Posts tagged Rock
The Giant Panther Salutes Moms Everywhere
May 9th
Hey Diddley Ho neighbors! It’s Mother’s Day. The day that probably ranks right next to your anniversaries as the day you fear forgetting the most. Thank God the sports world uses pink bats and ribbons huh? Way to keep us on track. Facebook helps me remember my friend’s birthdays, but only if I bother to log in. I don’t have that anniversary problem, but I do have a mother. She now hangs her hat in Las Vegas as she enjoys her Golden Years. She goes to see The Gambler (Kenny Rogers) and waxes nostalgic about The Rat Pack as she watches those old school hotels get torn down. I detest the heat so I don’t think Las Vegas would be my destination if and when I can ever retire, but she’s happy and that’s all that matters. We have a three hour time difference so she’s rising about now. I won’t tell her about the post though…even though she’s directly responsible for my love of music via her Buddy Holly, Bill Haley and Chuck Berry records, I don’t think she’s ever understood where it took me. Let’s just say Sabbath Bloody Sabbath isn’t on her best of list.
I don’t want to go on about how important mothers are to the world, but I certainly owe my mother a major debt of gratitude. Things never went as planned for her, but she never complained and shielded her brood from as much of the world as she could. We didn’t want for anything until we were old enough to understand how much money we didn’t have and that really didn’t happen until we started making plans for my sojourn to Emerson College. I was the oldest so everything was new to both of us. Unfortunately I took such a shine to my new town I never looked back. In my most recent job I used to travel to Las Vegas at least once a year and we’d hit the buffet, the wax museums and see a show (Blue Man Group, George Carlin or an hilarious comedy show featuring Harvey Korman & Tim Conway) every year. Fun for both of us. Anyway, Mom, even though you will never see this post, thank you for everything. As Neil Young might say; These notes are for you!
Lynyrd Skynyrd – Every Mother’s Son.mp3
Paul Simon – Mother and Child Reunion.mp3
Eric Clapton – Motherless Children.mp3
Tears For Fears – Mothers Talk.mp3
Dr Hook & The Medicine Show – Sylvia’s Mother.mp3
The Beatles – Your Mother Should Know.mp3
Johnny Cash – Send a Picture of Mother.mp3
Jethro Tull – For a Thousand Mothers.mp3
Queen – Tie Your Mother Down.mp3
Neil Young & Crazy Horse – Welfare Mothers.mp3
The Soup Dragons – Mother Universe.mp3
Three Dog Night – Mama Told Me (Not To Come).mp3
Fountains of Wayne – Stacy’s Mom.mp3
The Rolling Stones – Crazy Mama.mp3
Koko Taylor – Come To Mama.mp3
J.J. Cale – Blues For Mama.mp3
Lenny Kravitz – Always On The Run.mp3
My Insipid Record Collection – Frank Zappa
Mar 13th
I’d like to start by saying I’m really not an expert on the late Frank Zappa. And I was a painfully slow convert too. A friend of mine from Chicago was appalled, when I gave him untold free music via massive zip drive, that I had included a copy of Frank Zappa’s Strictly Commercial to the mix. He wasn’t a fan. I’m thinking, you like these other artists but no Frank? What a shame. Before I had even unloaded my meager possessions…ah, who am I kidding; my album collection…into my Emerson College dorm room in the Fall of 1978, my assigned roommate, who was blasting The Allman Brothers Band’s Live at Fillmore East when I started, had switched over to Frank Zappa’s Apostrophe. My poor mother, who was already wrestling with helping me lug a car’s worth of crap up eight flights of stairs because the elevator was broken, wasn’t sure what to make of my Long Island born pony tailed cigarette smoking co-habitant. He was nice enough to kill some volume so she could mourn the loss of her oldest for a few minutes in peace, but the die had been cast as far as my Frank Zappa indoctrination. It was a full on onslaught 24 x 7.
Over the next eight months I would hear every note of Freak Out!, Roxy & Elsewhere, Over-Nite Sensation, Joe’s Garage, Sheik Yerbouti, Bongo Fury, Apostrohe, Fillmore East – June 1971, Hot Rats, Studio Tan, Just Another Band From L.A., Sleep Dirt, One Size Fits All, Studio Tan, Waka Jawaka, Weasels Ripped My Flesh and Zoot Allures. These records are only a fraction of Frank’s legendary output, but there was no escape. I had my Beatles, Stones, Zeppelin and Dylan records and my new friend had his Zappa, Allman’s and George Thorogood records. We had a lot of common ground actually, even more today, but back then I really didn’t care for Frank Zappa. I had no idea how flat brilliant the guy was.
Slowly, but surely, almost by osmosis, the songs grew on me one by one; “Camarillo Brillo, Cosmik Debris, Montana, Crew Slut, Disco Boy, Trouble Every Day, Uncle Remus, San Ber’dino, Muffin Man, Don’t Eat Yellow Snow, Dirty Love, Dinah Moe Hum, Joe’s Garage, Dancin’ Fool, Valley Girl, Po-Jama People, Penguin in Bondage, Bobby Brown, Help I’m a Rock, I’m The Slime…even Billy The Mountain.” Today, knowing what I know about Frank Zappa and how he lived his life (my friend Doug has recommended The Real Frank Zappa Book by Frank Zappa with Peter Occhiogrosso so check that out) I’m a bigger fan of his than I ever was. It’s kind of ironic.
I was out in Santa Monica for business in January of 2002 and as usual, was looking for the local blues clubs to see what I could see. I was pointed by a local towards Harvelle’s on 4th Street (www.harvelles.com) and was fortunate enough to run into a great band called The Boneshakers (www.theboneshakersonline.com). I didn’t know these guys from a hole in the wall; I just wanted to hear some blues and maybe imbibe in some whiskey. About halfway through their set they broke into “Dirty Love” by Frank Zappa. Sold. Before long I was drinking with their Albino lead singer and telling him how great they were. The star of The Boneshakers is lead guitarist Randy Jacobs, but the fact that they had covered a great Frank Zappa song really got me going. I had a rip roaring blast and can only hope my client was none the wiser at the following morning’s meeting. The point is, I have settled nicely into my role as a Frank Zappa fan.
Frank Zappa was a great guitarist. That gets lost in mix of his 60 plus records (including Mothers of Invention releases and soundtracks). One of the main criticisms Zappa endured during his career was his alleged complete lack of commercial potential, which is why you have his tongue in cheek greatest hits package release photographed above. Aside from sprawling compositions, his obvious Jazz leanings and his sometimes tasteless musical commentary, Zappa just made records. He didn’t care much about commerce or censorship. Well, that’s not entirely true, he did care very much about censorship as his epic battles with Tipper Gore of the Parents Music Resource Center in the 1980′s might attest. I don’t feel like anyone else could have defended the music industry with such eloquence. Today we have a sticker on albums with objectionable lyrical content, but it could have been much worse if someone hadn’t taken a stand. Frank would probably have landed in jail in about 40 other countries for what he was able to release here in these great United States. It whistled over my head at the time (hey, I was 25 and listening to ZZ Top), but things would be mighty different today if not for Frank Zappa.
I can’t possibly do justice to Frank Zappa’s career in a couple of paragraphs contained in a post. The guy was trailblazer, a Rock & Roll Hall of Famer, a very political musician, a great story teller, a blender of Jazz, Classical, Doo-Wop and Rock music, a giant questioner of authority, completely against drugs, a big family man, an enormously popular live entertainer, a prolific composer, a satirist and he knocked over countless barriers regarding how music should be packaged, sold and released. Some people are considered gym rats, but Zappa was a studio rat. You may also recall Deep Purple’s song “Smoke On The Water” which was written as a result of an incident in Montreux, Switzerland involving Frank Zappa & The Mothers. A fan of Zappa’s allegedly brought a flare gun to his December 1971 concert at Casino de Montreux and the place was torched along with Zappa’s equipment. Now the incident is immortalized by Deep Purple’s song. Fun Zappa facts huh? He’s got many more, but I have limited space here.
It’s impossible to overstate the influence Frank Zappa had on culture and the artists that followed him. Fee Waybill, lead singer of The Tubes, is definitely a Zappa disciple for one and there are scores of others. OK, gotta go. If you consider yourself ignorant of Zappa because you think he only wrote gross novelty songs and named his kids funny names you’re completely missing the boat. This guy was a legend from his 1940 birth in Baltimore, Maryland right up until prostate cancer got him in 1993. Zappa was a true giant and I pray he’s resting comfortably somewhere. He earned it. ”Goodnight Austin, TX wherever you are!”
Frank Zappa – Trouble Every Day.mp3
Frank Zappa – Cosmik Debris.mp3
Frank Zappa – Crew Slut.mp3 YSI
Buy or download Strictly Commercial from Amazon here.
My Insipid Record Collection – Genesis
Mar 6th
They say March either comes in like a lion or a lamb. From the looks of this early March day here in Massachusetts, we’ve got the look and feel of lamb big time. Not too many records revolve around lambs, but I found this chestnut from Peter Gabriel era Genesis to discuss today. I don’t know how many of you are old enough to understand how great early Genesis really was, but I have to give some education here a shot. For those of you who feel like Genesis began with advent of their last decent record, 1981′s Abacab, we have a lot to talk about this afternoon.
I have very little interest in Pop Genesis. I have even less interest in Phil Collins’ solo career. I tried hard to follow Phil through his first two solo records, 1981′s Face Value and 1982′s Hello, I Must Be Going, but after that I bailed in a big way. Each of these records had something of redeeming quality in my opinion. I thought Phil and his Genesis lite solo Face Value record was listenable until radio began abusing “I Missed Again” and “In The Air Tonight.” I still like his version of The Beatle’s classic “Tomorrow Never Knows,” but by and large Face Value is forgettable fluff. No offense Phil. I’ll have more to say positive about the 1976-1980 Phil Collins led Genesis period in a minute. Hello, I Must Be Going had at least one track I loved in “Like China,” but that was cancelled out by the Supreme’s cover “You Can’t Hurry Love.” Look, I’m a huge Diana Ross & The Supreme’s fan myself, I heard “Love Child” in the dentist’s chair not three days ago and was loving it, but there is something about covering the Supreme’s that seems to fail most of the time. The J. Geils Band covered a few of them with less than type results in my opinion. I will say that both Rod Stewart and Vanilla Fudge did fantastic versions of “You Keep Me Hanging On” though. It’s such a great song it’s hard to screw it up, but I’m sure some folks have.
I have to say that I even liked Phil’s 1984 duet with Earth, Wind & Fire’s Philip Bailey called “Easy Lover,” as poppy as it was. But when No Jacket Required surfaced in 1985 I totally lost it. Phil Collins went on to become one of the most successful solo artists of the 80′s, but I wasn’t among the faithful. I was working at WBCN at the height of his popularity and they just crushed that record. I couldn’t stand it. I’m aware he was probably able to retire based on that one record, but songs like “One More Night” and “Take Me Home” went right through me. I remember that track “Against All Odds” from the soundtrack of the movie was the last straw. I guess the women loved that sort of thing, but not me. I had to divorce Phil. The thing is, I had a lot of respect for the way he pulled up Genesis from the crushing loss of then lead singer Peter Gabriel (who went on to have a pretty fair solo career in his own right he said with a trace of sarcasm…Gabriel is and was tremendous). Few folks really know or remember how great the first five post Gabriel Genesis records really were. A Trick of The Tail, Wind & Wuthering, …And Then There Were Three, Duke and Abacab are all fantastic records. Really. They all had just enough of the original sound to be more than credible. My hat is still off to Collins for picking up lead singer duties and releasing such quality in the wake of the loss of Gabriel.
When you talk about Progressive Rock most folks think King Crimson, Yes, Genesis, Emerson, Lake & Palmer and Pink Floyd for the most part. Chances are, most folks that have a copy of, say, 1986′s Invisible Touch do not have a copy of 1971′s Nursery Cryme or 1972′s Foxtrot. That is a crime in my book, but Progressive Rock isn’t for everyone I guess. Even the most diehard Prog Rock fans probably wondered where Genesis was headed with 1969′s From Genesis To Revelation and 1970′s Trespass. These two records definitely forshadowed vintage Genesis, but it wasn’t until Phil Collins came aboard just before Nursery Cryme that Genesis began to really take shape. It might have been a natural progression, to coin a phrase, and Collins just happened to be Philly on the spot, but whatever the case, Genesis definitely had an identity by 1971. I’m no expert on Progressive Rock, but I Know What I Like (in Your Wardrobe).
Long time Genesis fans will probably tell you their sweet spot was from 1971 to 1975. 1973′s Selling England By The Pound is probably the high point of that era, but 1974′s The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway is in the discussion. I can remember not really discovering Genesis until many years later. I had heard great songs like “Your Own Special Way” and “Follow You, Follow Me” over the latter part of the 70′s, but I really didn’t own a Genesis record until I got to Emerson College. First, I taped 1980′s Duke off of the radio, but it was two of my close friends who pointed me back in time to earlier Genesis. My friend Richard, whom I roomed with for a couple of years, was a fellow NJ boy who just loved Genesis. He turned me onto the previous eight or nine records because he just would not stop playing them. My friend Jefferson, a native of a suburb of Philadelphia, shared Richard’s zeal for Genesis though I’m not quite sure they were ever really friends at Emerson. Jefferson sort of took over tutoring me on the greatness of Genesis after Richard left town after graduating in 1982. He went on to be a big time Emmy Award winner at ESPN. Jefferson and I became friends in 1979 while sharing a class, but we bonded more over our mutual love of Jethro Tull than Genesis at first. Soon after though, I had it drilled into me that Selling England By The Pound was more than a decent record.
The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway is a sprawling double record that might well have benefited from some editing. I don’t say this to disparage, but sometimes double LPs can go on a bit long. If they had been released as a single record they can garner accolades that double albums have trouble getting sometimes. If nobody had the patience to sit through a double album back then, today it’s foolhardy to have a CD with more than nine songs on it seems. I saw a feature on Coldplay on 60 Minutes and if I remember correctly Chris Martin’s rule for Coldplay records is no more than nine songs. That kind of stuck with me. If your CD has 14 tracks you can bet folks are almost always least familiar with the last few tracks. Back in the day you played a 20 minute album side and if you had time you flipped the record. You could also go onto to another record entirely. Today you either play single mp3 tracks or lose interest in a CD after half an hour or whatever. The music business faces so many hurdles these days I can’t even cover them in one post.
OK, I’ve reached the 1200 word count in my post. Time to wrap it up. I have no off switch so I try to keep the posts within reason because I know many of them are never read anyway. If you made it this far, thank you. Peter Gabriel led Genesis unraveled for a number of reasons, but suffice to say the usual creative control and perceived lead singer more important than the band issues in addition to personal problems (including divorce) plagued the band around this time. The parting was amicable for the most part. It did seem that the theatrics and costumes started to detract from the music as time went on, but then again those very theatrics and costumes are part of what made Genesis so intriguing. And it should be said, reluctantly, that Genesis, post 1980 and still led by Phil Collins even with all the personnel changes over the years, was the most financially successful version of Genesis. Invisible Touch might have been their highest charting record, but no way was it their best. I’m leaving you with three of my favorites from The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway. Happy March.
Genesis – The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway.mp3
Genesis – The Carpet Crawlers.mp3
Genesis – The Carpet Crawlers.mp3 YSI
Buy or download The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway from Amazon here.
All Hail The Fourteenth of February…Lover’s Rock
Feb 14th
Grab your best girl or guy and feast your ears on a couple of ironic and thoughtful St Valentine’s nuggets. No chocolate, no flowers, no stuffed animals and no cards. Just some songs about love, sex, divorce, loneliness, isolation, heartbreak, pain and romance. You know, the usual. For a change I don’t have much to say except start your downloading. Some of them are funny, some of them are sad, some of them are heartfelt and some of them are not. Some of them you know well, some of them you don’t. Some of them you thought you might’ve heard for the last time already. Some of them might not even remind you of Valentine’s Day. I chopped it down from pages and pages, but in the end I’ll probably have to do this again next year so it’s best I save some for another time. Liz Lemon and I like to take Valentine’s Day with a grain of salt. Sorry Hallmark…Here’s a Dirty 30. Anything to help get you folks through the day…
Moby – Why Does My Heart Feel So Bad.mp3
John Hiatt – Real Fine Love.mp3
Kate Bush – Love and Anger.mp3
Kansas – It Takes a Woman’s Love (To Make a Man).mp3
She Wants Revenge – Tear You Apart.mp3
Simple Minds – Speed Your Love To Me.mp3
Paul Simon – 50 Ways To Leave Your Lover.mp3
The Rolling Stones – Love in Vain.mp3
Living Colour – Love Rears Its Ugly Head.mp3
Orchestral Manoeuvres in The Dark – So in Love.mp3
Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers – Listen To Her Heart.mp3
Al Green – Let’s Stay Together.mp3
Queen – Get Down, Make Love.mp3
Stevie Wonder – I Was Made To Love Her.mp3
Joe Jackson – Fools in Love.mp3
Hall & Oates – Kiss On My List.mp3
Paul McCartney – Maybe I’m Amazed.mp3
The Beatles – She Loves You.mp3
Lynyrd Skynyrd – Heatbreak Hotel.mp3
Sade – Hang On To Your Love.mp3
The Giant Panther Does Requests! – Kim Mitchell
Nov 3rd
I just learned something right here, right now…I mentioned Canadian rocker Kim Mitchell in my last post and somebody, anonymously, asked me to post the songs I made reference to. Never a problem as we aim to please at The Giant Panther, so I figured I better bone up on Kim before I speak out of turn. I did some checking and it turns out Kim Mitchell was the lead singer of a band called Max Webster. Why is this important? Well it’s probably not to any of you, but for me Max Webster was the first band I ever saw perform live at a rock show. I’m not going to count seeing David Cassidy at The Garden State Arts Center sometime in the early 70′s. Ssssh! Don’t tell anyone. Tracing some of my love of music from my allegedly cool late 60′s awakening on through The Partridge Family (1970-1974) before figuring out what cool actually means can really be embarrassing. Keep in mind I was ten years old when I first laid eyes on Laurie Partridge. The significance of stumbling onto this tidbit about Max Webster is mostly irony, but I’m guessing Kim Mitchell was probably the first rock guitarist I saw play live (assuming he was there). This was 1976 at The Tower Theatre in Philadelphia. Cheap Trick was also on the bill followed by Rush performing 2112. Not bad out of the chute as far as I’m concerned. Who doesn’t love a good blast of “The Temples of Syrinx” once in awhile? I definitely do even if I’m once again in the minority. I probably wouldn’t have ever made the connection between Kim and Max Webster if someone hadn’t requested these songs. I think that’s kind of cool don’t you? A little on the freaky side, but cool.
I own the two records you see in the picture above. Akimbo Alogo and Shakin’ Like a Human Being were their titles. I’m thinking I saw Kim Mitchell perform at either a WBCN (RIP) lunchtime concert (those were big in the 80′s…the band would go on stage around noon and be done by 12:45 PM so everybody could make it back to work…they usually went down on Lansdowne Street so basically it was for students, folks with employers that didn’t know or mind that you were cutting out fifteen minutes early and getting back fifteen minutes late, and those folks who worked in the Fenway area) or at something like a WBCN Rock & Roll Expo. I remember seeing The Long Ryders (Looking For Lewis & Clark) at something like this, but I can’t remember if I actually did see Kim Mitchell or not. “Go For a Soda” was played fairly regularly for a couple of months back in 1984 and “Patio Lanterns” had a minor run a couple of years later in 1986. Here they are both are courtesy of “Anonymous,” who seems to show up a lot in our comments files. Kim Mitchell apparently still records and performs according to his Wikipedia entry, but I have to admit to losing track of him. I did like these two songs though so I’m sure he’s got more if you can find them.
Kim Mitchell – Go For a Soda.mp3
One Track Mind – The Undertones
Sep 8th
“Teenage Kicks” is one of those songs you think you know and can never prove it when someone asks you who sings it. The Undertones were a band that formed initially in 1975 in Northern Ireland. They initially started out as The Hot Rods, but, shockingly enough, there was already another band using that moniker. It took them several years of performing covers and facing rejection when guitarist John O’Neill wrote a hard driving single called “Teenage Kicks” in 1977. It was finally recorded as a demo and sent to all of the labels without much luck in 1978. One of the people they sent the demo to was the legendary BBC Radio I DJ John Peel. He had them re-record it in June of 1978 in Belfast and it appeared as a four song EP called Teenage Kicks later that summer. Peel was so enamored of “Teenage Kicks” that he proclaimed it his favorite song up until he passed away in 2004. Pretty heady praise considering what he’s had access to all of those years. It seems like every European musical act from that era had some “Peel Sessions” threatening to be released in their back catalogue at some point. I’m sure there are several more to follow as well.
The Undertones were a three chord Power Pop/Punk band back in the late 70′s. At first they were influenced by The Beatles, but the advent of Punk Rock had them touring with The Clash and admiring Pete Shelley’s Buzzcocks. With the support of John Peel the sky is the limit in the UK. “Teenage Kicks” made it all the way to #31 on the British charts. They were signed by Sire Records and it seemed like they were on their way. They recorded their debut album, The Undertones, and it was released in May of 1979. Unfortunately, by 1981, The Undertones were unhappy with their label, feeling they were poorly promoted outside of the UK. They were able to successfully negotiate their way to EMI Records later that year, but their sales never did set the world on fire. Tensions in the band eventually led to the departure of lead vocalist Feargal Sharkey by 1983. Sharkey went on to form The Assembly with ex Depeche Mode keyboardist Vince Clarke before hitting the solo circuit in the 80′s. You may recognize Vince Clarke’s name from Erasure as well. I’m a big fan of both of those bands. Former Undertones guitarists John and Damian O’Neill went on to form another great band, That Petrol Emotion, which had a lot of success between 1985-1994. So, while many consider The Undertones a one hit wonder, there were some very good rock & roll genes over the long haul in this band. I always find ensuing success in different bands to be a good measure of a band’s stock. Clearly there was talent in The Undertones even if the charts disagree. Wrong place wrong time I guess…
The band completely reformed in 1999 with a new singer, Paul McLoone, and still tours to this day it appears. A Q Magazine poll of the British Public to unearth the 100 British albums of all time found The Undertones debut record placing 90th. Not bad at all. “Teenage Kicks” will always be their high point, but there is absolutely nothing wrong with that as far as I’m concerned.
The Undertones – Teenage Kicks.mp3
One Track Mind – The Del Fuegos
Aug 12th
Yet another Boston band from the 80′s was a band called The Del Fuegos. In the late eighties an artist named Juliana Hatfield immortalized The Del Fuegos in her song “My Sister” by name checking them as the warm-up act for a potential Violent Femmes show her sister might have taken her to if she’d stuck around. Before they had a record out, before they went gold…and started to grow. I always liked that line. In 1985 The Del Fuegos released an album called Boston, MA. WBCN was squarely behind them and the first single was “Don’t Run Wild.” It took me a few spins to warm up to it, but I was soon a huge fan of this single.
I wasn’t really sure what to make of The Del Fuegos when they released their first album in 1984. Yeah, they were a garage rock band, but aside from “Longest Day” and “Backseat Nothing” there wasn’t much to write home about relative to radio airplay. Led by brothers Dan and Warren Zanes, the band had an awful lot of hype around the station, but I didn’t really get the feeling they were headed for big things at the time. If memory serves they were toppled by the Aimee Mann led ‘Til Tuesday in the 1983 WBCN Rock & Roll Rumble (a battle of the bands for the unfamiliar). In fact the runner up was The Sex Execs of “My Ex” fame. Talk about where are they now huh? And I’m dead certain none of the judges were dazzled by Aimee’s drop dead good looks either. In fairness “Voices Carry” was and is a tremendous song and The Del Fuegos had yet to unleash “Don’t Run Wild.” The Fuegos were left behind with the likes of Digney Fignus and their hit “The Girl With The Curious Hand.” I’m sure they were hoping for more as good as that song was.
After “Don’t Run Wild” became a WBCN staple the world was The Del Fuegos’ oyster. They had another track called “I Still Want You” and “The Sound of Our Town” that did some minor charting, but “Don’t Run Wild” was a killer track. I don’t know what exactly happened to these folks after 1985, but it was all over by 1989 for The Del Fuegos. No matter. Every time I hear “Don’t Run Wild” I think very fondly of this time of my life. And to name their record Boston, MA was pretty ballsy even though it guaranteed some airplay with a title like that in this town. I hope you like this track as much as I do. I love the whole feel of it. Great tune.
Your Tour Guide – Kid Rock
Jul 30th
So You Wanna Be A Rock & Roll Star? Then listen now hear what I say. Knowing full well The Giant Panther is going to find this post cringe worthy, I wanted to tell you how much fun I had at the Kid Rock show last night. As most of you know, rock & roll is about attitude nine times out of ten. There is no shortage of attitude in Kid Rock’s world. There are plenty of acts out there that are potentially better than Robert James Ritchie in all aspects of musicianship, but Kid Rock is an entertainer. He’s An American Bad Ass. He is having fun up on that stage and the packed house at the Mansfield, MA venue formerly known as Great Woods was all over it. They can sense his humor and energy. They got what they came for and they loved it. It’s hard not to get caught up in his schtick.
I would not have been there, having witnessed AC/DC and Steely Dan perform over the past four days, but my friends Mark & Melanie suggested I tag along with them and I’m glad I did. My back to back concert going skills have eroded over the past decade or so. There was a time when I could do four or five live shows in a week and be no worse for the wear. No more. After six hours of celebrating amongst the 46,000 who saw AC/DC perform at Gillette Stadium the day before, I didn’t have much gas left in the tank. We showed up four hours before the concert for fun and games two days ago, but last night we did a mere 45 minutes of tailgating prior to the Black Stone Cherry, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Kid Rock triple bill. I haven’t seen three bands perform on the same day in years so Black Stone Cherry, hailing from Edmonton, KY, had no chance of being witnessed by us as the evening’s first act. Don’t take it personally men. Next time. It was pretty painful for me to watch what is left of Lynyrd Skynyrd run off their no surprises set list as Kid Rock’s fluffers though. They only have one original member remaining plus Ronnie Van Zant’s younger brother Johnny on the vocals. It’s not the musicianship that makes it painful for me though; it’s the overdone hamming it up for the crowd and the time honored mentioning of the local city and state to get a rise out the audience. It feels so staged to me. Lynyrd Skynyrd was one of the greatest and most important bands of the 70′s. They are a top three all time southern rock act. You want An American Bad Ass? Try Ronnie Van Zant. There was a Whiskey Rock A Roller and a Street Fightin’ Man…
The band we watched on stage last night felt like a souped up cover band. I don’t mean to offend anyone here, but it’s how I felt. My favorite Lynyrd Skynyrd songs are nowhere to be found when I see this version play. No Saturday Night Special, No On The Hunt, No I Ain’t The One, No Ballad of Curtis Loew, No Poison Whiskey, No Searchin’, No Cry For The Bad Man, No Every Mother’s Son, No Things Goin’ On and No I Never Dreamed. I understand they have to play the hits and they are now a warm up band at best with a finite hour long set list, but it seems a shame to carry on in a way. They did do a nice tribute to everyone who has ever played with them, both dead and alive, during their encore (please don’t make me tell you what song) which was touching, but I’m kind of hoping I never have to see them play again and I mean that in the nicest possible way. The original lineup were true legends, but this lineup kind of reminds me of Willie Mays circa 1973 and I really hate myself for saying as much. I truly loved this band and I respect their right to make a living.
As for Kid Rock, I would identify myself as a casual fan. I did buy Devil Without a Cause back in 1998, but mostly it was because I was buying everything in sight and the buzz on Kid Rock was pretty strong in those days. Bawitdaba seemed like more of the same rap-rock-metal I wasn’t very fond of in the early 90′s so that was not the song that got me to buy the CD. That had to be Cowboy. My local bar played it every time I was there back then and after being literally bludgeoned over the head by it 300 times or more I finally decided I liked it. Again, the humor involved was the big draw for me. Kid Rock is the David Lee Roth of this generation. Both of these devil may care rockers represent excess in rock & women and they thrive on your characterization of them as such. They are both caricatures of an ideal and persona that may or may not even really exist. Both are maligned and derided for any number of things, but neither one of them ever cared. That stuff was our problem, not theirs. Kid Rock seems like a very nice man having a blast to me. He was seen at a local club called Wally’s Cafe on Massachusetts Ave in Boston’s South End the night before the show. Wally’s is a no nonsense color blind jazz club that has been there for what seems like 100 years. There are absolutely no frills and it’s a neighborhood bar to boot. As it happens, Monday night Peter Wolf was in the bar, ostensibly to meet up with Kid or vice versa, and they apparently hobnobbed with the locals. The club’s capacity MIGHT be 100 if the Fire Marshall is appropriately greased so it’s a tiny venue. I wasn’t there, but a friend of mine was and got a picture of himself with Kid Rock as a keepsake. Pretty cool.
The Peter Wolf thing was curious to us (Mark, Melanie & I that is) because our friend said The J. Geils Band was rehearsing there. We figured it was Magic Dick or J. Geils minus Peter Wolf or something and kind of dismissed it. It stood to reason our friend was a bit confused not knowing the music of either act. He was more than likely stopping by to take in some jazz on a typical Monday night. Then, about halfway through the Kid Rock show last night, our skepticism was eradicated. Out strolled Peter Wolf to sing Centerfold with Kid Rock (I immediately thought it was a perfect opportunity for them to play Detroit Breakdown seeing as Kid is from there and The J. Geils Band’s second home was absolutely Detroit, but sometimes I outsmart myself). Centerfold will never be my favorite J. Geils cut, but it was a cool thing to have witnessed and I’m glad I did.
Kid Rock’s catalogue could be considered to be a bit thin to some, but I like an artist that isn’t afraid to do covers. Last Night’s show included The Rolling Stones’ Tumbling Dice, Sly & The Family Stone’s Everyday People and The Georgia Satellites’ Keep Your Hands To Yourself. We got a couple of bars of another Detroit icon in Ted Nugent’s Cat Scratch Fever as well. One of the highlights for me was Kid taking over the turntables from his DJ Uncle Kracker (I’m assuming that was him, but don’t quote me) and doing some quality scratching while a full bottle of Jim Beam and a glass rotated on the second turntable. Naturally he poured himself a monster belt and the crowd roared. Tremendously charismatic, Kid Rock can’t stop smiling as he soaks in the crowd’s adulation. Everyone had a blast and I don’t care who thinks this guy is White Trash (all due respect to Edgar Winter). There had to be close to 15,000 people there that were thinking the very same thing. Women love him and men want to be like him. The very definition of rock star no? Whine away if you don’t like his music, his musical ability, his voice or Pamela Anderson, but give this guy his due; he has a huge following.
One Track Mind – Angel City
Jul 23rd
This record, Darkroom, actually had a bigger hit than the song I came to blog about today way back in 1980. WCOZ and WBCN in Boston were both playing “No Secrets” around that time by a band (then) called Angel City. “No Secrets” had a great refrain and melody and it was ultra radio friendly. Today it has to be considered a true lost classic from the early eighties. As opposed to a “lost classic” you hear 95 times a year on your local classic rock station. Angel City was an Australian band that apparently was recommended to their local label by none other than Bon Scott and Malcolm Young of AC/DC in 1975. Nice endorsement. They were formed in 1970 and it took nearly a decade before they hit the big time and major label executives at Epic took a chance on them. I don’t know about album sales, but this was a fun record and a rockin’ good time…at least in my tiny slice of the world.
I think by now you all know I have a problem with bands that change their names, most of the time by legal force or record company pressure, after their initial surge into the marketplace, and then try to change it back after the conflicting band disappears. Today this band apparently goes by The Angels, but you’ll never hear me refer to them as anything but Angel City. I made the transition from “California” to “Anaheim” regarding baseball’s Angels, but I’ll be damned if I’m going to call the current Angels the “Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.” Who are they kidding? Anaheim was so much cooler and the city that actually houses the ballpark deserves sole billing in my book. Geesh. Back to Rock & Roll; if I understand the situation this band only went by Angel City to avoid confusion with the Washington, DC area glam rock band Angel who were famous in the late 70′s. You may remember Angel as the band that had that great holiday classic “The Winter Song” from their 1978 album White Hot. No offense to either band or their respective fan bases intended, but they both ended up being a footnote in rock history. Apparently they are still both recording in various personnel configurations to this day, but I don’t think they are getting much in the way of terrestrial radio airplay.
Angel City’s Darkroom had a cut called “Face The Day” that some of you might remember was eventually covered by the band Great White, who are famous for being the band that had the misfortune of performing the night of the deadly 2003 fire that killed 100 people at The Station nightclub in West Warwick, RI six years ago. That’s kind of ironic because Angel City and Great White have both had a myriad of personnel changes that make you wonder why they still want to use their respective band names. I’ll give Great White props for covering Ian Hunter’s “Once Bitten Twice Shy” as well as “Face The Day” though. These are two great tunes. “Face The Day” is a blitzkrieg of awesome driving sound. I love the guitar work and it’s on my own personal list of great forgotten one hit wonders (yes, I’m aware that “No Secrets,” at the very least, disqualifies them from that distinction, but I’m going with it just the same). Every time I load someone’s iPod or change the music on my gym device “Face The Day” seems to get the nod. It may sound dated to some of you, but I’ve always loved this track to death. It kicks some serious butt. In my own personal band rating criteria all you need is one great song to take your place in rock history. Since my vote is the only one that counts relative to this blog; welcome aboard Angel City. Job well done.
My Insipid Record Collection – The Jim Carroll Band
Jul 20th
As I get over the demise of WBCN, I’m going to feature bands that the radio station had a hand in breaking way back when. The Jim Carroll Band was something of a red hot meteor that bounced off my twenty year old noggin’ back in 1980. Their debut album Catholic Boy was one of those records that came out of nowhere for me. I didn’t know much of anything about who Jim Carroll was back then and what separated truth from fiction, but “People Who Died” was a tremendous track that instantly put this album on the map. People wanted to know who these guys were. Not exactly Punk Rock, but the urgency was incredible. It seemed so tongue in cheek that it had to be more funny than vicarious right? Apparently wrong. Legend has it that Carroll was a bonafide heroin addict at 13. 13! And here I was thinking I was a bad ass stealing a Budweiser from my father’s beer only refrigerator located in our garage at 14. Guess again rookie. Can you imagine Waiting For The Man at 13?
Jim Carroll was also a basketball junkie and apparently played in the National High School All-Star Game in 1966. Twelve years later he wrote The Basketball Diaries which was made into a movie in 1995. Who played Jim Carroll you ask? Try Leonardo DiCaprio. Whoa. That young man has the world by the tail no? Oh and did I leave out that Jim Carroll was allegedly a male prostitute to support his habit? The Basketball Diaries was said to be excerpts from his own diary between the ages of 12 and 16 detailing his world of drugs, sex and basketball. They say he worked for Andy Warhol and received encouragement from Patti Smith regarding his band. I would imagine that connection comes from the fact that they were both poets, but I’m only guessing. The Band came and went inside of three years essentially (though there was a late 90′s comeback of sorts), but they had a lot to say.
“People Who Died” has been on numerous lists of great 80′s songs and still gets a little radio airplay every now and then, but “It’s Too Late” is the song I came to talk about today. The first line is a killer, no pun intended…It’s too late to fall in love with Sharon Tate. You’d instantly think this was going to be a song about the beautiful actress who appeared in 1967′s Valley of The Dolls, but was later murdered by The Charles Manson “Family” in 1969. It wasn’t, but the lyric is ingrained in my brain forevermore. “It’s Too Late” is three minutes and four seconds of hard driving frustration. I’ve always been a big fan of this tune. The Jim Carroll Band never again reached the heights of their debut record, but I have a feeling the Catholic Boy is getting by just fine these days. If I had to hang my hat on two songs, these two would be just fine by me if I were him. Enjoy.
The Jim Carroll Band – It’s Too Late.mp3
