What can I say, I like variety. I see variety as a good thing in that my life has become richer as a result.

Also, you never know...you could be a hardcore metal fan, and not realize that a jazz nut lies within...only because you haven't tried it yet!

While I have some knowledge of the big metal bands over the ages, there's definitely some folks out there who are more well-versed than I am. I'll try to feature it a bit more here.

The Jagger-Richards songwriting team

2008-12-30T11:41:00.000-08:00

If you know anything about the musical philosophies of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards, a.k.a. the "Glimmer Twins" and the songwriting team behind the Rolling Stones, you might be amazed the band has lasted as long as it has.

It certainly hasn't been without some turmoil...but then again, no long-lasting songwriting team has smooth sailing 100% of the time.

In the early 1960s, the Rolling Stones were born out of American musical styles such as R&B and traditional delta blues. Their influences originate in American artists such as Muddy Waters, Bo Diddley, and Chuck Berry, to name a few. They are graduate students of that genre of music, to say the least. The very name of the band was founded on a line from an song by one of those artists in the 1950s.

However, as time passed and the 1970s emerged, Jagger had the philosophy that the Stones needed to evolve and change with the times. It's Mick's direction that prompted the progress of the band into directions in the vein of "Dance Little Sister" from 1974's It's Only Rock and Roll, and "Miss You" from 1978's Some Girls.

Richard's philosophy was always more oriented in traditional blues, as he was less adventurous about noodling with the classic Rolling Stones sound that had ingrained itself in classic rock by the 1970s...songs that come to mind that are of the Richards forte might be things like "Sway" from 1971's Sticky Fingers and "Ventilator Blues" from 1972's Exile on Main St.

As the Stones entered the 1980s, these differences in musical philosophy -- in addition to a different philosophy of how to spend their time in their personal lives -- began to create a deepening rift between the two. As a result, the quality of output from the Stones in that decade suffered greatly...it got so bad that nearly all the material from 1986's Dirty Work was written independently, and even in some cases vocals and guitars were recorded in separate studios.

The results of this discombobulated approach reflected in the music, and the Stones essentially ceased for some time to be a living, breathing entity as they didn't tour for the better part of eight years.

Such a lack of exposure would normally mean certain death to most rock bands -- but hey, these are the Stones.

Luckily, Jagger and Richards realized that the results from working together was greater than the sum of its parts; so they had a reconciliation by the end of the 80s. By compromising on the makeup of songs on albums, agreeing to disagree, and utilizing their individual strengths, the band flourished once again. There is also no denying the mutual respect the two have formed for each other over the years as artists and friends.

While the material from the band since 1989's Steel Wheels has never really been up to par with their classic material from the 1960s and 70s, it has certainly produced some gems in their massive cannon and has given Stones fans plenty to chew on in the last 20-some years.

Hopefully we'll get a little more from this timeless and legendary songwriting team before their flame goes out.

Happenings in Rushdom: another interview with Alex

2008-12-23T04:53:00.000-08:00

You may recall a prior post recently involving a lengthy interview with the guitarist of Rush...well here's another interview with Alex Lifeson.

While it's over a week old (came out on 12/11), Big Al always gives an interesting and insightful interview.

This is the work of Greg Prato at UGO Music Blog.

It’s no secret that over the years Rush has had its fair share of detractors - namely, in the music press. But the veteran Canadian group - which has long consisted of singer/bassist Geddy Lee, guitarist Alex Lifeson, and drummer/lyricist Neil Peart - certainly has gotten the last laugh, as they are still scoring hit albums and selling out arenas worldwide, nearly 35 years after the release of their self-titled debut. Recently, Rush has issued their latest live DVD, Snakes & Arrows Live, which chronicles a pair of sold-out shows at the Ahoy Arena in Rotterdam, Netherlands, on October 16 and 17, 2007, and features a heaping helping of classics, album cuts not played in eons, and newer material. Lifeson recently gave UGO the scoop about the DVD, as well as Rush’s future plans.

Let’s start with the new DVD, Snakes & Arrows Live...

Alex Lifeson: Well, towards the end of the [2007 European] tour, in Rotterdam, we had two days there - we had a day off before and a day off after. So it allowed us to get in on a set-up date, and having the second date, gave us the opportunity to get some really cool long shots and crowd shots. I think we had a fourteen-camera set-up - shot all in HD. It sounds really, really good. It’s funny with us - we always wait until the last minute to do these things, and I don’t know why we do that. We would probably be better off to think about doing something earlier in the tour. But it always turns out this way. Actually, one of the advantages is we’re pretty confident with our playing and the set feels pretty good. We’re quite pleased with it.

Why didn’t the DVD come out at the same time as the Snakes & Arrows CD (which was released in April)?

Alex Lifeson: The CD came out just prior to us going back out on the road - it gave us a little boost I think, in terms of making everybody aware that we were going back out for the second half of the tour. But these things take a while. To do the 5.1 mix is always time-consuming. So, we were able to get a stereo mix out quite easily.

How would you say that particular tour compared to others - as far as the band’s playing?

Alex Lifeson: I think we played the best we’ve ever played. As we get older - as we “mature” - there is a newfound confidence in our playing and the way we approach what we do. I thought we were really settled night-to-night - tempos were very consistent throughout the whole tour. You’re always making little improvements sonically. And there was a really good crispness and clarity to the sound - both out in the house as well as in internally in our monitors. And that always gets you playing a lot better. It was really night-to-night very settled - not often do I feel that way, or any of us feel that way. You come off a tour, and you figure you’ve done a dozen shows where you feel you played really well. This was night-to-night - we felt really confident and really good about the shows.

What about standout memories of that particular performance that night in Rotterdam?

Alex Lifeson: It was a very relaxed night - which is unusual, for that kind of “pressure” night. Whenever we’re recording, there’s always a sense of tension on stage. But we were really relaxed that night, and I think it was because we had the two nights. We were in the European portion - halfway through it - and we really enjoy traveling through Europe, so we were all in a pretty good headspace and relaxed. And I think it shows - there are moments throughout the DVD where there is interplay between the three of us and the audience - and you sense that we’re having fun.

Over the past few tours, Rush has brought back songs that have rarely been played live. How was it playing songs such as “Digital Man,” “Entre Nous,” and “Mission” again?

Alex Lifeson: It was fantastic. To play those songs that we hadn’t played before - or in a long time - was really nice. And the reaction from the crowd was great. I think Rush fans really enjoyed hearing some of those things that you don’t normally hear. On the second half of the tour, we switched things around a little bit and brought in some other ones - “Ghost of a Chance,” for example, and that exists on the DVD, as well. It’s almost like a bootleg session on the DVD, so there’s a nice variety there. And then all the “comedy stuff” that we try to do between the songs and at the opening and closing of the show is really fun, and there are some outtakes from those film sessions. It gives a whole different perspective on us and the individuals in the band.

Any obscure songs that you’d like to see make their way into the set in the future?

Alex Lifeson: I’m always toying with that idea - of really doing a tour, or a set, of more obscure stuff. Kind of stay away from “Tom Sawyer” and “The Spirit of Radio,” and explore some more obscure songs. I think the thing with us is, it’s “An Evening With,” and these are Rush fans that are there to see us play, and I think we can play just about anything we’ve written, and it would be accepted and there would be great interested in it. It would be really great to play those songs - for us to go on tour and play material that we haven’t played in 20 or 30 years...or ever. It would be a different tour, and something I hope we’ll consider seriously. It would be really interesting for us, I think. Playing “Ghost of a Chance” live, I felt like the song was reborn. There was a power, intensity, and dynamics to the song, that don’t come across quite the same as the recorded version. And when you play it now - or any of these older songs - we attack it differently. It’s kind of cool.

Looking back on the early years, I’ve read that Rush toured with Kiss in 1975.

Alex Lifeson: That was our first kind of “big tour.” We had started touring in ‘74 - we were opening for a few different bands. But the Kiss tour...and this was the start of their career, as well. The tour that we did with them, we opened for them, and we were playing 3,000-5,000 seat halls. They were a new band, and no one had really heard of them. So we did a lot of work with them - we probably toured with them for 60 or 70 shows. Back in those days, we were doing 200 to 250 shows a year anyways. But we toured with them over a fairly long period of time. We were very close and we had a lot of fun. We were both young bands, and quite different from each other - I think that was a nice compliment playing together. But like a lot of things, you sort of drift apart over the years. We stayed in touch for a while, but not so much in the past ten years or so.

Any specific memories of that tour?

Alex Lifeson: It was always a crazy scene at the end of tours - they’d plaster us with cream pies, there was always some sort of surprise lurking around a corner! And certainly, there were some fun nights - parties and things like that. They lived a little more of a “rock n’ roll lifestyle” than we did.

I’ve noticed in recent years, you’ve made the jump back to Gibson guitars - what prompted that switch?

Alex Lifeson: I just felt like a change, to be honest - it came down to that. I didn’t have any problem with what I was using - I was using primarily Paul Reed Smith guitars before - and I’ve always said that I love those guitars, they’re so beautifully built. But there’s something about a Les Paul in particular that’s so classic and traditional. I just felt that I wanted to go back to that place. I started working with Gibson, and they were very open and helpful - in developing the things I wanted, and worked very closely with Pat Foley at Gibson. I’ve been very happy with that relationship. We’ve been working on some models that have been inspired that some of the guitars that I have and some of the needs that I have. So it’s been a pretty good relationship with them of late.

I’ve also heard that you’re a big fan of the TV show ‘Family Guy.’ Is this true, and which other shows are your favorites?

Alex Lifeson: Oh, everybody watches ‘Family Guy’! It’s become so popular. What else do I watch… jeez, my wife and I started watching ‘Boston Legal’ for some reason - the first season, and really liked the writing. So we got the whole series and we’ve been watching it. ‘Dexter’ I enjoy quite a bit. I just got a Blu-ray player, so I’m building up my collection of Blu-ray discs, and watching a lot of that stuff. I got that ‘Planet Earth’ series - it’s just so stunning! And I got a series on dinosaurs that I watch with my grandson. ‘When We Left Earth,’ some IMAX stuff.

Recently, Rolling Stone featured the band in its magazine - how does it feel to be embraced all these years later by magazines and media that were once not so kind to the band?

Alex Lifeson: That’s nice, it’s a nice compliment. It was nice to do the interview for that - the writer was really a very pleasant guy and smart. We spent the better part of a week during rehearsals, and Chris [Norris] got into different aspects of our lives - I thought he did quite a good job. We didn’t have a very good relationship with Rolling Stone for a long time, so it was nice to be over that, and we couldn’t even remember why it was like that in the first place. Maybe it’s because we’ve been around for as long as we’ve been, and we’re still at it, and we like to think of ourselves as a “vital” kind of a band. We don’t do these nostalgia tours - there’s nothing wrong with that, but that’s not for us. I think begrudgingly, a lot of these non-supporters give us a little bit of respect for sticking around for so long.

What are Rush’s future plans? A new studio album?

Alex Lifeson: We finished the tour in July, and we were exhausted. We had been working hard for the last seven or eight years - I think we’d done four tours, four albums, and a bunch of DVD’s. Constantly working. And we all just need to get away from it. So our plan for the next year is to not even think about the band. And then jump into it fresh. I mean, there’s a bunch of stuff that we have coming out - the DVD, and we were part of a film called ‘I Love You, Man,’ that is coming out in the new year. A couple of other film things. There’s lots to keep us “plugged in” for the next little while, but we just want to clear our minds of the whole business for a little bit, and jump into it with a renewed energy. Maybe not this late next year, but sometime in the fall of next year, I think we’ll get together. Having said that, Ged and I have this habit of getting together sooner than later, and casually starting to do some work. So if we get bored in the new year, we might advance that schedule a little bit. But right now, we’re thinking about next fall.

FROM THE VAULT -- Taking Sandler's "Ode to My Car" for a new spin

2008-12-16T09:35:00.000-08:00

Back in 1996-97, this Adam Sandler tune "Ode to My Car" (off the album What the Hell Happened to Me?) was all over the radio.

For those of you who are big Sandler fans or were paying attention at the time, you might recall the song came in a few versions. There was the uncensored version on the CD, then there was a version with standard bleeps, which can be found on a CD single (long out of print, I believe)...then there was the version common on the radio -- which I consider the best -- where the bleeps are in the form of an "orchestra" of car horns.

Apart from an Adam Sandler SNL greatest hits video that's floating around out there, I'd argue What the Hell Happened to Me? is his best work. I have the CD with the uncensored version.

I've been unsuccessful in finding a CD version of "Ode to My Car" with the car horn bleeps, until I thought of looking it up on the tube, and voila! I still get a laugh out of this...and the video, seen below, gives some added interest.

Milan's Teatro La Scala: A fitting introduction to opera

2008-12-13T11:21:00.000-08:00

2006 was a big year for travel, and part of it involved venturing across the pond to Italy.

While Milan, in northern Italy, represented the gateway in and out of the country; research and advisement revealed that it didn't provide much in the way of tourist attractions...at least not like the other places Italy is known for.

As a matter of fact, Milan was considered rather unfriendly to tourists, as experience would also reveal.

However, like everything else in life, there are exceptions to that notion. While there weren't many attractions in the nation's financial capital, there was still a beautiful Cathedral (the third largest in Europe), the Arcadia (touted as the world's first indoor mall), and a fresco many of you might have heard of called The Last Supper.

Then, last but not least, there was the La Scala opera house.

While I'd studied up on a small degree of opera, I had never witnessed one live...so why not start with one -- if not THE -- most revered opera house in the world?

Hey, why not. We're here, aren't we?

La Scala was more about the history and the facility than the opera of that evening; it was about admiring a classic locale that countless operas had been performed in for literally hundreds of years.

The performance that night had lots of variety -- although I couldn't tell you a single word that was sung, as it was all in Italian, of course. The choice that evening was Dido and Aeneas, which blended together a creative balance of singing, acting, and ballet. It had a little bit of everything, which provided a colorful smorgasbord for newbies (yes, my hand is raised).

Our tickets were at the top row, waaaaaaaaaaay in the back, and definitely NOT on the railing, as the view was a bit obstructed. This wasn't like the upper deck of Yankee Stadium, this was the view from the circling blimp above the ballpark (hey, at least we weren't in the HORRIFIC BLIMP SHADOW...uh, inside joke). Needless to say, the quality of sight lines didn't seem to be on the minds of opera house architects and designers hundreds of years ago; at least not for the pobrecitos in the upper deck.

Nevertheless, the opera was enjoyable despite the fact that the story was difficult to follow (I'm not exactly up on my Italian, let alone understanding it while sung at a high octave). The idea of the story was more or less followed through the dancing and acting, which was very interesting and a feast for the eyes.

When the final act ended and the actors/singers took their final bows, I snuck up to the balcony and got a few shots of the massive chandelier that hung down from the high ceiling (see photo above).

I'll leave you with a rather comprehesive history on La Scala, courtesy of wikipedia...come on, get cultured, peeps! You'll learn something new today...and if you're here already, do you really have anything better to do with your time?:

Teatro La Scala

The Teatro alla Scala (or La Scala, as it is known), in Milan, Italy, is one of the world's most famous opera houses. The theatre was inaugurated on 3 August 1778, under the name Nuovo Regio Ducal Teatro alla Scala with Salieri's Europa riconosciuta. La Scala's season traditionally opens on 7 December, Saint Ambrose's Day, the feast day of Milan's patron saint. All performances must end before midnight; long operas start earlier in the evening if need be. Ticketholders are not allowed to enter after the performance has begun.

The La Scala Museum (Museo Teatrale alla Scala), accessible from the theatre's foyer and a part of the house, contains an extraordinary collection of paintings, drafts, statues, costumes, and other documents regarding opera and La Scala's history.

La Scala also hosts the Accademia d’Arti e Mestieri dello Spettacolo (Academy for the Performing Arts). Its goal is to train a new generation of young musicians, technical staff, and dancers (at the Scuola di Ballo del Teatro alla Scala, one of the Academy's divisions).

History

A fire destroyed the previous theatre, the ancient Teatro Ducale, on 25 February 1776, after a carnival gala. A group of ninety wealthy Milanese, who owned palchi (private boxes) in the theatre, wrote to Archduke Ferdinand I of Austria asking for a new theatre and a provisional one to be used while completing the new one. The neoclassical architect Giuseppe Piermarini produced an initial design but it was rejected by Count Firmian (the governor of the then Austrian Lombardy).

A second plan was accepted in 1776 by Empress Maria Theresa. The new theatre was built on the former location of the church of Santa Maria della Scala, from which the theatre gets its name. The church was deconsecrated and demolished, and over a period of two years the theatre was completed by Pietro Marliani, Pietro Nosetti and Antonio and Giuseppe Fe. This theatre had a total over 3,000 seats organized into 678 pit-stalls, arranged in six tiers of boxes above which is the 'loggione' or two galleries. Now the stage is one of the largest in Italy (16.15m d x 20.4m w x 26m h).

Building expenses were covered by the sale of palchi, which were lavishly decorated by their owners, impressing observers such as Stendhal. La Scala (as it soon became to be known) soon became the preeminent meeting place for noble and wealthy Milanese people. In the tradition of the times, the platea (the main floor) had no chairs and spectators watched the shows standing up. The orchestra was in full sight, as the golfo mistico (orchestra pit) had not yet been built.

Above the boxes, La Scala has always had a gallery where the less wealthy can watch the performances. It is called the loggione. The loggione is typically crowded with the most critical opera aficionados, who can be ecstatic or merciless towards singers' perceived successes or failures. La Scala's loggione is considered a baptism of fire in the opera world, and fiascos are long remembered. (One recent incident occurred in 2006 when tenor Roberto Alagna was booed off the stage during a performance of Aïda, forcing an understudy to replace him mid-scene wearing street clothes.) As with most of the theaters at that time, La Scala was also a casino, with gamblers sitting in the foyer.

La Scala was originally illuminated with eighty-four oil lamps mounted on the palcoscenico and another thousand in the rest of theater. To prevent the risks of fire, several rooms were filled with hundreds of water buckets. In time, oil lamps were replaced by gas lamps, these in turn were replaced by electric lights in 1883.

The original structure was renovated in 1907, when it was given its current layout with 2,800 seats. In 1943, during WWII, La Scala was severely damaged by bombing. It was rebuilt and reopened on 11 May 1946, with a memorable concert conducted by Arturo Toscanini, with a soprano solo by Renata Tebaldi, which created a sensation.

La Scala hosted the prima (first production) of many famous operas, and had a special relationship with Giuseppe Verdi. For several years, however, Verdi did not allow his work to be played here, as some of his music had been modified (he said "corrupted") by the orchestra. This dispute originated in a disagreement over the production of his Giovanna d'Arco in 1845; however the composer later conducted his Requiem there on 25 May 1874, and in 1886 announced that La Scala would host the premiere of his opera Otello.^[1] The premiere of his last opera, Falstaff was also given in the theatre.

In 1982, the Filarmonica della Scala was established, drawing its members from the larger pool of musicians that comprise the Orchestra della Scala.

Major rennovation 2002-2004

Following the traditional 7 December 2001 season opening performances of Otello, which ran through December, the theatre was closed for renovation^[2] and, from 19 January 2002 to November 2004, the opera company was transferred to the new Teatro degli Arcimboldi, built in the Pirelli-Bicocca industrial area 4.5 miles from the city centre.

The renovation by the renowned architect Mario Botta proved controversial, as preservationists feared that historic details would be lost; however, the opera company was said to be impressed with improvements to the structure and the sound quality, which was enhanced when the heavy red carpets in the hall were removed. The stage was entirely re-constructed, and an enlarged backstage will allow more sets to be stored, permitting more productions, and the seats now include monitors for the electronic libretto system, allowing audiences to follow opera libretti in English and Italian in addition to the original language.

Conducted by Riccardo Muti, the opera house re-opened on 7 December 2004 with a production of Salieri's Europa riconosciuta, the opera which was performed at La Scala's inauguration in 1778. ^[3]. Tickets for the re-opening fetched up to €2,000. The renovations cost a reported €61 million, and left a budget shortfall that the opera house did not overcome until 2006.^[4]

Rush has beer named after them...NOT KIDDING.

2008-12-12T23:26:00.000-08:00

Hey. Don't ask me how I find out about this stuff.

The Flat Earth Brewing Company out of Minnesota has their dark porter beer in tribute to Rush, and has named it the Cygnus X-1, after the last track from their 1977 prog masterpiece A Farewell to Kings.

It doesn't end there.

Apparently there's a beer tasting on the brewery calendar that involves a half dozen or so versions of beers named after Rush-isms.

Engine room, where is my drink.

See the site rushisaband.com for details:

Earlier this year I'd mentioned the Flat Earth Brewing Company in Saint Paul Minnesota because they feature a Cyngnus-X1 Porter as a tribute to their favorite band - Rush. For the month of December, they are holding their Porterfest event at the brewery and featuring several additional infused versions of the their Rush inspired Porter. Here's the calendar along with the featured brews:

* 12/4 - Hold Your Fire Porter - Spice & Ancho Pepper infused Porter
* 12/11 - Mystic Rhythms Porter - Raspberry infused Porter
* 12/18 - Freewill Porter - Vanilla infused Porter
* 12/23 - Snow Dog Porter - Peppermint infused Porter
* 12/31 - Big Money Porter - Wood aged Porter

Fledgling band LIVE revealed in a 1994 road trip

2008-12-09T17:44:00.000-08:00

Live has been one of the more interesting bands to come along in the last 20 years.

They're out of Pennsylvania and carved a hard-driving prog-alternative sound all their own out of the late 80s; when big hair metal reigned, bands with jangly guitars like R.E.M. were leading the way in the alternative college radio movement, and a grunge scene was taking shape in Seattle.

Somehow, Live evolved very much immune to all those other trends at the time...or so their sound seems to indicate.

I'd like to say that I was in on it early on, through the success and glory of the Throwing Copper era in 1994-95. For you stat nuts out there, Throwing Copper is the only album in Billboard history to go Number 1 after being on the charts for 52 weeks.

For you calculus crunchers out there, 52 weeks = 1 year. Woooow man, trippy stuff!

In 1994, a few months after my graduation from ASU, I was still living in Tempe and gearing up for graduate school in the fall. That summer, to break away from the Arizona heat, a friend and I hit the road for California to visit a mutual buddy for a weekend of music.

The focus of our visit centered around catching the band Yes live, at the Greek Theater located in the hills north of L.A. They were touring off the Talk album, which if I recall correctly was their last project involving Trevor Rabin.

Part of the weekend also involved going to the campus of UCLA to see a newer band called "Live" at a free gig. I had never heard of them before, but our friend we were visiting said that he'd heard good things.

The show took place in the middle of a courtyard to what I recall as a space in front of a student union building...pretty much smack dab in the middle of campus, in a rather random spot. Photos of the event do exist, and are currently packed away in a box...when they reveal themselves again, I'll be sure to share.

At that time, Throwing Copper had been out for several months and was slowly starting to receive radio airplay, but hadn't taken off yet...so the band was culling their set list from that album and their first project, 1991's Mental Jewelry.

There was an opening band, whose name I'm trying to recall...("Dig" perhaps?) I'll follow up on that. Whoever they were, they didn't make much of an impact and never took off.

Live, however, had an unmistakable energy...they seemed to have a combination of electric jamming musicianship and heady, passionate lyrics...maybe like a hard alternative cross between Rush and U2.

Extensive online research for the set list on that day is still in the works. Interestingly enough, I have a vague memory of one of my friends grabbing the written set list that was onstage that day.

As another year progressed, the band would continue to grow into a massive phenomenon. By 1995 they were the "cool thing" and all over the radio. I would see them a second time; this time around it would be with 20,000 others at the Desert Sky Pavilion in Phoenix. By this time the band was clearly at it's popular height.

However...that day, back in Santa Monica, I discovered a favorite newer band born out of the 1990s -- in their fledgling days.

Rush is back: an interview with Alex Lifeson

2008-12-02T16:27:00.000-08:00

Well, for me, they never really went anywhere, with the exception of the hiatus in the late 90s, and that was due to exceptional circumstances out of the band's control.

This is more for the general public and how the band has been received in that light. It's one of the better interviews about the band of recent history...it gives some interesting insights into their future.

The Rosetta Stone on how they've kept it going for so long? It's simpler than you might think.

Friendship.

In addition to touring ceaselessly, that's the essential ingredient that's kept the band alive for so long...but it's more fun to hear about it straight from them than to hear me go on and on, so I'll shut up now.

Rush is Back: Pop culture proclaims the formerly dorky band cool
By KIRK BAIRD
BLADE STAFF WRITER
Rush has spent nearly 35 years being uncool; the antidote to hip.

Its songs have been derided by critics as musically out of fashion, and lyrically obtuse. (Drummer Neil Peart, who writes the songs, was chosen by Blender magazine as second only to Sting as worst rock lyricist.)

But it’s not just critics who’ve slagged the band.

In the 1999 movie SLC Punk! a flashback to future Salt Lake City punkers Stevo and Bob shows the pair as junior high school nerds playing Dungeons and Dragons in a basement while listening to Rush’s “Trees,” an allegorical tale set in a forest. Then Bob offers something “new” — “Kiss Me Deadly” by Generation X — and their lives change.

The indie film’s message is less than subtle: Rush is a fossil; even worse, it’s the group of choice for teenage dorks, geeks, and nerds alike.

But the winds of fortune have changed in Rush’s favor, beginning with a Rolling Stone profile of the band in its July 10 issue, a first for the magazine.

Suddenly, Rush is everywhere: performing its biggest hit, “Tom Sawyer,” on The Colbert Report; appearing on VH-1 Classic in a 24-hour marathon of the band’s concerts and videos titled “Rush Hashanah” during the Jewish New Year, and having its bestselling album, “Moving Pictures,” available as a complete download in the game Rock Band (one of only a handful of records available so far).

And next year, just in time for the band’s 35th birthday, look for a Rush documentary and a cameo by the band members in the comedy I Love You, Man, starring Paul Rudd, Jason Segel, and Jon Favreau, punctuated by an induction into the Hollywood Walk of Fame.

Given all the love that’s coming the band’s way, dare we now proclaim Rush cool? Perhaps. And how does all this attention make band members feel? Surprised, said guitarist Alex Lifeson, after an early morning spent on the phone talking to reporters to promote the band’s just-released Snakes and Arrows Live DVD.

“We’ve always sort of been outside — well, maybe not a little bit — we’ve always been kind of outside the mainstream, we’ve done things our own way,” Lifeson said. “We have a very strong core following that’s been very loyal and stuck with us for all these years and allowed us to function that way without having a broader appeal. To suddenly be asked to be in films, of course the Rolling Stone thing, and the Stephen Colbert — all these things ... it makes us smile that all of a sudden Rush is a cool thing, when we have not been a very cool thing for a very long time.”
The Canadian power trio — rounded out by Geddy Lee on bass, vocals, and keyboards — are praised by musicians and fans for the members’ prodigious instrumental skills, showcased in early epic prog rock songs about black holes, Greek gods, and totalitarian societies.

As the band members grew older, though, their music matured. They left behind the concept albums to focus on thematic records about the human condition, and social commentary — often with a libertarian point of view.

The band’s sound also grew tighter, smarter, and more straightforward.
In more than three decades of recording, Rush has released 24 records, 17 of which are studio recordings. All 24 of those records have gone Gold, 14 of them have been certified Platinum, and three have gone multiple Platinum. In fact, Rush ranks behind the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Aerosmith for the most consecutive gold or platinum records by a rock group, for total sales of 25 million records in the United States alone. Rush released its first, eponymous LP in 1974 in Canada on its own label, with little interest in exporting the record to U.S. listeners. Then Donna Halper, then program director at WMMS-FM in Cleveland, played the import on her late-night radio show and everything changed. The album “got really great phone response,” Lifeson recalled, and Halper reached out to a friend at Mercury Records in Chicago. Within a week the band was signed and began a tour with Peart now manning the skins. (Rutsey left the band for health reasons — he was diabetic — which made it difficult for him to tour.)

“Neil was in the band for two weeks before we did our first gig, so it didn’t allow a lot of time to go over a lot of material,” Lifeson said. “Granted, for the most part we were just opening, so we were only playing for 20-30 minutes. At that time that was only two songs, ‘Finding My Way’ and ‘Working Man,’ but we were also doing some headline club gigs, so we needed to have some decent amount of material. We used to rehearse in the van and in hotel rooms, as much as we could, and then we’d go into these clubs.”

FROM THE VAULT -- 1972 Stones footage

2008-11-24T07:18:00.000-08:00

Yes, the Stones renaissance at the Music Project continues.

This time we're featuring footage from the 1972 Stones Traveling Party tour, which was off the heels of their most acclaimed studio album, Exile on Main St.

Featured songs in this 9 minute clip are "Bitch" and "Gimme Shelter."

The footage seen here was part of a live movie release in 1974, Ladies and Gentlemen the Rolling Stones, in which speaker systems were set up in movie houses to what was referred to as "quadrophonic sound" (the precursor to 5.1 surround sound).

Unfortunately this movie has never been released on DVD...and I'm not even sure it ever came out on VHS either. Interesting, considering it's the band seemingly at it's all-time peak during the Mick Taylor era. Richards plays lead guitar on "Bitch" while Taylor takes the lead on "Gimme Shelter." Flapping lips and countless gestures of innuendo are abound from Mr. Jagger, in the silly delivery as only he knows how.

FROM THE VAULT -- "She's So Cold" is vintage Jagger

2008-11-21T07:53:00.000-08:00

Since we're on a roll with the Stones, who's stopping us now?

If you've never seen the vid for "She's So Cold," IMO the strongest track from 1980's Emotional Rescue, it's essential viewing. This is Mick Jagger at his absolute peak as an entertainer bathing in over-the-top silliness. All those funny faces and bizarre gestures...you gotta love this guy's shtick.

I believe the video first appeared on Video Rewind in the early 80s (back when all you had were cassettes and video tape, which you had to "rewind"...get it?). Nearly 30 years (and repeated viewings) later, I still get a kick out of this.

FROM THE VAULT -- The Stones' "Waiting on a Friend"

2008-11-21T07:28:00.000-08:00

This has long been one of my favorites by the Stones...there's some special memories attached to it. While it's a bit dated - in most humorous fashion - the video's worth a spin.

Exploring 60s Stones

2008-11-20T07:37:00.000-08:00

It was inevitable, even though it took a very, very long time. I'm making a swing back towards the Stones, and it's their early stuff I'm finally taking interest in.

With the exception of their hits from the 60s (specifically 1963-67), I've never fully explored this early period of the band. I do know, however, everything from Beggars Banquet (1968) on...by heart, pretty much.

I recall telling myself years ago, or thinking to myself, that there would be a time and place in the future to noodle through the early Stones.

There were a couple of reasons for this.

Many of their albums had cover songs. I seem to gravitate toward original work.
I wasn't that taken by the raw bluesy sound of their music from the 60s...my tastes needed to evolve a bit.
They needed to remaster their 60s catalog.

They finally remastered their catalog from that period in 2002 on hybrid CD/SACD technology...so I've begun with the 3-CD compilation The Singles Collection * The London Years. It digs very deep through their period on ABKO, and plugs all the holes that their other 60s albums can't since there were several singles out there that never made it to album such as their very first recorded single "Come On," along with more well known tunes like "19th Nervous Breakdown" and "Jumping Jack Flash."

From what I understand, the lineup of CDs to canvass the pre-Beggars Banquet period goes as follows:

England's Newest Hitmakers (first album)
The Rolling Stones NOW!
Out of Our Heads
12x5
Aftermath (UK reissue)
Between the Buttons
Their Satanic Majesties Request

That looks like quite a bit of work, but I look forward to it. It would be cool to shuffle the Stones on the iPod, and get "She's So Cold" from 1980's Emotional Rescue playing after "Out of Time," for example.

For those of you who are curious to read more about the Stones, I've thrown an overview of their career in here...I've marked it up with some headings to navigate through, as it's a bit exhaustive.

THE ROLLING STONES: An Interesting and Comprehensive Overview

By the time the Rolling Stones began calling themselves the World's Greatest Rock & Roll Band in the late '60s, they had already staked out an impressive claim on the title.

A Condensed Overview

As the self-consciously dangerous alternative to the bouncy Merseybeat of the Beatles in the British Invasion, the Stones had pioneered the gritty, hard-driving blues-based rock & roll that came to define hard rock. With his preening machismo and latent maliciousness, Mick Jagger became the prototypical rock frontman, tempering his macho showmanship with a detached, campy irony while Keith Richards and Brian Jones wrote the blueprint for sinewy, interlocking rhythm guitars. Backed by the strong yet subtly swinging rhythm section of bassist Bill Wyman and drummer Charlie Watts, the Stones became the breakout band of the British blues scene, eclipsing such contemporaries as the Animals and Them.

Over the course of their career, the Stones never really abandoned blues, but as soon as they reached popularity in the U.K., they began experimenting musically, incorporating the British pop of contemporaries like the Beatles, Kinks, and Who into their sound. After a brief dalliance with psychedelia, the Stones re-emerged in the late '60s as a jaded, blues-soaked hard rock quintet.

The Stones always flirted with the seedy side of rock & roll, but as the hippie dream began to break apart, they exposed and reveled in the new rock culture. It wasn't without difficulty, of course. Shortly after he was fired from the group, Jones was found dead in a swimming pool, while at a 1969 free concert at Altamont, a concertgoer was brutally killed during the Stones' show. But the Stones never stopped going.

For the next 30 years, they continued to record and perform, and while their records weren't always blockbusters, they were never less than the most visible band of their era -- certainly, none of their British peers continued to be as popular or productive as the Stones. And no band since has proven to have such a broad fan base or far-reaching popularity, and it is impossible to hear any of the groups that followed them without detecting some sort of influence, whether it was musical or aesthetic.

Pre-band evolution

Throughout their career, Mick Jagger (vocals) and Keith Richards (guitar, vocals) remained at the core of the Rolling Stones. The pair initially met as children at Dartford Maypole County Primary School. They drifted apart over the next ten years, eventually making each other's acquaintance again in 1960, when they met through a mutual friend, Dick Taylor, who was attending Sidcup Art School with Richards. At the time, Jagger was studying at the London School of Economics and playing with Taylor in the blues band Little Boy Blue and the Blue Boys. Shortly afterward, Richards joined the band.

Within a year, they had met Brian Jones (guitar, vocals), a Cheltenham native who had dropped out of school to play saxophone and clarinet. By the time he became a fixture on the British blues scene, Jones had already had a wild life. He ran away to Scandinavia when he was 16; by that time, he had already fathered two illegitimate children. He returned to Cheltenham after a few months, where he began playing with the Ramrods. Shortly afterward, he moved to London, where he played in Alexis Korner's group, Blues Inc. Jones quickly decided he wanted to form his own group and advertised for members; among those he recruited was the heavyset blues pianist Ian Stewart.

As he played with his group, Jones also moonlighted under the name Elmo Jones at the Ealing Blues Club. At the pub, he became reacquainted with Blues, Inc., which now featured drummer Charlie Watts, and, on occasion, cameos by Jagger and Richards. Jones became friends with Jagger and Richards, and they soon began playing together with Taylor and Stewart; during this time, Mick was elevated to the status of Blues, Inc.'s lead singer. With the assistance of drummer Tony Chapman, the fledgling band recorded a demo tape. After the tape was rejected by EMI, Taylor left the band to attend the Royal College of Art; he would later form the Pretty Things. Before Taylor's departure, the group named itself the Rolling Stones, borrowing the moniker from a Muddy Waters song.

1962 - First live performance

The Rolling Stones gave their first performance at the Marquee Club in London on July 12, 1962. At the time, the group consisted of Jagger, Richards, Jones, pianist Ian Stewart, drummer Mick Avory, and Dick Taylor, who had briefly returned to the fold. Weeks after the concert, Taylor left again and was replaced by Bill Wyman, formerly of the Cliftons. Avory also left the group -- he would later join the Kinks -- and the Stones hired Tony Chapman, who proved to be unsatisfactory. After a few months of persuasion, the band recruited Charlie Watts, who had quit Blues, Inc. to work at an advertising agency once the group's schedule became too hectic.

1963 - First singles emerge

By 1963, the band's lineup had been set, and the Stones began an eight-month residency at the Crawdaddy Club, which proved to substantially increase their fan base. It also attracted the attention of Andrew Loog Oldham, who became the Stones' manager, signing them from underneath Crawdaddy's Giorgio Gomelsky. Although Oldham didn't know much about music, he was gifted at promotion, and he latched upon the idea of fashioning the Stones as the bad-boy opposition to the clean-cut Beatles. At his insistence, the large yet meek Stewart was forced out of the group, since his appearance contrasted with the rest of the group. Stewart didn't disappear from the Stones; he became one of their key roadies and played on their albums and tours until his death in 1985.

With Oldham's help, the Rolling Stones signed with Decca Records, and that June, they released their debut single, a cover of Chuck Berry's "Come On." The single became a minor hit, reaching number 21, and the group supported it with appearances on festivals and package tours. At the end of the year, they released a version of Lennon-McCartney's "I Wanna Be Your Man" that soared into the Top 15. Early in 1964, they released a cover of Buddy Holly's "Not Fade Away," which shot to number three. "Not Fade Away" became their first American hit, reaching number 48 that spring. By that time, the Stones were notorious in their homeland.

Considerably rougher and sexier than the Beatles, the Stones were the subject of numerous sensationalistic articles in the British press, culminating in a story about the band urinating in public. All of these stories cemented the Stones as a dangerous, rebellious band in the minds of the public, and had the effect of beginning a manufactured rivalry between them and the Beatles, which helped the group rocket to popularity in the U.S.

1964 - First album

In the spring of 1964, the Stones released their eponymous debut album, which was followed by "It's All Over Now," their first U.K. number one. That summer, they toured America to riotous crowds, recording the Five by Five EP at Chess Records in Chicago in the midst of the tour. By the time it was over, they had another number one U.K. single with Howlin' Wolf's "Little Red Rooster." Although the Stones had achieved massive popularity, Oldham decided to push Jagger and Richards into composing their own songs, since they -- and his publishing company -- would receive more money that away.

In June of 1964, the group released their first original single, "Tell Me (You're Coming Back)," which became their first American Top 40 hit. Shortly afterward, a version of Irma Thomas' "Time Is on My Side" became their first U.S. Top Ten. It was followed by "The Last Time" in early 1965, a number one U.K. and Top Ten U.S. hit that began a virtually uninterrupted string of Jagger-Richards hit singles. Still, it wasn't until the group released "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction" in the summer of 1965 that they were elevated to superstars.

1965 - "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction"

Driven by a fuzz-guitar riff designed to replicate the sound of a horn section, "Satisfaction" signaled that Jagger and Richards had come into their own as songwriters, breaking away from their blues roots and developing a signature style of big, bluesy riffs and wry, sardonic lyrics. It stayed at number one for four weeks and began a string of Top Ten singles that ran for the next two years, including such classics as "Get off My Cloud," "19th Nervous Breakdown," "As Tears Go By," and "Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby, Standing in the Shadow?"

1966 - First all-original album

By 1966, the Stones had decided to respond to the Beatles' increasingly complex albums with their first album of all-original material, Aftermath. Due to Brian Jones' increasingly exotic musical tastes, the record boasted a wide range of influences, from the sitar-drenched "Paint It, Black" to the Eastern drones of "I'm Going Home." These eclectic influences continued to blossom on Between the Buttons (1967), the most pop-oriented album the group ever made. Ironically, the album's release was bookended by two of the most notorious incidents in the band's history.

1967 - Psychadelic period

Before the record was released, the Stones performed the suggestive "Let's Spend the Night Together," the B-side to the medieval ballad "Ruby Tuesday," on The Ed Sullivan Show, which forced Jagger to alter the song's title to an incomprehensible mumble, or else face being banned. In February of 1967, Jagger and Richards were arrested for drug possession, and within three months, Jones was arrested on the same charge. All three were given suspended jail sentences, and the group backed away from the spotlight as the summer of love kicked into gear in 1967. Jagger, along with his then-girlfriend Marianne Faithfull, went with the Beatles to meet the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi; they were also prominent in the international broadcast of the Beatles' "All You Need Is Love." Appropriately, the Stones' next single, "Dandelion"/"We Love You," was a psychedelic pop effort, and it was followed by their response to Sgt. Pepper, Their Satanic Majesties Request, which was greeted with lukewarm reviews.

1968 - Redefining the band

The Stones' infatuation with psychedelia was brief. By early 1968, they had fired Andrew Loog Oldham and hired Allen Klein as their manager. The move coincided with their return to driving rock & roll, which happened to coincide with Richards' discovery of open tunings, a move that gave the Stones their distinctively fat, powerful sound. The revitalized Stones were showcased on the malevolent single "Jumpin' Jack Flash," which climbed to number three in May 1968. Their next album, Beggar's Banquet, was finally released in the fall, after being delayed for five months due its controversial cover art of a dirty, graffiti-laden restroom. An edgy record filled with detours into straight blues and campy country, Beggar's Banquet was hailed as a masterpiece among the fledgling rock press. Although it was seen as a return to form, few realized that while it opened a new chapter of the Stones' history, it also was the closing of their time with Brian Jones.

1969 - Mick Taylor emerges, followed by Jones' tragedy

Throughout the recording of Beggar's Banquet, Jones was on the sidelines due to his deepening drug addiction and his resentment of the dominance of Jagger and Richards. Jones left the band on June 9, 1969, claiming to be suffering from artistic differences between himself and the rest of the band. On July 3, 1969 -- less than a month after his departure -- Jones was found dead in his swimming pool. The coroner ruled that it was "death by misadventure," yet his passing was the subject of countless rumors over the next two years.

By the time of his death, the Stones had already replaced Brian Jones with Mick Taylor, a former guitarist for John Mayall's Bluesbreakers. He wasn't featured on "Honky Tonk Women," a number one single released days after Jones' funeral, and he contributed only a handful of leads on their next album, Let It Bleed. Released in the fall of 1969, Let It Bleed was comprised of sessions with Jones and Taylor, yet it continued the direction of Beggar's Banquet, signaling that a new era in the Stones' career had begun, one marked by ragged music and an increasingly wasted sensibility. Following Jagger's filming of Ned Kelly in Australia during the first part of 1969, the group launched its first American tour in three years. Throughout the tour -- the first where they were billed as the World's Greatest Rock & Roll Band -- the group broke attendance records, but it was given a sour note when the group staged a free concert at Altamont Speedway.

On the advice of the Grateful Dead, the Stones hired Hell's Angels as security, but that plan backfired tragically. The entire show was unorganized and in shambles, yet it turned tragic when the Angels killed a young black man, Meredith Hunter, during the Stones' performance. In the wake of the public outcry, the Stones again retreated from the spotlight and dropped "Sympathy for the Devil," which some critics ignorantly claimed incited the violence, from their set.

1970-72 - The Stones at their peak

As the group entered hiatus, they released the live Get Yer Ya-Ya's Out! in the fall of 1970. It was their last album for Decca/London, and they formed Rolling Stones Records, which became a subsidiary of Atlantic Records. During 1970, Jagger starred in Nicolas Roeg's cult film Performance and married Nicaraguan model Bianca Perez Morena de Macias, and the couple quickly entered high society. As Jagger was jet-setting, Richards was slumming, hanging out with country-rock pioneer Gram Parsons. Keith wound up having more musical influence on 1971's Sticky Fingers, the first album the Stones released though their new label. Following its release, the band retreated to France on tax exile, where they shared a house and recorded a double album, Exile on Main St. Upon its May 1972 release, Exile on Main St. was widely panned, but over time it came to be considered one of the group's defining moments.

1973-77 - Ronnie Wood emerges

Following Exile, the Stones began to splinter in two, as Jagger concentrated on being a celebrity and Richards sank into drug addiction. The band remained popular throughout the '70s, but their critical support waned. Goats Head Soup, released in 1973, reached number one, as did 1974's It's Only Rock 'n' Roll, but neither record was particularly well received. Taylor left the band after It's Only Rock 'n' Roll, and the group recorded their next album as they auditioned new lead guitarists, including Jeff Beck. They finally settled on Ron Wood, former lead guitarist for the Faces and Rod Stewart, in 1976, the same year they released Black n' Blue, which only featured Wood on a handful of cuts. During the mid- and late '70s, all the Stones pursued side projects, with both Wyman and Wood releasing solo albums with regularity. Richards was arrested in Canada in 1977 with his common-law wife Anita Pallenberg for heroin possession. After his arrest, he cleaned up and was given a suspended sentence the following year.

1978-82

The band reconvened in 1978 to record Some Girls, an energetic response to punk, new wave, and disco. The record and its first single, the thumping disco-rocker "Miss You," both reached number one, and the album restored the group's image. However, the group squandered that goodwill with the follow-up, Emotional Rescue, a number one record that nevertheless received lukewarm reviews upon its 1980 release. Tattoo You, released the following year, fared better both critically and commercially, as the singles "Start Me Up" and "Waiting on a Friend" helped the album spend nine weeks at number one. The Stones supported Tattoo You with an extensive stadium tour captured in Hal Ashby's movie Let's Spend the Night Together and the 1982 live album Still Life.

1983-91

Tattoo You proved to be the last time the Stones completely dominated the charts and the stadiums. Although the group continued to sell out concerts in the '80s and '90s, their records didn't sell as well as previous efforts, partially because the albums suffered due to Jagger and Richards' notorious mid-'80s feud. Starting with 1983's Undercover, the duo conflicted about which way the band should go, with Jagger wanting the Stones to follow contemporary trends and Richards wanting them to stay true to their rock roots. As a result, Undercover was a mean-spirited, unfocused record that received relatively weak sales and mixed reviews.

Released in 1986, Dirty Work suffered a worse fate, since Jagger was preoccupied with his fledgling solo career. Once Jagger decided that the Stones would not support Dirty Work with a tour, Richards decided to make his own solo record with 1988's Talk Is Cheap. Appearing a year after Jagger's failed second solo album, Talk Is Cheap received good reviews and went gold, prompting Jagger and Richards to reunite late in 1988. The following year, the Stones released Steel Wheels, which was received with good reviews, but the record was overshadowed by its supporting tour, which grossed over 140 million dollars and broke many box office records. In 1991, the live album Flashpoint, which was culled from the Steel Wheels shows, was released.

1991-present

Following the release of Flashpoint, Bill Wyman left the band; he published a memoir, Stone Alone, within a few years of leaving. The Stones didn't immediately replace Wyman, since they were all working on solo projects; this time, there was none of the animosity surrounding their mid-'80s projects. The group reconvened in 1994 with bassist Darryl Jones, who had previously played with Miles Davis and Sting, to record and release the Don Was-produced Voodoo Lounge. The album received the band's strongest reviews in years, and its accompanying tour was even more successful than the Steel Wheels tour. On top of being more successful than its predecessor, Voodoo Lounge also won the Stones their first Grammy for Best Rock Album.

Upon the completion of the Voodoo Lounge tour, the Stones released the live, "unplugged" album Stripped in the fall of 1995. Similarly, after wrapping up their tour in support of 1997's Bridges to Babylon, the group issued yet another live set, No Security, the following year. A high-profile greatest-hits tour in 2002 was launched despite the lack of a studio album to support, and its album document Live Licks appeared in 2004. A year later, the group issued A Bigger Bang, their third effort with producer Don Was. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide

FROM THE VAULT -- The lost Pink Floyd track "Embryo"...performed live!

2008-11-15T08:52:00.000-08:00

"Embryo" is a classic Pink Floyd tune that never appeared on any of their original albums, although it did show up later on the mini-compilation Works.

It was part of their live set from 1968 to 1972. I want to say it was last performed on the DSOTM tour and then permanently dropped thereafter.

What an awesome find...the band performs it live here. This is the belly of the beast; Pink Floyd in all their awe-inspiring mystery and creativity...long before there was MTV.

Radiohead fans, take note...these are the Jedi Masters of art rock that gave Yorke and Greenwood some of their ideas for what you get from them these days.

This decade's biggest musical event: the 2005 Pink Floyd reunion

2008-11-13T22:00:00.000-08:00

It happened on only one night in 2005...but, in my opinion, it was the single most significant musical event of this decade.

It was Pink Floyd's reunion for Live 8, which occurred in London.

I point to the significance of this event on several levels.

It was the first time since 1981's tour of The Wall that Roger Waters appeared onstage with the other 3 members.
A cause "worthy" of a reunion brought the band together...and I realize I'm sounding as if a rock band is more important than a cause to help the ailing and sick continent of Africa...IT ISN'T.
In a passionate call out onstage from Roger Waters, Syd Barrett was recognized through an embrace of brotherly love, and was alive to hear it. Those who know the band understand the significance of Syd and the unimaginable weight of Roger's words (see the video here).
The event almost never happened to begin with due to constant feuding between Gilmour and Waters over the years...I'm convinced we caught them in a rare moment when the waters were calm (pun intended)...but considering how often they are ridden with disagreements, for one moment the stars and (dark side) of the moon lined up and they came together.
They actually appeared happy to be together onstage...they "all were Pink" that night. Roger Waters looked elated to be there, like a kid in a candystore. I think they were all realizing the importance of what they were doing at the time, and that it meant everything to them.
The fans were finally served what they'd been so richly deserving for so many years...their band together again, even if it was for only one night.
And, for the foursome that hadn't performed together in nearly 25 years, they sounded pretty damn sharp. Amazingly sharp, actually.

The significance of the reunion event has since been further elevated with the passing of songwriter /guitarist Syd Barrett (the band's founding member) a year later in July 2006...and then more recently Rick Wright in September 2008 (their man on the keys).

With Wright now gone -- a co-founder of the band who played in every single live performance the band ever put on -- it's safe to say that the band is finished, and that their 2005 reunion was the final curtain call.

Again, the fact that these four men were onstage together for even one night, opposed to a prolonged tour, only adds to the enigma of the band and its legendary status...and it makes the Live 8 event that much bigger of a deal.

This, of course, is being stated with less than 12 months of this decade left to tick off the clock...but I'll take my chances.

Feel free to share any thoughts on this.

THE REVIEW CORNER -- The Refreshments: Fizzy Fuzzy Big & Buzzy (1996 issue, Polygram)

2008-11-12T21:55:00.000-08:00

There are some albums out there that pass under the radar amongst the general population, but serve as hidden gems to epitomize a certain time and place.

Fizzy Fuzzy Big & Buzzy by The Refreshments - one of a handful of bands that came out of Tempe, Arizona in the late 80s and 1990s - defined what a Tempe bar band sounded like in that time period, and define the culture and landscapes of Arizona...and the life of an Arizonan passing across the border to a town such as Rocky Point, Mexico.

This is a bit of a rambly and scattered post, so bear with...hopefully it should give off a feel much like the album in question...scattered and wistful tequila brains.

Lots of memories lie in the Sonoran Desert and the highways between Tempe, Tucson and Rocky Point...like when all of ASU and UofA would head down there for the Labor Day weekend to let loose.

So then I guess it only makes sense to set a tone and paint the picture by the lyrics from one of the album's premier tracks, "Mexico":
Well the good guys and the bad guys,
they never work past noon around here.
They sit side by side in the cantina,
talk to senoritas,
and drink more beer.

You get the idea...

This album also screams Tucson on Y2K...it was first introduced to me by a friend who came to visit me from Phoenix after I'd first moved there at the end of 1995 for a job. The band took hold, and I saw them live later that year at what was called the courtyard in front of the America West building (now defunct airline) in Tempe, in the heart of several bars whose names I've long forgotten.

I'd throw on the disc occasionally for a couple years thereafter, but it really reared its head back on New Year's Eve 2000...for some reason it was the fitting selection for that time...and my good friend Mr. Mop was introduced to the band on that night as well.

The open desert sky and 90s college lifestyle of Arizona, through a drunken tequila-tinged long-range looking glass, are all over this album. It opens with the rager "Blue Collar Suicide," seemingly a love/hate bitch session about a girlfriend.

Another highlight is "Mekong," with some of the album's most classic lines:
Barkeep
We need to go around again
One for me and what's his name
My new best friend
Deal me in and I'll pick my cards up off the floor
I'll see a lucky coin
And raise a pack of lies

Smile to the girl at the door
Another 4 dollar whore
But don't look her in the eyes
She'll break your heart
We came all the way
From Tempe today
Still Bangkok's pissin' rain and we're going blind again
And I haven't seen my girl in fifteen thousand miles

Well is it true
It's always happy hour here
And if it is I'd like to stay a while
Well as cliche as it may sound
I'd like to raise another round
And if your bottle's empty
Help yourself to mine
Thank you for your time
And here's to life

Much of the album seems to psychologically moan and ache into the absurd...almost boasting, in a strange way, an overblown wistful element.

It might seem far-fetched, but it actually echoes the fate of many who pass through the transient desertscape of Arizona, and speaks to the ever elusive Rosetta Stone that resolves each person's trials and tribulations lying somewhere in the timeline of the enigmatic and beautiful Sonoran Desert.

I know. I lived it...the good, the bad, and the ugly.

...so, to that effect, there's also the life-gone-into-the-trash tune "Interstate":
Well you should have known better
Dead thoughts and lost horizons
And to take it further
It don't get any better
Well out here on the border
Ain't nobody asking questions
No I don't need a miracle
But I could use a push in the right direction

Handgun and a bottle of Boone's
and a "69" Ford
and a new pair of shoes
Left from Boise Idaho '95
When they crossed the state line
They were just in time to fall
Asleep at the wheel

Last fact of the matter
Never was no facts involved
And to take it further
It never really matters
Well out here on the border
Ants drag bones across the hot dry ground
and over there at the trailer park
They got a million souls at the lost and found

While it may seem a bit like a eulogy of a soul now camped out in the desolate corner of the junkyard on a hot Phoenix day pushing 120 degrees, the poetry and imagery of this band was never stronger in any of its work...I would imagine...not that I really know what I'm talking about here.

Oddly enough, I've never actually heard another album by The Refreshments, and I'm not convinced that I ever need to. The statement that is this lost 90s classic, Fizzy Fuzzy Big & Buzzy, says everything to me that I need to know from this corner of the tequila bar, just over the Arizona border in that little Mexican town known as Rocky Point.

Here's more of an official report on The Refreshments:

While the Gin Blossoms were Tempe, AZ's most recognizable band in the post-grunge era, the Refreshments were perhaps the town's hometown favorite. Their brand of alternative pop/rock owed much to the band's Southwestern environs, whose influence increased with their sophomore effort The Bottle & Fresh Horses (and later came to fruition with the spin-off Americana outfit Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers).

Oddly enough, the very elements that endeared the Refreshments to their Arizona audiences -- the quartet's localized sound, mariachi-styled detours, and Tempe-centric lyrics -- prevented their music from finding true national appeal apart from the modern rock hit "Banditos." The fledgling Mercury Records sacked the group after their second album failed to provide a follow-up hit to "Banditos," and the Refreshments called it quits the following year (Mercury would also fold in 1998, having been absorbed into the Island Def Jam Music Group). Nevertheless, the Refreshments' legacy lives on in the Southwest, where the aforementioned Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers have since emerged as one of the area's biggest draws.

The Refreshments' roots date back to 1993, when Arizona State grads Roger Clyne (vocals, guitar), Brian David Blush (guitar), and Arthur "Buddy" Edwards (bass) first convened for a night of drinking and card-playing. A musical partnership formed and was soon completed by P.H. Naffah (drummer), whose association with Clyne would later extend into the Peacemakers. The band issued a self-released full-length debut, Wheelie, in 1994, with an EP titled Lo, Our Much Praised Yet Not Altogether Satisfactory Lady following shortly thereafter.

Both releases proved to be incredibly popular locally, with the original 2,000 pressings of Wheelie selling out quickly. Mercury Records took note and signed the band in 1995, later issuing their major-label debut, Fizzy Fuzzy Big & Buzzy, in 1996. Propelled by the hit single "Banditos," whose irreverent lyrics spun the tale of a Mexican crime caper, the album enjoyed moderate success. The Refreshments' good luck continued into 1997, when an instrumental composition (which the band had previously performed during soundchecks) was chosen as the iconic TV theme song for King of the Hill.

The band's mature follow-up, The Bottle & Fresh Horses, was also released in 1997, but it failed to gain much traction outside of local Arizona radio. The Refreshments subsequently lost their contract with Mercury, and the group disbanded in 1998. Buddy Edwards refashioned himself as a fiction writer, and Blush found work as a guitarist for several local bands. Clyne and Naffah would continue to explore the intersection of traditional Southwestern music and rock & roll with Roger Clyne & the Peacemakers, an Arizona supergroup whose lineup has featured members of the Gin Blossoms, Dead Hot Workshop, and Gloritone. ~ Andrew Leahey, All Music Guide

Cecil Taylor: Freeform Genius

2008-11-04T12:53:00.000-08:00

When I glanced at the calendar to see who was passing through town for the Earshot Jazz Festival some time back, the one performer that caught my eye as a must-see was the legendary free jazz pianist Cecil Taylor.

Last week presented a rare opportunity to see him perform as a solo pianist at Seattle's Town Hall, and perform the free jazz magic ball of yarn he's spun throughout a career spanning over 50 years...that's right, 50.

I arrived about a half hour prior to show time, and caught myself a second row seat at stage right, so I'd be able to see what he was doing with his hands. Not long after 8PM, the director of the Earshot Jazz Festival gave his introduction.

To thunderous applause, a shorter man then shuffled onto the stage with a folder of papers, sporting a black button down dress shirt, blue pajama pants, and rainbow colored foot stockings. He gave a short nod of acknowledgment to the audience as he shuffled through some paperwork, standing over the side of the Steinway grand piano onstage.

He then proceeded to read...and my brain cells started to fry like sausage on a griddle.

Cecil Taylor started shouting what sounded like various numbers, and at first came across as someone with Teret's. He then morphed into a diatribe for about ten minutes about mathematical definitions, Western metaphysics, and other theories that were barely understandable through his machine gun rate of speech...somewhere in there he also spoke of the definition of velocity. This went on for about 10 minutes.

I soon figured out that he was framing the tone for the show, especially for those who weren't familiar with his work...he was explaining to the audience that his theory on the piano involved partly that of mathematics; a concept first brought out by jazz pianist Thelonius Monk in the 1940s, and furthered by Taylor and some of his peers in the avant garde free jazz movement of the 1960s.

One might say he brought all that magic out of the top hat last night.

For more than an hour and a half, Taylor led the audience through the most dynamic and dramatic free form piano improvisation that anyone could ever serve witness to.

It's hard to describe the piano work of this man...but the one concept that keeps coming back to me is this: unadultered freedom.

He did not speak to the audience, nor announce the titles to any of the songs; perhaps because they had no real titles. His work on the keys is all about improvisation; it spanned from blinding fast movements across the piano keyboard to light delicate textures emphasizing the space between notes...then back to dramatic pounding.

Taylor's style features an ebb and flow quality...he binds mayhem together with tonal passages and patterns. One can pick up on the different movements tying it all together...

...but it requires your undivided attention.

In all, Taylor put together a 40 minute passage, flanked with two passages of about 15 minutes apiece. He then came out for two encores spanning about 10 minutes apiece. At the end of the regular set and both encores, he bowed to the audience as they showed him the great appreciation this legend deserved.

Needless to say, my brain felt like mush by the end of all of this. It was -- hands down -- the most exhausting musical exercise on my senses that I've ever experienced.

Election countdown psyche-out: music defining the times

2008-10-24T19:43:00.000-07:00

I don't usually like to get political on this blog, however with the election 11 days away, I can't help myself.

Music and politics do sometimes cross paths...more often than not, actually. There's lots of music out there that is political in nature, but there are only a handful of albums that can be deemed sharply topical enough to apply to the state of the country and the world over the course of this decade.

The music I have listed here is ranked in order of significance, so if you're interested in picking any of these up I'd work from the top down. A small hint: it's a bit left-leaning.

So here it goes.

Neil Young - Living with War (2005). The quintessential anti-Bush album; Neil Young's primal scream against the administration and its policies. Interestingly enough, Young comes across as more of a single voice in the crowd than some random complaining artist. That being said, Young has plenty to complain about, and he might actually have a point...Living with War involves mainly Iraq, and focuses on various aspects of war and its consequences. It also screams impeachment and the desire to look for a new leader. The most essential album of the times. Living with War is a very relevant and sympathizing with lots of the anger out there in the country.
Green Day - American Idiot (2005). The Gen X version of Living with War, with the punk edge. It's not quite as heady as Young's album, but has its moments. It's actually refreshing to hear Green Day getting more personal and behind societal issues. The album has much more substance to it than just its title track, and it focuses on a wide array of issues Americans are facing today; including war and illegal survellaince...but it's mainly about Iraq.
Roger Waters - Amused to Death (1992). Waters is totally amazing and prophetic...and one might conclude that the guy doesn't really like war. The subject matter of this project from the early 1990s calls out unrest and wars in the Middle East, as it came off the heels of the Gulf War...and Roger does it in a tone of sarcasm as only he knows how. It has a little bit of everything, including a musing on a cheering crowd-filled stadium and the voice of Marv Albert commentating on a sub torpedoing an oil tanker in sports play by play fashion, in addition to a skewering of Andrew Lloyd Weber. The subject matter, which involves war and how power and oil drives it, is as relevant today as it was 15 years ago.
Rush - Snakes & Arrows (2007). Lyrically very heady, but there may be no piece of work out there that's more relevant to the state of the world. This is what you get when you hear an atheist Libertarian Canadian drummer commentating on the state of the world through a falsetto singer. Had Rush been an American band, Peart's lyrics probably wouldn't be as couched in metaphor, as the band is careful about coming across as too specifically topical when it comes to the American-based politics Canadians are affected and understandably frustrated by. However, Snakes & Arrows is as political as the band has ever been since 1984's Grace Under Pressure. The use of lines like "The battle flags are flown at the feet of a God unknown," obviously deliver the point straight home, and there's many more weighty and interesting moments in this project. Snakes & Arrows is a fascinating and mature response to the far-right religious ideology and dogmatic shit sandwich that has been shoved down the throats of many Americans, Canadians, and the like over the last several years. For those who sit down with it and take it all in, Peart's lyrics will have you pondering the subject matter long after the listen.
Dixie Chicks - Taking the Long Way (2006). What can I say...I just couldn't help myself. There's no artist out there who's more relevant to what's been happening this decade than the Dixie Chicks...or more victimized. The subject matter in this album covers the issues they dealt with several years back when they took flack and were banned on many of the country airwaves after criticizing the Bush administration. Much about it involves their response to the criticism...so I had to throw a personal call out here to these brave women and all the unneccessary crap they put up with. Here's to free speech...Dixie Chicks, this one's for you!

So those are the recommendations...only 11 days until the election! Rock the vote, everyone! Happy voting!

Neil Peart performs at Buddy Rich memorial concert

2008-10-24T08:18:00.000-07:00

A few posts back I mentioned Neil performing at the Buddy Rich Memorial Concert in NYC last Sunday...I believe I've found footage of it here...of course when he starts on the cowbells you can hear the Rush fans in the crowd.

I also have included footage of Rich as well, so you can have an idea of how skilled and unbelievable this guy was.

Neil Young clip from Everett show

2008-10-22T14:07:00.000-07:00

Here's a quick clip of Neil's Everett show from last night...should give you a good idea. If you can make out a guy 4 rows back center stage in a black skully, that's me.

Neil Young road testing new material?

2008-10-22T08:24:00.000-07:00

...or so I'm guessing. Here's a vid from this year's tour, a tune called "Sea Change." He performed this and another new tune called "When Worlds Collide" in Everett last night. The lyric in that song mentioning "money" and "it ain't funny" conjures up that old Kinks tune "Low Budget."

I'm not going to even try to speculate whether or not this new material is to be expected on an upcoming project, considering Young's history of shelving recorded projects and a handful of songs from as far back as the 70s that he performs live but has never released on any album.

Hey, it's all part of the Neil Young charm...right?

Neil Young inspires the Everett faithful

2008-10-22T07:09:00.000-07:00

Neil Young is a GOD. It's that simple.

I don't think I've ever seen a performer more passionate about his music than Neil Young...and from all accounts, he bestows to his fans the same guts as a man approaching his mid-60s that he did 40 years ago.

This was my second Neil Young concert. I was four rows back from the stage last night at Comcast Arena in Everett, Washington....about 20 miles north of Seattle, the newer venue serves as a nice alternative for acts that come through town. I'd say it's a much better option than Key Arena in Seattle, which is traffic nightmare central.

Opening the night was a band called Everest, which I wasn't familiar with, and Death Cab for Cutie, an interesting alternative band from Seattle with a mosaic that echoes bands like U2 and The Stone Roses...however the singer has a unique style that I'm still getting used to...I'm not saying I don't like him, I'm just getting used to him.

Since my favorite band has a falsetto singer with a high-pitched shrill, I figure I'm the last one on the planet to be intolerant of other singers I might need to adapt to.

So back to Neil.

Unlike last year, when he split the show between acoustic and electric sets (see post on that show here), all songs were part of one set. Electric Neil sandwiched Acoustic Neil in the middle portion of the set.

I love how this guy mixes things up.

There was an indication that electric Neil was going to open up the show when his guitar tech Larry Cragg brought Old Black onstage...that's his prized guitar that he's used since the 1960s.

When the show began, he launched into "Love and Only Love," one of the classics from Ragged Glory, his grungy 1990 project and perhaps the best project to date with Crazy Horse.

He soon brought up one of my personal favorites, "Powderfinger," which originally appeared on 1979's Rust Never Sleeps. He was emotionally involves with his music as he sweat and sneered through many of the vocal passages.

One of the amazing qualities of a live Neil Young performance is how he seamlessly transitions from the beautiful electric sludge of tunes like "Hey Hey, My My," where his extended solos careen through the auditorium with sounds like a dinosaur moaning in pain from a leg amputation...to the acoustic grace and sentiments of a song like "Old Man."

He seemed to have a bit more energy onstage tonight than a year ago at WAMU Theater in Seattle...where at times he even seemed a bit disoriented onstage.

Not tonight.

The only ones who were disoriented were the audience, left fending for their lives as they took blows to the head from the dungeon of Neil's grungy extended jams.

How can I explain it...Neil Young's sludgy electric brand of rock & roll is the equivalent of a musical axe being swung at your head...and, elated, you can't wait for that blade to chop into your skull...only the blade hasn't been sharpened in awhile, and it has pits and gouges in it...so it just manages to knock off a chunk of your skull...get it? Sure you do.

Okay, we're getting carried away here...what did he play last night?

The set list:

Love and Only Love
Hey Hey, My My
Everybody Knows this is Nowhere
Powderfinger
Spirit Road
Cinnamon Girl (they goofed the opening and started it over...too funny.)
Oh, Lonesome Me
Mother Earth
The Needle and the Damage Done
Unknown Legend
Heart of Gold
Old Man
Get Back to the Country
Just Singing a Song
Sea Change (or is it "See" change?)
When Worlds Collide
Cowgirl in the Sand
Rockin' in the Free World
[encore 1] A Day in the Life (In his effort to make as much racket as possible at the end, he ends up ripping off the guitar strings from Old Black)
[encore 2] The Sultan (instrumental with a big gong being hit by a guy dressed in swami gear...very odd)

You can follow all the set lists from Neil Young's tour at SugarMountain.org.

So that's it...I'm hoping that Neil's next project involves Crazy Horse again...now THAT'S the show I'm waiting to see!

Neil Peart performing at Buddy Rich Memorial Concert

2008-10-17T17:03:00.000-07:00

Neil will be the final drummer performing at the Buddy Rich Memorial Concert in New York City Sunday night...information on the event can be found HERE.

The event will be caught on digital stream via the drum channel...I'll look for the link and come back to post it.

My Amazon list of best rock albums

2008-10-15T02:05:00.000-07:00

Since I put out the jazz list, here's a rock list that I also have.

Here's the rock list: Amazon.com: "Start an eclectic rock collection - 35 recommendations!".

The list:

Pink Floyd - The Dark Side of the Moon
Beatles - Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band
Fleetwood Mac - Rumours
Jimi Hendrix - Are You Experienced?
Rush - Moving Pictures
Dire Straits - Communique
Beach Boys - Pet Sounds
Rolling Stones - Sticky Fingers
The Doors (eponymous)
Led Zeppelin - IV
The Who - Who's Next
Bob Dylan - Blonde on Blonde
Santana - Abraxas
Carole King - Tapestry
U2 - The Joshua Tree
Elton John - Tumbleweed Connection
Bruce Springsteen - Born to Run
Lou Reed - Transformer
Coldplay - A Rush of Blood to the Head
Peter Frampton - Frampton Comes Alive!
Grateful Dead - Without a Net
Van Halen (eponymous)
Nirvana - Nevermind
Eagles - Hotel California
Ritchie Valens
R.E.M. - Lifes Rich Pageant
Joni Mitchell - Blue
Elvis - Elvis Presley
Elvis Costello - Trust
The Police - Zenyatta Mandatta
Neil Young - Harvest
Radiohead - OK Computer
The Cars (eponymous)
10,000 Maniacs - In My Tribe
Queensryche - Empire

That's it for the Amazon lists.

My Amazon list of best jazz albums

2008-10-13T02:00:00.000-07:00

Being the Swiss cheese brain that I am, it never occurred to me to bring my Amazon music lists to the blog.

Here's the link to my list of recommendations to build your Jazz collection at Amazon.com: Amazon.com: "Begin a diversified Jazz collection - for jazz newbies!", with reviews for each recording.

Other recordings beyond the list are also mentioned, but the initial list suggests how you should build your jazz collection...in order.

Here's the list:

Miles Davis - Kind of Blue
Herbie Hancock - Maiden Voyage
Dave Brubeck Quartet - Time Out
John Coltrane - Blue Train
Miles Davis - In a Silent Way
Sonny Rollins - Saxophone Colossus
Miles Davis - Bitches Brew
Charlie Parker - With Strings (The Master Takes)
Miles Davis - Birth of the Cool
Clifford Brown & Max Roach (eponymous)
Louis Armstrong - The Hot Fives & Sevens
Eric Dolphy - Out to Lunch
Matthew Shipp - Harmony & Abyss
Frank Sinatra with Count Basie - Sinatra at the Sands
Charlie Parker & Dizzy Gillespie - Complete Jazz at Massey Hall
Billie Holiday & Lester Young - A Musical Romance
Wynton Marsalis - Live at the Village Vanguard
Ornette Coleman - Free Jazz
John Coltrane - Giant Steps
Jaco Pastorius (eponymous)
Dave Holland - Live at Birdland
Wayne Shorter - Adams Apple
McCoy Tyner - The Real McCoy
The Complete Ella Fitzgerald & Louis Armstrong
Thelonius Monk - Straight No Chaser
Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers - A Night in Tunisia
Cannonball Adderley - Somethin' Else
Jason Moran - The Bandwagon
Modern Jazz Quartet - Django
Miles Davis - Bags' Groove

Those are my recommendations on starting your jazz collection.

The Kaoss Pad...again!

2008-10-12T02:00:00.000-07:00

I posted last month about this device, and showcased Radiohead's use of it in a live setting.

However now I found a video of what appears to be an older model in use, and it should be a bit more informative of the various mechanics and how it's used. It's essentially a demonstration you'd get in a music store if someone was trying to sell it to you.

Sorry if I'm killing this subject, but I find this gadget to be totally fascinating. This seems to reveal and give context to what we've heard on the radio at times from artists over the last 5-10 years.