And now the conclusion of my look back at the music of the nether year 1982...
DEBUTS
STEVIE NICKS—Bella Donna Stevie’s first solo effort was highly-anticipated and she didn’t disappoint. She scored big hits with “Edge Of Seventeen” and her duets with Tom Petty (“Stop Draggin’ My Heart Around”) and Don Henley (“Leather And Lace”). Another good track was “After The Glitter Fades”.
SCANDAL—Scandal Scandal came from New Yawk and hit fairly big in the early MTV era with “Goodbye To You” on their debut EP (that’s Extended Play, for youse youngins). It also yielded another single that’s now largely forgotten, “Love’s Got A Line On You”. They soon changed their name to Scandal featuring Patty Smyth and broke out with “The Warrior” in 1984.
DON HENLEY—Can’t Stand Still Dangerous Don’s first non-Eagles release featured the classic “Dirty Laundry”, with its brutal smackdown on the phoniness of the TV news industry. Fox News Channel didn’t even exist yet, Anderson Cooper and Sean Hannity were still in puberty, CNN was in its infancy, Katie Couric was running for prom queen and Bill O’Reilly was probably bussing tables when this song first came out and it’s even more prescient today than it was 27 years ago. Another track called “Johnny Can’t Read” offered up more social commentary about illiteracy.
ROBERT PLANT—Pictures At Eleven Another solo debut from a well-established singer, Plant was doing everything he could to distance himself from his Led Zep past (although why I’m not sure). PAE had some interesting songs, but in typical Robert Plant cryptic fashion, he gave them strange titles that had nothing to do with the lyrics therein like “Pledge Pin” (drop and give him 20?!?), “Burning Down One Side” and “Worse Than Detroit”.
MISSING PERSONS—Spring Session M One of the first songs I ever remember listening to on a Sony Walkman was Missing Persons’ “Words” and I was quite impressed with it. I was also strangely drawn to this Dale Bozzio woman with her multi-colored hair and creative use of electrical tape in her stage costumes, particularly around the breast area. Spring Session M—an anagram for Missing Persons—also featured “Destination Unknown” and the underrated “Walking In L.A.”, “Windows” and “Mental Hopscotch”, all of which reside on my iPod today.
A FLOCK OF SEAGULLS—A Flock Of Seagulls This was the greatest Techno-Pop album ever made. These guys were surprisingly good in concert, too, and although they sounded robotic as all get-out, I liked them anyway, for some reason. Go past the big hits “I Ran” and “Space-Age Love Song” and there’s still lots of great stuff here, like “Telecommunication”, “Modern Love Is Automatic”, “You Can Run”, “Messages”, “Standing In The Doorway” and the instrumental “D.N.A.”. Sadly, groups like AFOS and Missing Persons had very short shelf-lives, but it was fun while it lasted, anyway.
MOTLEY CRUE—Too Fast For Love While far from being the Crue’s greatest recorded achievement, Too Fast was at least a good start. It featured “Take Me To The Top” (not the Loverboy song of the same name), “Piece Of Your Action” and “Live Wire”, and laid the groundwork for the next album, Shout At The Devil, which was their best, IMO.
BREAKOUTS
STRAY CATS—Built For Speed Contrary to popular belief, this was not the Cats’ first album, per se, as they had already released two over in England from which this album was pieced together. It certainly threw a big curve ball to the music scene that was almost overwrought by New Wave and Techno music by kicking it old-school. “Rock This Town” and “Stray Cat Strut” were great, but “Rumble In Brighton”, “Double Talkin’ Baby” and “Runaway Boys” were even better.
SCORPIONS—Blackout The Scorps had been around quite a while too, and 1980’s “The Zoo” was a major step forward for them. Blackout finally put them on the map for keeps with the big hit radio hit “No One Like You”. The rest of the album didn’t suck either, with scorchers like the title track, “Dynamite” and “Can’t Live Without You”. These crazy Germans were still on the rise, too…
IRON MAIDEN—The Number Of The Beast And here was another heavy metal band on the rise. Bruce Dickinson’s Daltrey-like scream at the beginning of the title track ushered in the new Iron Maiden era, and they finally found the singer they were looking for to replace the one-dimensional Paul d’Anno. Their fortunes improved exponentially on Beast, which featured the classic “Run To The Hills” and several others.
ADAM ANT—Friend Or Foe I was highly-resistant to the whole New Wave thing in the early ‘80s and avoided acts like Duran Duran and Culture Club like the Plague, but resistance was futile when I heard Adam Ant’s “Goody Two Shoes” on the radio. On a whim, I bought Friend Or Foe and it wound up being one of my surprise favorites that year. I loved the freight train-like rhythm of “Goody Two Shoes”, and it also popped up in the title track and a couple other songs. “Place In The Country”, “Desperate But Not Serious” and “Crackpot History” were standouts too.
MY PERSONAL FAVORITES FROM '82
RUSH—Signals Rush was on a roll in the early ‘80s, and Signals is one of my all-time favorite Rush albums, the cassette copy of which I practically wore out driving to and from classes as a Freshman at UMKC, and I really began to embrace thinking-man’s Rock. I instantly took a liking to “Subdivisions”—especially Geddy Lee’s trippy synthesizer solo therein. You can also find some very underrated stuff here, like “The Analog Kid”, “Digital Man” and “Countdown”, the latter of which features actual radio transmissions from the early Space Shuttle launches that Rush was very privileged to be able to use—NASA doesn’t loan those out to just anyone. Rush even cracked the Top 40 for the first and only time with “New World Man”.
OZZY OSBOURNE—Diary Of A Madman According to legend, Diary was recorded during the same sessions as Blizzard Of Ozz, and the quality was certainly consistent with, if not even a little better than, its predecessor. I resisted Ozzy initially because of the whole canary-biting thing, but was irrevocably hooked by Randy Rhoads’ chugga-chugga-chugga intro to “Over The Mountain”. “Flying High Again” is a classic, of course, while “Little Dolls” and “Tonight” were great under-the-radar tracks, and Rhoads showed off his acoustic side on the anthemic “You Can’t Kill Rock ‘N’ Roll”. Again, I have to say, what might have been, with young Master Rhoads. Rest in peace, Randy—you rocked!
OZZY OSBOURNE—Speak Of The Devil Ozzy owed Epic Records a live concert album, but balked at doing one covering his current solo work because (to his credit) he didn’t want to appear to be capitalizing on the tragic death of Randy Rhoads just six months earlier. He waited until a more appropriate time and released Tribute in 1987, featuring Rhoads’ live work, circa. 1981. In the meantime, His Royal Ozz-ness (or someone) came up with the ingenious idea of doing a live album comprised of nothing but Black Sabbath tunes, some of which he hadn’t performed in several years. Devil was amazingly good considering how Ozzy’s band—drummer Tommy Aldridge, erstwhile Quiet Riot bassist Rudy Sarzo and guitarist Brad Gillis, who was on loan from Night Ranger—had to learn most of the material (almost literally) overnight for the two concerts this album was culled from. They’d already been playing “Paranoid”, “Children Of The Grave” and “Iron Man” as part of Ozzy’s regular live act, but tunes like “Symptom Of The Universe”, “Never Say Die”, “Sweet Leaf”, “Fairies Wear Boots” and “The Wizard” were all new material for the band, and these guys were obviously quick-studies, because the result was phenomenal. In the process, Ozzy killed two birds (canaries?) with one stone—he fulfilled his obligation to Epic and aced out his former band in the 1982 live album department by light years.
JEFFERSON STARSHIP—Winds Of Change Guitarist Paul Kantner pissed and moaned on VH-1’s “Behind The Music” that the band had sold out during this period and that they were putting out crap. Well, Bud, it was YOUR band and you were a co-founder of it, so why didn’t you do something about it? Whiny bitch. Anyway, I thought Winds Of Change was a dandy record, and Grace Slick being back full-time made it even better. She sounded great on cuts like “Can’t Find Love”, the title track and the frenetic “Out Of Control”, Mickey Thomas was a standout on “Keep On Dreamin’”, and I really liked Craig Chaquico’s guitar work throughout. This turned out to be the last really good record J. Starship ever made, as 1984’s Nuclear Furniture sputtered and then things went from bad (the insipid “We Built This City” schlock in ’85) to worse (the putrid “Nothing’s Gonna Stop Us Now” in ’87). I still can’t believe Bernie Taupin co-wrote "We Built This City", either...
ASIA—Asia The critics ripped this album as "corporate Rock at its worst", but since when do I ever listen to critics anyway? True, "supergroups" like this comprised of major playas from other bands usually wind up producing roach droppings, but I thought this was a killer album. Ex-Buggle keyboardist Geoff Downes, ex-Yes guitar man Steve Howe (not the baseball pitcher), ex-King Crimson bassist/singer John Wetton and ex-ELP drummer Carl Palmer put together a fine slab of vinyl on which nearly every track was outstanding, with the big radio hits "Heat Of The Moment" and "Only Time Will Tell" and "Your Wildest Dreams". Even better were "Here Comes The Feeling" and my personal favorite, "Time Again", on which the band members individually flexed their musical muscles.
JUDAS PRIEST—Screaming For Vengeance The Beast that is The Priest is another act I was reluctant to embrace at first, mostly because of their poor performance opening for Kiss in ’79, but to be fair, that was before “Breaking The Law” and “Living After Midnight” came out. Priest put on a much better show on an MTV concert I saw in late, ‘82/early ’83 and it convinced me to buy Vengeance and I was quite impressed. “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin’” is great, but it’s not even the best song on the record, IMO. “Bloodstone”, “Ridin’ On The Wind” and the opening segue “The Hellion/Electric Eye” are even better. Definitely one of the better Heavy Metal albums of the early ‘80s.
DAVE EDMUNDS—D.E. 7th This outstanding record made the summer of ’82 a lot more enjoyable as I played it to death on my car stereo. From the Springsteen-penned lead-off track “From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)” to the closing Chuck Berry cover, “Dear Dad”, Dave had it clicking on all cylinders. He threw in a little of everything on this record: a little Cajun (“Bail You Out”), a little Bluegrass (“Warmed Over Kisses”), a little Country (“Louisiana Man”), a little Cowboy (“Deep In The Heart Of Texas”) and some good ol’ Rock ‘N’ Roll (“Generation Rumble”, “Other Guys’ Girls”, and a nifty cover of NRBQ’s “Me And The Boys”). The Boss wrote “From Small Things” specifically for Edmunds, and it’s a funny tale about wedded-bliss gone south, while “Dear Dad” is one of the funniest Chuck Berry songs ever, and Dave’s version blows the original away. I highly recommend this album if you’re looking to “kick it old school”.
BEST OF THE REST
PAT BENATAR—Get Nervous PB continued her successful early ‘80s run with another very consistent record, which featured the hits “Shadows Of The Night”, “Lookin’ For A Stranger” and “Little Too Late”. “Anxiety (Get Nervous)” and “The Victim” were my personal favorites, and the straight-jacket/rubber room motif on the cover was a cool added touch. Unfortunately, the rest of Pat’s career would be very hit-and-miss from this point onward…
PHIL COLLINS—Hello, I Must Be Going! I liked PC’s second solo album even better than his first one, Face Value with "In The Air Tonight". “I Don’t Care Anymore” and Phil’s Motown cover of “You Can’t Hurry Love” were all over the radio, but there were a couple other gems on here like “It Don’t Matter To Me”, “Like China” and “Do You Know, Do You Care?”. Commercial as all get-out, to be sure, but still not a bad Pop/Rock album.
.38 SPECIAL—Special Forces One of the better albums these guys ever made, featuring the radio hit “Caught Up In You”. Best song was the now somewhat-forgotten “Chain Lightning”, and it also contained "Rough-Housin'" and "You Keep Runnin' Away".
GEORGE THOROGOOD—Bad To The Bone Lonesome George and the Delaware Destroyers broke through with his trademark song on this album, which also featured a dandy cover of the Human Beinz’ “Nobody But Me”, which is quite possibly the most negative song ever written, thanks to all its inherent “no, no’s”. BTTB also featured a cool original called “Back To Wentzville”, which was inspired by some shenanigans that went on in the west suburbs of St. Louis.
BILLY JOEL—The Nylon Curtain While not quite as good as its predecessor Glass Houses, Nylon Curtain had its moments like “Goodnight Saigon” and the big radio hits “Pressure” and “Allentown“. Mr. Piano Man also did his best John Lennon impression on the track called "Laura".
NICK LOWE—Nick The Knife Not the greatest album His Royal Lowe-ness ever made, but it contained two tracks that I loved, the silly “Ba-Doom” and one of the better “up yours” kiss-off songs of all-time, “Stick It Where The Sun Don’t Shine”.
JOAN JETT & THE BLACKHEARTS—I Love Rock ‘N’ Roll I never did much care for the title track here—it plods along too slowly and it features the worst guitar solo this side of Spinal Tap. But, I really liked Joan’s cover of Tommy James’ “Crimson And Clover” and there was also a song on the album called “Nag” that was a bit of a stitch.
MOTORHEAD—Iron Fist The final Motorhead album with Fast Eddie Clarke on guitar, and they still packed a wallop on the title track, which bore more than slight resemblance to their signature tune, “Ace of Spades”. Great lyrics from Uncle Lemmy on “(Don’t Need) Religion”, “Go To Hell”, “Sex And Outrage” and “I’m The Doctor”.
SAMMY HAGAR—Three Lock Box Sammy was still crankin’ out some great tunes here, including the title track and “Baby’s On Fire”, “Your Love Is Driving Me Crazy”, “Remember The Heroes” and “I Don’t Need Love”.
THE WHO—It’s Hard While it was hardly another Who’s Next or Who Are You, It’s Hard was a major improvement over the flaccid Face Dances from ’81. As was the case with Dances, John Entwistle’s contributions (“It’s Your Turn”, “Dangerous” and “One At A Time”) were better than Pete Townshend’s, but this time PT put forth a little more effort which resulted in two classics, “Eminence Front” and “Cry If You Want”. The title track and “Cook’s County” weren’t bad either. Still, it wasn’t quite the way one would like to have seen this mighty band go out as a recording unit…
Saturday, March 21, 2009
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
Just another Wednesday
HE’S BAD, HE’S NATIONWIDE
I was shocked that ESPN actually interrupted all their incessant Bracket-ology folderol and obsessing over Manny Ramirez on "SportsCenter" to recognize that a major sports record was broken last night. Congrats to New Jersey Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur for breaking the all-time NHL record for career victories (552), surpassing Patrick Roy with a 3-2 win over Chicago. This guy doesn’t get near enough recognition (even though he plays in the New York area) for what he does—he’s as dependable as the day is long in goal, he doesn’t whine and complain about anything, he doesn’t do steroids or get DUIs or beat on his wife or shit like that, he’s won three Stanley Cups (and is working on a fourth one now), and has played his entire career with the same team, no less. He’s only four shutouts away from breaking the late Terry Sawchuk’s all-time record, too, and what’s even scarier is Brodeur still has plenty of gas left in the tank, thus (barring injury), he might well win 700 games before he’s done.
UTTER MADNESS
Here’s my fearless Final Four prognostication: Louisville, Memphis, Pittsburgh and Arizona St., with Memphis winning the whole shooting match. There’s really no clear-cut dominant team in the field this year, and since Memphis came so close last year against Kansas, I have a good feeling about them this time. I envision quite a few upsets in the first couple rounds this year (watch out for Cleveland State, Stephen F. Austin and Western Kentucky!), and I have Kansas falling to Boston College in round three because KU just can’t handle schools that start with ‘B’ (Bucknell, Bradley, Baylor, etc.). My Mizzou Tigers will also fall in the third round to the other Tigers of Memphis. Then again, for about the fifth straight year, I incorrectly predicted the winner of the "play-in" game (thanks a lot, Morehead State!), so take my picks with a grain of salt. Hey, at least I’m consistent…
And won’t it be simply grand to not have to listen to Billy Packer calling the games on CBS this year? Between that and Dickey-Dick-Brain Vitale being relegated to NIT duty on ESPN, it’s gonna be awesome, bay-bee!
GAME, SET AND MATCH, MR. STEWART
I absolutely loved watching CNBC’s financial "expert" Jim Cramer squeal like an eel and squirm like a worm (as Louie DePalma would say) on Jon Stewart’s "Daily Show" last week on Comedy Central. Stewart made Cramer look like some miscreant school kid sitting in the principal’s office as he reamed Jimbo like Roto-Rooter for all the crackpot B.S. he’s been dishing out during the recession (and even prior to it). A gold star to Mr. Stewart for putting this doofus in his place—you have done well, young grasshopper. Here’s the whole unedited video, in case you missed it. Then again, anyone ignorant enough to listen to this Cramer boob is every bit as culpable as he is for losing their hard-earned money. His "Mad Money" show looks like something MTV would produce anyway—I’d sooner seek financial advice from one of the Teletubbies…
THE FIRST DOMINO TO FALL…
Sad to hear that the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has ceased being a print newspaper and is now totally an on-line going concern as of yesterday. This will surely be the first of many such conversions by major papers in the U.S., as advertising revenues plummet and the Internet becomes more pervasive as a news source. I have mixed feelings about it all myself, because I still subscribe to the K.C. Star and enjoy reading it front-to-back every day at work, but I do tend to get more and more of my news off the Internet as time goes by. Local TV news is a joke anymore and radio is turning into a dinosaur as well, so the paper is certainly a better resource for local news, and I hate to see it go away altogether.
MATH FOR AGNOSTICS
My man Leonard Pitts, Jr. is on a roll these days, and he wrote yet another fine column this week about a new survey that showed how fewer and fewer people are religious these days. Although Pitts himself is indeed a church-goer, he did a more brilliant job than I ever could have of summing up why I’m not one with the following:
"And people of faith should ask themselves: What is the cumulative effect upon outside observers of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker living like lords on the largesse of the poor, multiplied by Jimmy Swaggart’s pornography addiction [not to mention his taste for $10 whores!—BH], plus Eric Rudolph bombing Olympians and gay people in the name of God, plus Muslims hijacking airplanes in the name of God, multiplied by the church that kicked out some members because they voted Democrat, divided by people caterwauling on courthouse steps as a rock bearing the Ten Commandments was removed, multiplied by the square root of Catholic priests preying on little boys while the church looked on and did nothing, multiplied by Muslims rioting over cartoons, plus the continuing demonization of gay men and lesbians, divided by all those "traditional values" coalitions and "family values" councils that try to bully public schools into becoming worship houses, with morning prayers and science lessons from the book of Genesis? Then subtract selflessness, service, sacrifice, holiness and hope."
He went on to say, "Who can be surprised if the sheer absurdity, fundamentalist cruelty and ungodly hypocrisy that have characterized so much "religion" in the last 30 years have driven people away?"
All I gotta say to all that is, "Amen, brother!"
LENNY THE COOL?
Local station KMBC Channel 9 made a big whoop the other night about sportscaster Len Dawson cutting back on his duties now that he’s in his ‘70s. Leonard isn’t retiring, per se, but will no longer anchor the nightly sportscasts as he’s done since he was a player back in the ‘60s, and will remain at the station to cover and analyze the Chiefs and NFL during the Fall. All of this was accompanied by a 5-minute retrospective of Len’s broadcasting career—oy! Don’t get me wrong—I loved Lenny to death as a player during the Chiefs’ glory years, and I think he does a fine job as color analyst on Chiefs radio broadcasts and he wasn’t bad on HBO’s "Inside The NFL". He’s a class act, no doubt, but I won’t miss all the mispronounced player names, pregnant pauses and mangled sports copy that rendered Dawson to be the Les Nessman of local sports anchors. There isn’t a Tele-Prompt-Er on earth with big enough letters for him to read clearly! Dawson knows football inside and out, but his knowledge of baseball and basketball is iffy at best, and hockey, NASCAR and soccer might as well be nuclear physics to him because he doesn’t have a clue about them.
I was shocked that ESPN actually interrupted all their incessant Bracket-ology folderol and obsessing over Manny Ramirez on "SportsCenter" to recognize that a major sports record was broken last night. Congrats to New Jersey Devils goaltender Martin Brodeur for breaking the all-time NHL record for career victories (552), surpassing Patrick Roy with a 3-2 win over Chicago. This guy doesn’t get near enough recognition (even though he plays in the New York area) for what he does—he’s as dependable as the day is long in goal, he doesn’t whine and complain about anything, he doesn’t do steroids or get DUIs or beat on his wife or shit like that, he’s won three Stanley Cups (and is working on a fourth one now), and has played his entire career with the same team, no less. He’s only four shutouts away from breaking the late Terry Sawchuk’s all-time record, too, and what’s even scarier is Brodeur still has plenty of gas left in the tank, thus (barring injury), he might well win 700 games before he’s done.
UTTER MADNESS
Here’s my fearless Final Four prognostication: Louisville, Memphis, Pittsburgh and Arizona St., with Memphis winning the whole shooting match. There’s really no clear-cut dominant team in the field this year, and since Memphis came so close last year against Kansas, I have a good feeling about them this time. I envision quite a few upsets in the first couple rounds this year (watch out for Cleveland State, Stephen F. Austin and Western Kentucky!), and I have Kansas falling to Boston College in round three because KU just can’t handle schools that start with ‘B’ (Bucknell, Bradley, Baylor, etc.). My Mizzou Tigers will also fall in the third round to the other Tigers of Memphis. Then again, for about the fifth straight year, I incorrectly predicted the winner of the "play-in" game (thanks a lot, Morehead State!), so take my picks with a grain of salt. Hey, at least I’m consistent…
And won’t it be simply grand to not have to listen to Billy Packer calling the games on CBS this year? Between that and Dickey-Dick-Brain Vitale being relegated to NIT duty on ESPN, it’s gonna be awesome, bay-bee!
GAME, SET AND MATCH, MR. STEWART
I absolutely loved watching CNBC’s financial "expert" Jim Cramer squeal like an eel and squirm like a worm (as Louie DePalma would say) on Jon Stewart’s "Daily Show" last week on Comedy Central. Stewart made Cramer look like some miscreant school kid sitting in the principal’s office as he reamed Jimbo like Roto-Rooter for all the crackpot B.S. he’s been dishing out during the recession (and even prior to it). A gold star to Mr. Stewart for putting this doofus in his place—you have done well, young grasshopper. Here’s the whole unedited video, in case you missed it. Then again, anyone ignorant enough to listen to this Cramer boob is every bit as culpable as he is for losing their hard-earned money. His "Mad Money" show looks like something MTV would produce anyway—I’d sooner seek financial advice from one of the Teletubbies…
THE FIRST DOMINO TO FALL…
Sad to hear that the Seattle Post-Intelligencer has ceased being a print newspaper and is now totally an on-line going concern as of yesterday. This will surely be the first of many such conversions by major papers in the U.S., as advertising revenues plummet and the Internet becomes more pervasive as a news source. I have mixed feelings about it all myself, because I still subscribe to the K.C. Star and enjoy reading it front-to-back every day at work, but I do tend to get more and more of my news off the Internet as time goes by. Local TV news is a joke anymore and radio is turning into a dinosaur as well, so the paper is certainly a better resource for local news, and I hate to see it go away altogether.
MATH FOR AGNOSTICS
My man Leonard Pitts, Jr. is on a roll these days, and he wrote yet another fine column this week about a new survey that showed how fewer and fewer people are religious these days. Although Pitts himself is indeed a church-goer, he did a more brilliant job than I ever could have of summing up why I’m not one with the following:
"And people of faith should ask themselves: What is the cumulative effect upon outside observers of Jim and Tammy Faye Bakker living like lords on the largesse of the poor, multiplied by Jimmy Swaggart’s pornography addiction [not to mention his taste for $10 whores!—BH], plus Eric Rudolph bombing Olympians and gay people in the name of God, plus Muslims hijacking airplanes in the name of God, multiplied by the church that kicked out some members because they voted Democrat, divided by people caterwauling on courthouse steps as a rock bearing the Ten Commandments was removed, multiplied by the square root of Catholic priests preying on little boys while the church looked on and did nothing, multiplied by Muslims rioting over cartoons, plus the continuing demonization of gay men and lesbians, divided by all those "traditional values" coalitions and "family values" councils that try to bully public schools into becoming worship houses, with morning prayers and science lessons from the book of Genesis? Then subtract selflessness, service, sacrifice, holiness and hope."
He went on to say, "Who can be surprised if the sheer absurdity, fundamentalist cruelty and ungodly hypocrisy that have characterized so much "religion" in the last 30 years have driven people away?"
All I gotta say to all that is, "Amen, brother!"
LENNY THE COOL?
Local station KMBC Channel 9 made a big whoop the other night about sportscaster Len Dawson cutting back on his duties now that he’s in his ‘70s. Leonard isn’t retiring, per se, but will no longer anchor the nightly sportscasts as he’s done since he was a player back in the ‘60s, and will remain at the station to cover and analyze the Chiefs and NFL during the Fall. All of this was accompanied by a 5-minute retrospective of Len’s broadcasting career—oy! Don’t get me wrong—I loved Lenny to death as a player during the Chiefs’ glory years, and I think he does a fine job as color analyst on Chiefs radio broadcasts and he wasn’t bad on HBO’s "Inside The NFL". He’s a class act, no doubt, but I won’t miss all the mispronounced player names, pregnant pauses and mangled sports copy that rendered Dawson to be the Les Nessman of local sports anchors. There isn’t a Tele-Prompt-Er on earth with big enough letters for him to read clearly! Dawson knows football inside and out, but his knowledge of baseball and basketball is iffy at best, and hockey, NASCAR and soccer might as well be nuclear physics to him because he doesn’t have a clue about them.
Monday, March 16, 2009
1982--The Other Year of the Album, Part 1
I enjoyed reliving the great year in music that was 1981 so much, that I decided to do a similar review of the following year, 1982, which I remember well because it was the year I graduated high school and started college and it was another pretty good one for album releases. This was also the year I made the jump from 8-track to cassette player in my car, which naturally offered me more versatility in my listening choices, plus options that 8-tracks didn’t have: namely fast-forward and rewind! Some of those albums on cassette were instrumental in getting me through that first semester in college at UMKC as I drove to and from class.
Slightly different format this time, as I’ve grouped the albums in different categories according to their overall impact and status in the careers of the artists. This chapter will cover the comebacks, disappointments and clunkers, while Part II will feature the debuts, breakouts and the better overall albums of ’82. Enjoy the ride…
THE COMEBACKS
TED NUGENT—Nugent It looked for a while like the Nuge might actually survive his near-fatal career mistake from the year before—the disastrous Intensities In 10 Cities fiasco—with Nugent, his first album on his new label, Atlantic Records. He at least partially atoned for the substandard quality of Intensities with some decent songs and the return of longtime singer and rhythm guitarist Derek St. Holmes. Journeyman drummer Carmine Appice also joined Nugent’s band and sounded pretty good on tracks like "Good And Ready", "Fightin’ Words" and the album’s centerpiece, "Bound And Gagged", Nugent’s response to the 1980-81 Iran hostage crisis. That song sounded great back then, but Nugent’s pseudo-patriotic chest-thumping and right-wing ranting rings very hollow and shallow today. Anyway, while Nugent was hardly Cat Scratch Fever or even Free-For-All, it was definitely a step in the right direction for Ted. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t make another decent album again until 1995, when Derek St. Holmes returned to the band once again. You’d think Nugent would catch on sooner or later and keep this guy around longer…
ELTON JOHN—Jump Up EJ's gradual comeback from his late ‘70s musical purgatory commenced with 1981’s semi-decent The Fox album and continued here. Not-so-coincidentally, the quality of his music improved exponentially as he reunited here with longtime lyricist Bernie Taupin, as well as his backing band from his ‘70s heyday, Nigel Olsson, Davey Johnstone and the late Dee Murray. While not really chuck-full of major hits, there was good stuff to be had on Jump Up, namely "Dear John", "Where Have All The Good Times Gone?" (not the Kinks song of the same name that Van Halen covered in ‘82), "Blue Eyes" and "Ball And Chain", which featured a guest appearance by The Who’s Pete Townshend. The best track, by far, was "Empty Garden (Hey Hey Johnny)", which is easily the best of the John Lennon tribute songs that flooded the market in the early ‘80s. EJ and the boys also hit the road during the summer and played what turned out to be the greatest concert I’ve ever attended. To paraphrase a tagline from a movie that was very popular at that time, "He’s baaaaaack!"
PAUL McCARTNEY—Tug Of War Big Macca also came out with his best album in years in 1982 with Tug Of War, and it too featured a John Lennon tribute, the long-anticipated "Here Today". While not nearly as poignant as Elton’s "Empty Garden", it was certainly a far superior response to JL’s death than "It’s a drag, innit?" TOW also had some fun tracks like "Take It Away", "Ballroom Dancing" and "Get It", a duet with the late Carl Perkins. I had to take points off, however, for the insipid duet with Stevie Wonder, "Ebony And Ivory". Another popular phrase from that time sums up my feelings on it: "Gag me with a spoon!"
KISS—Creatures Of The Night Ahhhh, finally the Kiss we all knew and loved was back! Well, not quite the Kiss we all knew and loved, but a reasonable facsimile, anyway. Ace Frehley and Peter Criss were gone (although Ace’s mug graced the original COTN album jacket anyway), and Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley decided to quit trying to please the critics and/or cater to Top 40 audiences and got back to the down-and-dirty heavy metal sound they were originally known for. Although he sounded a bit too military-marchy in places, late drummer Eric Carr stood out on Creatures, and it’s anyone’s guess who played lead guitar on this record (Bob Kulick, Vinnie Vincent, the Man from Glad, who knows?), but this was easily the most consistent Kiss album since the Bicentennial. "War Machine", "Killer" and the title track were my personal favorites, and Stanley’s almost-mournful "I Still Love You" surprisingly became a Kiss concert staple in the ‘80s.
STEVE MILLER BAND—Abracadabra We were only four years or so removed from the Space Cowboy’s Fly Like An Eagle/Book of Dreams heyday, but the Gangster of Love slipped badly and put out a flop of an album in ’81, the one containing "Heart Like A Wheel" on which Steve was nearly yodeling. Good ol’ Maurice rebounded nicely with this little hunk of magic, and the title track hit #1 in the summer of ’82. The follow-up single, "Keeps Me Wondering Why", wasn’t too shabby either. Haven’t heard much from the Pompatus of Love since, though…
CHICAGO—Chicago 16 Chicago is another act that was just a few years past their '70s halcyon days, but following the tragic 1978 death of guitarist Terry Kath, they lost their way a bit. They found it again in the summer of ’82 with big hits "Hard To Say I’m Sorry/Get Away" and "Love Me Tomorrow". Their next album in ’84 would be even better…
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS
SUPERTRAMP—Famous Last Words… Well, not really their last words, but FLW was indeed their final album with singer/keyboardist Roger Hodgson. As was the case with AC/DC in the wake of the monster that was Back In Black, Supertramp had the no-win chore of topping their magnum opus, 1979’s Breakfast In America, so most anything they came out with would’ve been disappointing in comparison. The opening track, "Crazy" (not the Patsy Cline number) wasn’t bad and the hit single "It’s Raining Again" was just okay, but it was the album’s closer that was easily the best song, Hodgson’s melodramatic plea, "Don’t Leave Me Now". The rest of the band members should’ve serenaded him with it, because one can easily see what RH brought to the Supertramp table by listening to their post-Hodgson output in the ‘80s, which was pretty flaccid.
R.E.O. SPEEDWAGON—Good Trouble Same scenario as Supertramp above, trying to follow up a killer album. Trouble wasn’t a bad record, really, but it was no match for its predecessor HI inFIdelity, and accordingly, didn’t sell nearly as well. "Keep The Fire Burnin’" was the only hit single from it, but "Stillness Of The Night" was a good song, and I really liked the album’s closing title track. Like Famous Last Words…, AC/DC’s For Those About To Rock, and Elton John’s Caribou before it, Good Trouble was destined to disappoint, irregardless of its true merits.
APRIL WINE—Power Play As I stated in my recap of AW’s Nature Of The Beast, it appears they shot their creative wad on that album, because this was a really bland follow-up to it. The single "Enough Is Enough" wasn’t all that bad, but the rest was just plain plain. The only other thing that came close to a standout track was the contrively-titled "If You See Kay", and they also included a remake of The Beatles’ "Tell Me Why", which they slowed to a crawl. Please tell me why they did that, will ya?
VAN HALEN—Diver Down Yes, this one sold pretty well and did have a couple really good tracks on it, but it should’ve been so much better! With no less than four cover songs (five, if you count the silly one-minute a capella closer "Happy Trails"), three short instrumentals and a running time of 31-and-a-half minutes, Diver Down came across as a rather half-assed effort. Of the original songs here, "Hang ‘Em High", "Little Guitars" and "The Full Bug" were quite tasty, and of all the cover songs, "Pretty Woman" was a killer, but the rest were so-so, at best. Eddie, Michael and Alex didn’t even want "Dancing In The Street" on the album, but Diamond Dave got his way, and it wound up being a big radio hit. Successful, yes, but Diver Down was a big letdown for me coming on the heels of the outstanding Fair Warning. The next one, 1984, wasn’t much better, either…
PETE TOWNSHEND—All The Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes Given the stellar quality of 1980’s Empty Glass, I expected big things from Chairman Townshend on Chinese Eyes, but was left a bit wanting. To his credit, Pete got clean and sober during this time, but his music was almost as unfocused as the increasingly bad haircuts he was sporting then. This is not to say that Chinese Eyes sucked altogether—it did have some standout songs like "Stop Hurting People" (the horns on which sounded like they were lifted from a Barry White record), the rapid-fire "Communication" and "The Sea Refuses No River". The closing track, "Slit Skirts" is one of my favorite Pete songs ever, with lines like "No one respects the flame quite like the fool who’s badly burned", "Have to be so drunk to try a new dance", and "Can’t pretend that growing older never hurts". In retrospect, even "Face Dances (Part 2)" was a lot better than the Who album it was named after, and Chinese Eyes does sound better to me now than it did in 1982, but it still feels like Townshend was underachieving here.
THE GO-GO’S—Vacation By all accounts, this album was a rush-job, as the Go-Go’s pulled out of a tour opening for The Police to re-enter the studio to cash in on the unexpected success of their first album, Beauty And The Beat. Not much good new material here, except for the title track, and much of the album was made up of songs that were already staples of their live act like "Beatnik Beach", "He’s So Strange" and their cover version of the Capitols’ "Cool Jerk". Classic case of too much, too soon, unfortunately.
BILLY SQUIER—Emotions In Motion Another victim of high expectations, although EIM out-sold its predecessor, the far-superior Don’t Say No. "Everybody Wants You" is an Album Rock standard, the title track was pretty good, and I loved "Keep Me Satisfied", but the rest of this one left me really flat. Sad to say that things would only get worse for young master Squier next time out—"out" being the operative word…
CHEAP TRICK—One On One After breaking out in a major way in 1978-79 with Heaven Tonight, At Budokan and Dream Police, Cheap Trick stumbled into the early ‘80s and had trouble rediscovering their winning formula. Bassist Tom Petersson got bored and left the band and was replaced by Jon Brant, but CT needed a more potent jump-start than he could provide. One On One yielded the bland minor hit "If You Want My Love (You Got It)" and one killer track, the classic "She’s Tight", but the remainder was rather forgettable.
THE CLUNKERS
QUEEN—Hot Space Talk about your letdowns! Queen had the world by the balls in 1980 with what I thought was their best album ever, The Game, and while it would’ve been difficult to top that one, they didn’t even bother to try! Instead, they added horns to several tracks and put out a bunch of pseudo-R&B stuff that just left the fans scratching their heads. True, Hot Space contained "Under Pressure" with David Bowie, but it had already been a hit single long before the album came out, and the only other acceptable track was "Life Is Real (Song For Lennon)", which I’d rank second behind Elton’s "Empty Garden" for best Lennon tribute song. It would be a while before Queen regained their core audience.
HEART—Private Audition Even Ann and Nancy Wilson themselves rate this one a clunker. The lead-off track, "City’s Burning", wasn’t bad, and I remember a song called "The Situation" that was okay, but the rest of it pretty much sucked. The band was in disarray by that time, and the rhythm section of Steve Fossen and Mike Derosier would soon be jettisoned in favor of ex-Spirit/Firefall bassist Mark Andes and ex-Montrose drummer Denny Carmassi, setting the stage for Heart’s successful mid-‘80s comeback.
BLACK SABBATH—Live Evil Whatever good karma Ronnie James Dio and Black Sabbath had during the Heaven And Hell era had long evaporated in the wake of the disastrous Mob Rules album and accompanying 1981 concert tour, which resulted in this putrid "live" album. I put live in quotation marks because this album sounded highly touched-up to me, and according to the good Dr. Sardonicus, Dio did indeed tinker with some of his vocals for it. Plus, Dio doing Ozzy’s old songs like "Paranoid" and "Children of The Grave" bordered on sacrilege. Live Vile might’ve been a more suitable title, here, and Ozzy had the last laugh with his own 1982 double-live Sabbath opus, Speak Of The Devil, which I will profile in Part 2.
Slightly different format this time, as I’ve grouped the albums in different categories according to their overall impact and status in the careers of the artists. This chapter will cover the comebacks, disappointments and clunkers, while Part II will feature the debuts, breakouts and the better overall albums of ’82. Enjoy the ride…
THE COMEBACKS
TED NUGENT—Nugent It looked for a while like the Nuge might actually survive his near-fatal career mistake from the year before—the disastrous Intensities In 10 Cities fiasco—with Nugent, his first album on his new label, Atlantic Records. He at least partially atoned for the substandard quality of Intensities with some decent songs and the return of longtime singer and rhythm guitarist Derek St. Holmes. Journeyman drummer Carmine Appice also joined Nugent’s band and sounded pretty good on tracks like "Good And Ready", "Fightin’ Words" and the album’s centerpiece, "Bound And Gagged", Nugent’s response to the 1980-81 Iran hostage crisis. That song sounded great back then, but Nugent’s pseudo-patriotic chest-thumping and right-wing ranting rings very hollow and shallow today. Anyway, while Nugent was hardly Cat Scratch Fever or even Free-For-All, it was definitely a step in the right direction for Ted. Unfortunately, he wouldn’t make another decent album again until 1995, when Derek St. Holmes returned to the band once again. You’d think Nugent would catch on sooner or later and keep this guy around longer…
ELTON JOHN—Jump Up EJ's gradual comeback from his late ‘70s musical purgatory commenced with 1981’s semi-decent The Fox album and continued here. Not-so-coincidentally, the quality of his music improved exponentially as he reunited here with longtime lyricist Bernie Taupin, as well as his backing band from his ‘70s heyday, Nigel Olsson, Davey Johnstone and the late Dee Murray. While not really chuck-full of major hits, there was good stuff to be had on Jump Up, namely "Dear John", "Where Have All The Good Times Gone?" (not the Kinks song of the same name that Van Halen covered in ‘82), "Blue Eyes" and "Ball And Chain", which featured a guest appearance by The Who’s Pete Townshend. The best track, by far, was "Empty Garden (Hey Hey Johnny)", which is easily the best of the John Lennon tribute songs that flooded the market in the early ‘80s. EJ and the boys also hit the road during the summer and played what turned out to be the greatest concert I’ve ever attended. To paraphrase a tagline from a movie that was very popular at that time, "He’s baaaaaack!"
PAUL McCARTNEY—Tug Of War Big Macca also came out with his best album in years in 1982 with Tug Of War, and it too featured a John Lennon tribute, the long-anticipated "Here Today". While not nearly as poignant as Elton’s "Empty Garden", it was certainly a far superior response to JL’s death than "It’s a drag, innit?" TOW also had some fun tracks like "Take It Away", "Ballroom Dancing" and "Get It", a duet with the late Carl Perkins. I had to take points off, however, for the insipid duet with Stevie Wonder, "Ebony And Ivory". Another popular phrase from that time sums up my feelings on it: "Gag me with a spoon!"
KISS—Creatures Of The Night Ahhhh, finally the Kiss we all knew and loved was back! Well, not quite the Kiss we all knew and loved, but a reasonable facsimile, anyway. Ace Frehley and Peter Criss were gone (although Ace’s mug graced the original COTN album jacket anyway), and Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley decided to quit trying to please the critics and/or cater to Top 40 audiences and got back to the down-and-dirty heavy metal sound they were originally known for. Although he sounded a bit too military-marchy in places, late drummer Eric Carr stood out on Creatures, and it’s anyone’s guess who played lead guitar on this record (Bob Kulick, Vinnie Vincent, the Man from Glad, who knows?), but this was easily the most consistent Kiss album since the Bicentennial. "War Machine", "Killer" and the title track were my personal favorites, and Stanley’s almost-mournful "I Still Love You" surprisingly became a Kiss concert staple in the ‘80s.
STEVE MILLER BAND—Abracadabra We were only four years or so removed from the Space Cowboy’s Fly Like An Eagle/Book of Dreams heyday, but the Gangster of Love slipped badly and put out a flop of an album in ’81, the one containing "Heart Like A Wheel" on which Steve was nearly yodeling. Good ol’ Maurice rebounded nicely with this little hunk of magic, and the title track hit #1 in the summer of ’82. The follow-up single, "Keeps Me Wondering Why", wasn’t too shabby either. Haven’t heard much from the Pompatus of Love since, though…
CHICAGO—Chicago 16 Chicago is another act that was just a few years past their '70s halcyon days, but following the tragic 1978 death of guitarist Terry Kath, they lost their way a bit. They found it again in the summer of ’82 with big hits "Hard To Say I’m Sorry/Get Away" and "Love Me Tomorrow". Their next album in ’84 would be even better…
THE DISAPPOINTMENTS
SUPERTRAMP—Famous Last Words… Well, not really their last words, but FLW was indeed their final album with singer/keyboardist Roger Hodgson. As was the case with AC/DC in the wake of the monster that was Back In Black, Supertramp had the no-win chore of topping their magnum opus, 1979’s Breakfast In America, so most anything they came out with would’ve been disappointing in comparison. The opening track, "Crazy" (not the Patsy Cline number) wasn’t bad and the hit single "It’s Raining Again" was just okay, but it was the album’s closer that was easily the best song, Hodgson’s melodramatic plea, "Don’t Leave Me Now". The rest of the band members should’ve serenaded him with it, because one can easily see what RH brought to the Supertramp table by listening to their post-Hodgson output in the ‘80s, which was pretty flaccid.
R.E.O. SPEEDWAGON—Good Trouble Same scenario as Supertramp above, trying to follow up a killer album. Trouble wasn’t a bad record, really, but it was no match for its predecessor HI inFIdelity, and accordingly, didn’t sell nearly as well. "Keep The Fire Burnin’" was the only hit single from it, but "Stillness Of The Night" was a good song, and I really liked the album’s closing title track. Like Famous Last Words…, AC/DC’s For Those About To Rock, and Elton John’s Caribou before it, Good Trouble was destined to disappoint, irregardless of its true merits.
APRIL WINE—Power Play As I stated in my recap of AW’s Nature Of The Beast, it appears they shot their creative wad on that album, because this was a really bland follow-up to it. The single "Enough Is Enough" wasn’t all that bad, but the rest was just plain plain. The only other thing that came close to a standout track was the contrively-titled "If You See Kay", and they also included a remake of The Beatles’ "Tell Me Why", which they slowed to a crawl. Please tell me why they did that, will ya?
VAN HALEN—Diver Down Yes, this one sold pretty well and did have a couple really good tracks on it, but it should’ve been so much better! With no less than four cover songs (five, if you count the silly one-minute a capella closer "Happy Trails"), three short instrumentals and a running time of 31-and-a-half minutes, Diver Down came across as a rather half-assed effort. Of the original songs here, "Hang ‘Em High", "Little Guitars" and "The Full Bug" were quite tasty, and of all the cover songs, "Pretty Woman" was a killer, but the rest were so-so, at best. Eddie, Michael and Alex didn’t even want "Dancing In The Street" on the album, but Diamond Dave got his way, and it wound up being a big radio hit. Successful, yes, but Diver Down was a big letdown for me coming on the heels of the outstanding Fair Warning. The next one, 1984, wasn’t much better, either…
PETE TOWNSHEND—All The Best Cowboys Have Chinese Eyes Given the stellar quality of 1980’s Empty Glass, I expected big things from Chairman Townshend on Chinese Eyes, but was left a bit wanting. To his credit, Pete got clean and sober during this time, but his music was almost as unfocused as the increasingly bad haircuts he was sporting then. This is not to say that Chinese Eyes sucked altogether—it did have some standout songs like "Stop Hurting People" (the horns on which sounded like they were lifted from a Barry White record), the rapid-fire "Communication" and "The Sea Refuses No River". The closing track, "Slit Skirts" is one of my favorite Pete songs ever, with lines like "No one respects the flame quite like the fool who’s badly burned", "Have to be so drunk to try a new dance", and "Can’t pretend that growing older never hurts". In retrospect, even "Face Dances (Part 2)" was a lot better than the Who album it was named after, and Chinese Eyes does sound better to me now than it did in 1982, but it still feels like Townshend was underachieving here.
THE GO-GO’S—Vacation By all accounts, this album was a rush-job, as the Go-Go’s pulled out of a tour opening for The Police to re-enter the studio to cash in on the unexpected success of their first album, Beauty And The Beat. Not much good new material here, except for the title track, and much of the album was made up of songs that were already staples of their live act like "Beatnik Beach", "He’s So Strange" and their cover version of the Capitols’ "Cool Jerk". Classic case of too much, too soon, unfortunately.
BILLY SQUIER—Emotions In Motion Another victim of high expectations, although EIM out-sold its predecessor, the far-superior Don’t Say No. "Everybody Wants You" is an Album Rock standard, the title track was pretty good, and I loved "Keep Me Satisfied", but the rest of this one left me really flat. Sad to say that things would only get worse for young master Squier next time out—"out" being the operative word…
CHEAP TRICK—One On One After breaking out in a major way in 1978-79 with Heaven Tonight, At Budokan and Dream Police, Cheap Trick stumbled into the early ‘80s and had trouble rediscovering their winning formula. Bassist Tom Petersson got bored and left the band and was replaced by Jon Brant, but CT needed a more potent jump-start than he could provide. One On One yielded the bland minor hit "If You Want My Love (You Got It)" and one killer track, the classic "She’s Tight", but the remainder was rather forgettable.
THE CLUNKERS
QUEEN—Hot Space Talk about your letdowns! Queen had the world by the balls in 1980 with what I thought was their best album ever, The Game, and while it would’ve been difficult to top that one, they didn’t even bother to try! Instead, they added horns to several tracks and put out a bunch of pseudo-R&B stuff that just left the fans scratching their heads. True, Hot Space contained "Under Pressure" with David Bowie, but it had already been a hit single long before the album came out, and the only other acceptable track was "Life Is Real (Song For Lennon)", which I’d rank second behind Elton’s "Empty Garden" for best Lennon tribute song. It would be a while before Queen regained their core audience.
HEART—Private Audition Even Ann and Nancy Wilson themselves rate this one a clunker. The lead-off track, "City’s Burning", wasn’t bad, and I remember a song called "The Situation" that was okay, but the rest of it pretty much sucked. The band was in disarray by that time, and the rhythm section of Steve Fossen and Mike Derosier would soon be jettisoned in favor of ex-Spirit/Firefall bassist Mark Andes and ex-Montrose drummer Denny Carmassi, setting the stage for Heart’s successful mid-‘80s comeback.
BLACK SABBATH—Live Evil Whatever good karma Ronnie James Dio and Black Sabbath had during the Heaven And Hell era had long evaporated in the wake of the disastrous Mob Rules album and accompanying 1981 concert tour, which resulted in this putrid "live" album. I put live in quotation marks because this album sounded highly touched-up to me, and according to the good Dr. Sardonicus, Dio did indeed tinker with some of his vocals for it. Plus, Dio doing Ozzy’s old songs like "Paranoid" and "Children of The Grave" bordered on sacrilege. Live Vile might’ve been a more suitable title, here, and Ozzy had the last laugh with his own 1982 double-live Sabbath opus, Speak Of The Devil, which I will profile in Part 2.
Thursday, March 12, 2009
"Your captain's at the helm...
…sail across the sea of lights"
LEONARD PITTS FOR PRESIDENT!
If Barack Obama turns out to be a bust as our Prez (and I don’t believe he will), I have the ideal replacement in mind for 2012: columnist Leonard Pitts, Jr. I’ve praised him many times on this blog already because this guy is so right-on about most subjects, and it’s refreshing in this day and age to see a columnist/pundit who uses his head for something besides a hat rack, and who also doesn’t seem to be pursuing any kind of personal political agenda. LP authored yet another brilliant column this week and did a mighty fine job of cutting the Rush Limbaugh cheese in the process. A sample paragraph: "To judge from the eagerness with which they [Republicans] prostrate themselves before Limbaugh, the answer is troublingly simple: They fear losing the votes they have. They are unable to disenthrall themselves from that culturally intolerant, intellectually incoherent, perpetually outraged and willfully ignorant cohort of the American demographic they call their base, i.e., extreme social conservatives." Damn, I wish I’d written that! Here’s the entire column.
While we’re on the subject, a letter-to-the-editor writer in today’s K.C. Star, one Bud Simpson, had this to say: "Let me get this straight. The Republican Party, the party that has sold itself for years as the only one that can keep us safe from foreign interests, terrorists and economic meltdown, is now the party that doesn’t have the guts to stand up to a radio personality? That’s just pathetic." Well said, Bud. Heeeee shoots and scores!
GOT MILK?
Sorry, couldn’t resist the pun. I was quite impressed with Sean Penn’s Oscar-winning performance in Milk—it’s everything the critics said it was, and you truly do lose track of Sean Penn and just see Harvey Milk throughout. I had to keep reminding myself this guy was once best known as Jeff "Hey, bud—let’s party!" Spicoli from Fast Times At Ridgemont High! Even though I knew Penn was playing a flamboyant, openly-gay man, I was still a bit startled when he hauled off and kissed another guy right smack on the lips. In doing so, he sure showed some stones as an actor—I think if it were me, I would’ve insisted on a stunt double woman made-up to be the guy before I did any kissing that intense! Josh Brolin—fresh off his role as Dubya in W—also turned in another pretty good performance here as unstable bad guy City Supervisor Dan White. How this creep (White) got off with only manslaughter convictions after murdering two city officials (including the mayor) by way of blaming his actions on a chemical imbalance (the "Twinkie defense") is truly absurd. Maybe I should go out and commit a major felony and use the ol’ "T-bone steak defense".
After having seen the movie—much of which was filmed on location in San Francisco—I regret not making it over to the city hall when I was out there last summer. It would’ve been neat to see where so much of the drama took place. Even though I’m not homosexual, I am sympathetic to their cause because of the way the religious right constantly shits on them, and I’ve always found Harvey Milk to be a rather fascinating figure. If nothing else, the guy sure had balls to challenge the status quo and rankle the establishment, thus giving a voice to millions of disenfranchised people. I loved how he took on phonies like Anita Bryant and right-wing so-called religious and political "leaders" head-on without blinking. Btw, the documentary film The Times of Harvey Milk is quite good as well, if you’re wanting to learn more about the man.
I’ve never gotten all the hatred and hostility the religious right heaps on gay people, especially their raging paranoia about how gays are "destroying the American family". How? Why? Just because they aren’t able (or don’t want) to have children? So what? Hell, I’m straight, and I can guaran-freakin’-tee that y’all ain’t getting any kids out of me, so what difference does it make who’s procreating and who isn’t? As for gay people adopting, I’d much rather see a child being raised by two gay parents who actually give a shit about him or her, as opposed to two neglectful and/or abusive heterosexual parents, wouldn’t you? Just relax, religious right folks—there are still plenty of straight people out there being fruitful (oops!) and multiplying, so there will be more than enough unwanted babies to go around. And then there’s all that ignorant clap-trap about "them homo-sek-shuls are out to recruit your kids" or that watching a gay movie will "turn you gay". It truly embarrasses me to be a member of the same species as the mongoloids who think that way. Sorry, folks, but watching a movie about Harvey Milk doesn’t make me any less heterosexual or any less of a man—it just makes me more aware of a wider reality.
This is not to say that I embrace everything about gay culture or condone everything gays do or stand for. I can do without the man-hating lesbians (and man-hating straight women, for that matter) as well as flamers like those you see on all these shallow-as-shit reality shows about fashion and gay guys who are so prissy that they’re afraid to get their hands dirty and do some honest-to-goodness hard work once in a while, like some former co-workers I’ve dealt with. That ACT-UP bunch is another group I can do without. And this is also not to say that I’m above describing something as "faggy" or making fun of famous gay people now and then (George Michael—TEN HUT!). Still, having said all that, geez Louise, can’t we all just live and let live? I seem to remember there’s something in the Bible about that, but I guess all the homophobic bigots out there just conveniently forget that part…
Sorry to turn a movie review into a rant, but I needed to take that garbage out of my system. Anyway, I give the film Milk about an 8.5 (out of 10). I think maybe I’ll mail a DVD copy to Rev. Fred Phelps in Topeka—I’m sure he’ll love it…
DUCK DELUXE
In what may well be the most bizarre double-feature ever executed, before I watched Milk the other night, I revisited that 1986 colossal bomb of a movie, Howard The Duck, which also debuted on DVD Tuesday. Yes, I know, it was a stupid movie for the most part, but it did have its moments. Actually, the first hour or so wasn’t all that bad—it was the whole "overlord of the universe" bit with Jeffrey Owens (the vice-principal guy from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) that killed it for me. That, and the duck himself, who wasn’t terribly likeable. Howard The Duck had a cult following in comic book circles prior to the movie, but like Garfield and Scooby-Doo, he simply didn’t transfer well to the silver screen.
However, HTD did have something that I liked when I first saw it. Hmmm, let’s see, what the heck was it? Gimme a minute, okay? Oh wait, now I remember what initially drew me to it…
Ah yes, the lovely Lea Thompson was a real hottie in this one (to this horny 22-year-old in 1986, anyway) and she turned in the only decent performance in this disasterpiece. To her credit, she doesn’t try to act like Howard never happened, and gladly participated in the DVD’s special features, unlike Tim "Shawshank" Robbins, who was nowhere to be found. I was surprised to learn that Lea actually did her own vocals in the film (she played a singer), and wasn’t too shabby at it—quite serviceable, anyway, for the ‘80s. LT still looks very attractive today, too—nice to see she’s taken care of herself and hasn’t become another Hollywood casualty.
CLASSIC OVERUSED MOVIE/TV CLICHÉ #10
Ain’t it amazing how apartment and/or office building rooftops in the movies and on TV are so neat and tidy? Oftentimes these roofs are totally devoid of all that silly tar and gravel—let alone pigeon poop and trash—that one would normally find there. A glaring example of this is the "Frasier" episode where Frasier and Martin arrange it so Daphne and Niles can have a secluded romantic dinner for two on the roof of Elliott Bay Tower, and the surface of that roof was almost clean enough to eat off of! Also amazing is the incredibly easy access TV and movie characters have to these roofs without setting off any sort of security alarms.
CLASSIC OVERUSED MOVIE/TV CLICHÉ 11
Speaking of double-features, here’s another cliché that I find particularly asinine: pretending to be Jewish (or any other religious denomination) just to impress a potential mate you’re attracted to. This plotline also happened on "Frasier", as well as "Caroline In The City" and no doubt countless other TV shows. This should be pretty self-evident, but I’ll say it anyway—if you feel you have to change who you are to impress someone, they ain’t freakin’ worth it, anyway…
KLINGONS ON THE STARBOARD BOW, STARBOARD BOW!
I was surprised to discover this week that the first woman I ever lusted after in my life—the lovely Yvonne Craig, who played Batgirl on TV’s "Batman"—also played the green chick that Kirk tried to get it on with on "Star Trek". Like Eddie Murphy once said, "You gotta be pretty hard-up to do it with a green bitch."
In a related issue, it took me years to finally notice that actor John Larroquette was one of the Klingons in Star Trek III—The Search For Spock in a pre-"Night Court"/Dan Fielding role. He was the one who uttered, "I do not deserve to live," to which Kirk replied, "Then I’ll kill you later."
While I’m at it, wouldn’t Rob Zombie make a dandy Klingon?
"WHAT THEY NEED'S A DAMN GOOD WHACKING!"
And it sounds like the folks at CNBC, especially raving lunatic financial guru Jim Cramer, got one on Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" that was taped today. It airs in about an hour, and I look very much forward to seeing these schlubs taken to task for all their crappy financial advice...
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #110
"Kicks"—PAUL REVERE & THE RAIDERS (1966) "Before you find out it’s too late, girl, you better get straight." Or to my three-year-old ears when I first heard it, "…girl, you better get stretched."
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
This would've been a really bad celebrity product endorsement: "Hello, Vincent Van Gogh here for Miracle Ear…"
FROM THE "SUCKER BORN EVERY MINUTE" DEPT.:
This recession has produced a new cottage industry you might have noticed lately—these "Cash For Gold" TV ads, or "Dinero Por Oro" for youse Univision viewers. You gotta be a real piece of spackle to send off your valuable jewelry in the mail and actually expect any kind of decent reimbursement in return. Just go to a pawn shop, dummy!
Another cottage industry that popped up before the recession is all this identity theft prevention hysteria crap. I’m not saying ID theft doesn’t happen now and then, but I find it hard to believe it’s as prevalent as these sensationalistic fear-mongering advertisers make it out to be. Hell, if someone wants to steal my ID, they can fucking have it—it’s not like I’m scoring any hot chicks with my current one, and I’ll gladly let the sucker pay my credit cards off instead!
LEONARD PITTS FOR PRESIDENT!
If Barack Obama turns out to be a bust as our Prez (and I don’t believe he will), I have the ideal replacement in mind for 2012: columnist Leonard Pitts, Jr. I’ve praised him many times on this blog already because this guy is so right-on about most subjects, and it’s refreshing in this day and age to see a columnist/pundit who uses his head for something besides a hat rack, and who also doesn’t seem to be pursuing any kind of personal political agenda. LP authored yet another brilliant column this week and did a mighty fine job of cutting the Rush Limbaugh cheese in the process. A sample paragraph: "To judge from the eagerness with which they [Republicans] prostrate themselves before Limbaugh, the answer is troublingly simple: They fear losing the votes they have. They are unable to disenthrall themselves from that culturally intolerant, intellectually incoherent, perpetually outraged and willfully ignorant cohort of the American demographic they call their base, i.e., extreme social conservatives." Damn, I wish I’d written that! Here’s the entire column.
While we’re on the subject, a letter-to-the-editor writer in today’s K.C. Star, one Bud Simpson, had this to say: "Let me get this straight. The Republican Party, the party that has sold itself for years as the only one that can keep us safe from foreign interests, terrorists and economic meltdown, is now the party that doesn’t have the guts to stand up to a radio personality? That’s just pathetic." Well said, Bud. Heeeee shoots and scores!
GOT MILK?
Sorry, couldn’t resist the pun. I was quite impressed with Sean Penn’s Oscar-winning performance in Milk—it’s everything the critics said it was, and you truly do lose track of Sean Penn and just see Harvey Milk throughout. I had to keep reminding myself this guy was once best known as Jeff "Hey, bud—let’s party!" Spicoli from Fast Times At Ridgemont High! Even though I knew Penn was playing a flamboyant, openly-gay man, I was still a bit startled when he hauled off and kissed another guy right smack on the lips. In doing so, he sure showed some stones as an actor—I think if it were me, I would’ve insisted on a stunt double woman made-up to be the guy before I did any kissing that intense! Josh Brolin—fresh off his role as Dubya in W—also turned in another pretty good performance here as unstable bad guy City Supervisor Dan White. How this creep (White) got off with only manslaughter convictions after murdering two city officials (including the mayor) by way of blaming his actions on a chemical imbalance (the "Twinkie defense") is truly absurd. Maybe I should go out and commit a major felony and use the ol’ "T-bone steak defense".
After having seen the movie—much of which was filmed on location in San Francisco—I regret not making it over to the city hall when I was out there last summer. It would’ve been neat to see where so much of the drama took place. Even though I’m not homosexual, I am sympathetic to their cause because of the way the religious right constantly shits on them, and I’ve always found Harvey Milk to be a rather fascinating figure. If nothing else, the guy sure had balls to challenge the status quo and rankle the establishment, thus giving a voice to millions of disenfranchised people. I loved how he took on phonies like Anita Bryant and right-wing so-called religious and political "leaders" head-on without blinking. Btw, the documentary film The Times of Harvey Milk is quite good as well, if you’re wanting to learn more about the man.
I’ve never gotten all the hatred and hostility the religious right heaps on gay people, especially their raging paranoia about how gays are "destroying the American family". How? Why? Just because they aren’t able (or don’t want) to have children? So what? Hell, I’m straight, and I can guaran-freakin’-tee that y’all ain’t getting any kids out of me, so what difference does it make who’s procreating and who isn’t? As for gay people adopting, I’d much rather see a child being raised by two gay parents who actually give a shit about him or her, as opposed to two neglectful and/or abusive heterosexual parents, wouldn’t you? Just relax, religious right folks—there are still plenty of straight people out there being fruitful (oops!) and multiplying, so there will be more than enough unwanted babies to go around. And then there’s all that ignorant clap-trap about "them homo-sek-shuls are out to recruit your kids" or that watching a gay movie will "turn you gay". It truly embarrasses me to be a member of the same species as the mongoloids who think that way. Sorry, folks, but watching a movie about Harvey Milk doesn’t make me any less heterosexual or any less of a man—it just makes me more aware of a wider reality.
This is not to say that I embrace everything about gay culture or condone everything gays do or stand for. I can do without the man-hating lesbians (and man-hating straight women, for that matter) as well as flamers like those you see on all these shallow-as-shit reality shows about fashion and gay guys who are so prissy that they’re afraid to get their hands dirty and do some honest-to-goodness hard work once in a while, like some former co-workers I’ve dealt with. That ACT-UP bunch is another group I can do without. And this is also not to say that I’m above describing something as "faggy" or making fun of famous gay people now and then (George Michael—TEN HUT!). Still, having said all that, geez Louise, can’t we all just live and let live? I seem to remember there’s something in the Bible about that, but I guess all the homophobic bigots out there just conveniently forget that part…
Sorry to turn a movie review into a rant, but I needed to take that garbage out of my system. Anyway, I give the film Milk about an 8.5 (out of 10). I think maybe I’ll mail a DVD copy to Rev. Fred Phelps in Topeka—I’m sure he’ll love it…
DUCK DELUXE
In what may well be the most bizarre double-feature ever executed, before I watched Milk the other night, I revisited that 1986 colossal bomb of a movie, Howard The Duck, which also debuted on DVD Tuesday. Yes, I know, it was a stupid movie for the most part, but it did have its moments. Actually, the first hour or so wasn’t all that bad—it was the whole "overlord of the universe" bit with Jeffrey Owens (the vice-principal guy from Ferris Bueller’s Day Off) that killed it for me. That, and the duck himself, who wasn’t terribly likeable. Howard The Duck had a cult following in comic book circles prior to the movie, but like Garfield and Scooby-Doo, he simply didn’t transfer well to the silver screen.
However, HTD did have something that I liked when I first saw it. Hmmm, let’s see, what the heck was it? Gimme a minute, okay? Oh wait, now I remember what initially drew me to it…
Ah yes, the lovely Lea Thompson was a real hottie in this one (to this horny 22-year-old in 1986, anyway) and she turned in the only decent performance in this disasterpiece. To her credit, she doesn’t try to act like Howard never happened, and gladly participated in the DVD’s special features, unlike Tim "Shawshank" Robbins, who was nowhere to be found. I was surprised to learn that Lea actually did her own vocals in the film (she played a singer), and wasn’t too shabby at it—quite serviceable, anyway, for the ‘80s. LT still looks very attractive today, too—nice to see she’s taken care of herself and hasn’t become another Hollywood casualty.
CLASSIC OVERUSED MOVIE/TV CLICHÉ #10
Ain’t it amazing how apartment and/or office building rooftops in the movies and on TV are so neat and tidy? Oftentimes these roofs are totally devoid of all that silly tar and gravel—let alone pigeon poop and trash—that one would normally find there. A glaring example of this is the "Frasier" episode where Frasier and Martin arrange it so Daphne and Niles can have a secluded romantic dinner for two on the roof of Elliott Bay Tower, and the surface of that roof was almost clean enough to eat off of! Also amazing is the incredibly easy access TV and movie characters have to these roofs without setting off any sort of security alarms.
CLASSIC OVERUSED MOVIE/TV CLICHÉ 11
Speaking of double-features, here’s another cliché that I find particularly asinine: pretending to be Jewish (or any other religious denomination) just to impress a potential mate you’re attracted to. This plotline also happened on "Frasier", as well as "Caroline In The City" and no doubt countless other TV shows. This should be pretty self-evident, but I’ll say it anyway—if you feel you have to change who you are to impress someone, they ain’t freakin’ worth it, anyway…
KLINGONS ON THE STARBOARD BOW, STARBOARD BOW!
I was surprised to discover this week that the first woman I ever lusted after in my life—the lovely Yvonne Craig, who played Batgirl on TV’s "Batman"—also played the green chick that Kirk tried to get it on with on "Star Trek". Like Eddie Murphy once said, "You gotta be pretty hard-up to do it with a green bitch."
In a related issue, it took me years to finally notice that actor John Larroquette was one of the Klingons in Star Trek III—The Search For Spock in a pre-"Night Court"/Dan Fielding role. He was the one who uttered, "I do not deserve to live," to which Kirk replied, "Then I’ll kill you later."
While I’m at it, wouldn’t Rob Zombie make a dandy Klingon?
"WHAT THEY NEED'S A DAMN GOOD WHACKING!"
And it sounds like the folks at CNBC, especially raving lunatic financial guru Jim Cramer, got one on Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" that was taped today. It airs in about an hour, and I look very much forward to seeing these schlubs taken to task for all their crappy financial advice...
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #110
"Kicks"—PAUL REVERE & THE RAIDERS (1966) "Before you find out it’s too late, girl, you better get straight." Or to my three-year-old ears when I first heard it, "…girl, you better get stretched."
CAN YOU HEAR ME NOW?
This would've been a really bad celebrity product endorsement: "Hello, Vincent Van Gogh here for Miracle Ear…"
FROM THE "SUCKER BORN EVERY MINUTE" DEPT.:
This recession has produced a new cottage industry you might have noticed lately—these "Cash For Gold" TV ads, or "Dinero Por Oro" for youse Univision viewers. You gotta be a real piece of spackle to send off your valuable jewelry in the mail and actually expect any kind of decent reimbursement in return. Just go to a pawn shop, dummy!
Another cottage industry that popped up before the recession is all this identity theft prevention hysteria crap. I’m not saying ID theft doesn’t happen now and then, but I find it hard to believe it’s as prevalent as these sensationalistic fear-mongering advertisers make it out to be. Hell, if someone wants to steal my ID, they can fucking have it—it’s not like I’m scoring any hot chicks with my current one, and I’ll gladly let the sucker pay my credit cards off instead!
Saturday, March 7, 2009
1981 - Year of the Album, Part II
And now the conclusion of my look back at the nether year 1981, which was one of my favorites ever for Rock 'N' Roll longplayer releases. Here are some more of the great albums that came out that year, plus a few that weren't so great (again, in no particular order)...
Z.Z. TOP—El Loco I already liked Z.Z. Top a lot, but El Loco forever cemented me as a fan of that Little Ol’ Band From Tejas right from the get-go with the irresistible “Tube Snake Boogie”. True, their next album, Eliminator, was Z.Z.’s career apex in terms of global success—thanks in large part to those classic videos with the babes and the '32 Ford—but I’ve always preferred Loco, which is somewhat forgotten now, for some reason. I have fond memories of wearing out the 8-track tape I had of it in my car during the summer of ’81, grooving to the likes of “Don’t Tease Me”, “Party On The Patio”, “Ten Foot Pole” and the underrated classic “Pearl Necklace”. Pure as the driven slush, indeed…
MOODY BLUES—Long Distance Voyager Most everyone had given this band up for dead (me included) when they came back from out of nowhere with Long Distance Voyager. Original keyboardist Mike Pinder was long gone and was replaced by synthesizer maven Patrick Moraz, who was omnipresent on the first big hit from LDV, “Gemini Dream”. “The Voice”, “Talking Out Of Turn” and “Veteran Cosmic Rocker” sounded a bit more like the classic Moodies stuff, but all in all, I much prefer their original seven albums over anything that came after.
FOREIGNER—4 Like Styx and Speedwagon before them, Foreigner broke out in a major way in ’81 with a record that featured one of my all-time favorite album covers. “Night Life”, “Urgent”, “Juke Box Hero”, "Break It Up" and “Waiting For A Girl Like You” dominated the radio over the second half of the year as Foreigner (or as they pronounce it in Arkansas, 'Furner') was at the height of their popularity.
JOURNEY—Escape Journey was already on the rise in the late ‘70s/ early ‘80s, and even the departure of longtime keyboardist Gregg Rolie—following 1980’s Departure, ironically—didn’t slow them down one bit. Rolie was replaced by former Baby Jonathan Cain (come to think of it, aren’t most of us former babies?) and he stepped right in and Journey did just like one of their new songs advocated: “Keep On Running”. Although Escape was chuck-full of big hits (“Don’t Stop Believin'”, “Stone In Love”, “Who’s Crying Now?” and “Open Arms”, etc.), the “B-stuff” from it didn’t suck either, like “Keep On Running”, “Lay It Down” and the title track. Scarily enough, Journey had yet to peak, either…
LOVERBOY—Get Lucky Loverboy deftly avoided the sophomore jinx and built on the momentum generated from their first album from the year before on Get Lucky with biggies like “Working For The Weekend”, “Lucky Ones” and “Take Me To The Top”. Under-the-radar songs like “Jump” (not the icky Van Halen song) and “It’s Your Life” were just as good as the front-line stuff, too.
DEF LEPPARD—High ‘n’ Dry No sophomore jinx here either, and Def Lep actually improved exponentially upon their 1980 debut release On Through The Night as they began working with producer Mutt Lange, who embellished their sound with more elaborate arrangements and vocal layers. “Let It Go” was a great leadoff track, and “Bringin’ On The Heartbreak/Switch 625” was the centerpiece of the record. As the lyric to one of their future songs went, “the best was yet to come” for these guys. And some of the worst, too…
THE POLICE—Ghost In The Machine Easily my favorite Police platter, this was another one I pretty much wore out in the ol’ automobile tape deck in ’81. Loved “Demolition Man”, “Spirits In The Material World” and “Invisible Sun” and the horns on “One World (Not Three)” and “Rehumanize Yourself” were a nice added touch. Great concert tour the following year, too.
THE CARS—Shake It Up The Cars responded to the inconsistent Panorama from ’80 with a record that is quintessential ‘80s in Shake It Up. There wasn’t a bad track on this one, and it was a fun album from start-to-finish. “Since You’re Gone”, the title track and “Cruiser” were standouts on side one, and the trippy “A Dream Away” was a great lead-off to side two (remember when albums had sides, kids?). The late Ben Orr’s “Think It Over” should’ve been a hit single, too, IMHO.
THE GO-GO’S—Beauty And The Beat Oh, what a breath of fresh air this was in the fall of ’81! As good as the music was that year, I was tired of seeing nerdy guys in skinny neckties (no offense, Ric Ocasek!), thus an all-chick band in mini-skirts was just the ticket, especially an all-chick band in mini-skirts that could write and perform their own music. The hits “Our Lips Are Sealed” and “We Got The Beat” were dandy, but even better were tracks like “This Town”, “Lust To Love”, “Can’t Stop The World” and the witty “Skidmarks On My Heart”. I lusted after Belinda Carlisle and Jane Wiedlin mightily during this time. Still do, sometimes...
ROLLING STONES—Tattoo You Mick and Keef and the boys rebounded rather nicely from the almost stillborn Emotional Rescue from the year before with the album that contained their classic “Start Me Up” as well as “Hang Fire” and the underrated “Waiting On A Friend”. Love the sax solo by Bobby Keys on the latter song. This would be the last time (pun partially intended) that the Stones would release new studio albums in successive years.
ROD STEWART—Tonight I’m Yours Rod the Mod was coming off a bad 1980 album too (the one with the faggy-looking polka-dotted cover—I forget the title) and fared much better with this one, which yielded the big hit “Young Turks”. The title track was fun romp, as was “Tora! Tora! Tora! (Out With The Boys)”, and I really liked Rod’s touching tribute to late cancer victim/advocate Terry Fox on “Never Give Up On A Dream”.
JOHN ENTWISTLE—Too Late The Hero The Ox’s much-anticipated fifth solo album was a commercial flop, but it was certainly far superior to The Who's 1981 release (see below). Guitarist Joe Walsh guest-starred on Hero and stood out on tracks like “I’m Comin’ Back” and “Love Is A Heart Attack” (an eerie omen for Enwistle himself, as it turned out), and Big Johnnie Twinkle’s bass rumbled throughout, especially on the album’s best track, “Talk Dirty”.
GENESIS—Abacab Probably my favorite Genesis record, I remember when it came out how my friend Tom and I tried to divine the meaning of “Abacab”, trying things like matching musical notes up to the individual letters and such. Sometimes things don’t mean anything! Anyway, beyond the title track, I really liked “Like It Or Not” and I remember “Man On The Corner” being one of the first videos I ever saw on this new thing called MTV.
============
THE BOMBS
This is not to say that everything that came out in 1981 was like the popular TV show of the day "Solid Gold"—there were a few clunkers from some of my favorite groups as well…
KISS—Music From The Elder Ah yes, the final installment of what I like to call the “Lost Weekend Years” for Kiss, in which they tried to impress all the critics with how smart they were by making a concept album whose story the band members themselves didn’t even understand. Guitarist Ace Frehley was so disgusted with the record that he soon left the band, and when it came out, most of us die-hard fans were like “What the fuck is this?” upon hearing Paul Stanley singing lines like "a child in a sun dress," etc. The critics naturally liked Elder, of course, and like most Kiss fans, even I have a soft spot in my heart for it, and there are a couple pretty cool tracks that sound great on my iPod—namely “The Oath”, “Escape From the Island” and "I"—but overall, the album was just plain weird. Not-so-long ago, the Kiss tribute band Kiss attempted to resurrect “I” in concert. Funny how Gene Simmons can’t remember how the song goes, even though he co-wrote the bloody thing!
THE WHO—Face Dances Expectations were higher than your average Grateful Dead fan for The Who’s first studio album since the death of drummer Keith Moon, to the point where Circus magazine dubbed Face Dances as “The Fiery Return of The Who,” in one article. Uhhh, put the hoses away, fellas, you coulda blown this fire out with your own breath. By this time, Pete Townshend was hoarding his best songs for his solo albums, so the material was pretty bland here, especially as watered-down by erstwhile Eagles producer Bill Szymcyzk (where the hell was Glyn Johns?!?). Kenney Jones’ rather pedestrian drumming style (which Roger Daltrey often criticized) didn’t exactly help, and only John Entwistle’s tracks—the anything-but-quiet “Quiet One” and “You”—truly rocked out here. Of Townshend’s tunes, “You Better You Bet” hasn’t aged well with me at all, "Cache Cache", "Don't Let Go The Coat" and "Did You Steal My Money?" were pure caca and only "Daily Records" and “Another Tricky Day” were really worth writing home about. Easily one of the most disappointing Rock albums of all-time.
TED NUGENT—Intensities In 10 Cities Given the outstanding quality of Nugent’s 1978 live opus, Double Live Gonzo!, I was very excited when it was announced that Ted was making yet another live record in ’81. I incorrectly assumed Intensities would be Nugent’s Kiss Alive II, so to speak, and feature live versions of his post-Gonzo! stuff off Weekend Warriors, State Of Shock and Scream Dream, and what a colossal flop this thing turned out to be! Alas, the Rev. Theodosius Atrocious let his Alpha-male ego get the best of him and he put out a bunch of lame new songs, many with macho-man titles like “The Flying Lip-Lock” and “My Love Is Like A Tire Iron”, along with an absurd cover of Wilson Pickett’s “Land of 1,000 Dances”. About the only acceptable tracks were “Heads Will Roll” and the instrumental “TNT Overture”. True, Intensities was merely contractual-obligation stuff that Nugent owed Epic Records, but he could’ve made a better effort than this steaming pile of yak excrement, and his career never has fully recovered from it. He'd have been much better served to just release the 1979 "King Biscuit Flower Hour" show from Hammersmith Odeon that eventually came out on CD about ten years ago.
MOLLY HATCHET—Take No Prisoners Molly Hatchet came roaring out of the chute with two excellent albums in 1978 and 1979, and they appeared to be the heir-apparent to Lynyrd Skynyrd as the big-cheese Southern Rock band until late lead singer Danny Joe Brown jumped ship in 1980. Their first release without him, Beatin’ The Odds, wasn’t all that terrible, but new singer Jimmy Farrar didn't quite experience the same smooth transition enjoyed by Brian Johnson when he replaced the late Bon Scott in AC/DC the same year. Farrar had a decent voice, but sounded so radically different than Brown, and the vibe just wasn’t the same. Take No Prisoners was a step further backwards for Hatchet, and it was just a really bland record except for one really good track, “Bloody Reunion”, which sounded every bit as good with DJB singing it in concert upon his return. MH’s next album, 1983’s vastly overlooked No Guts…No Glory (with Danny Joe back in the fold) was a major improvement.
ABBA—The Visitors The bored looks on the faces of ABBA on the album cover of The Visitors should’ve been a red flag to record buyers that they were just playing out the string by this time. There were no more new worlds left to conquer for Sweden's greatest export since Volvo, and it showed in the dull material here, plus the vocals were beginning to sound awfully robotic in places. A creative rest might’ve suited Björn and Benny a little better…
BLACK SABBATH—The Mob Rules The surprising success of post-Ozzy Black Sabbath on 1980’s classic Heaven And Hell, plus the excellent title track here promised great things, but sadly, the rest of Mob Rules was fairly forgettable. From this point onward, Ozzy would have the last laugh as his career soared and Sabbath began its lead singer carousel period—Ian Gillan, David Donato, Glenn Hughes, Tony Martin, Ronnie James Dio (again), Rob Halford, Tony Martin (again), ad nauseam...
Z.Z. TOP—El Loco I already liked Z.Z. Top a lot, but El Loco forever cemented me as a fan of that Little Ol’ Band From Tejas right from the get-go with the irresistible “Tube Snake Boogie”. True, their next album, Eliminator, was Z.Z.’s career apex in terms of global success—thanks in large part to those classic videos with the babes and the '32 Ford—but I’ve always preferred Loco, which is somewhat forgotten now, for some reason. I have fond memories of wearing out the 8-track tape I had of it in my car during the summer of ’81, grooving to the likes of “Don’t Tease Me”, “Party On The Patio”, “Ten Foot Pole” and the underrated classic “Pearl Necklace”. Pure as the driven slush, indeed…
MOODY BLUES—Long Distance Voyager Most everyone had given this band up for dead (me included) when they came back from out of nowhere with Long Distance Voyager. Original keyboardist Mike Pinder was long gone and was replaced by synthesizer maven Patrick Moraz, who was omnipresent on the first big hit from LDV, “Gemini Dream”. “The Voice”, “Talking Out Of Turn” and “Veteran Cosmic Rocker” sounded a bit more like the classic Moodies stuff, but all in all, I much prefer their original seven albums over anything that came after.
FOREIGNER—4 Like Styx and Speedwagon before them, Foreigner broke out in a major way in ’81 with a record that featured one of my all-time favorite album covers. “Night Life”, “Urgent”, “Juke Box Hero”, "Break It Up" and “Waiting For A Girl Like You” dominated the radio over the second half of the year as Foreigner (or as they pronounce it in Arkansas, 'Furner') was at the height of their popularity.
JOURNEY—Escape Journey was already on the rise in the late ‘70s/ early ‘80s, and even the departure of longtime keyboardist Gregg Rolie—following 1980’s Departure, ironically—didn’t slow them down one bit. Rolie was replaced by former Baby Jonathan Cain (come to think of it, aren’t most of us former babies?) and he stepped right in and Journey did just like one of their new songs advocated: “Keep On Running”. Although Escape was chuck-full of big hits (“Don’t Stop Believin'”, “Stone In Love”, “Who’s Crying Now?” and “Open Arms”, etc.), the “B-stuff” from it didn’t suck either, like “Keep On Running”, “Lay It Down” and the title track. Scarily enough, Journey had yet to peak, either…
LOVERBOY—Get Lucky Loverboy deftly avoided the sophomore jinx and built on the momentum generated from their first album from the year before on Get Lucky with biggies like “Working For The Weekend”, “Lucky Ones” and “Take Me To The Top”. Under-the-radar songs like “Jump” (not the icky Van Halen song) and “It’s Your Life” were just as good as the front-line stuff, too.
DEF LEPPARD—High ‘n’ Dry No sophomore jinx here either, and Def Lep actually improved exponentially upon their 1980 debut release On Through The Night as they began working with producer Mutt Lange, who embellished their sound with more elaborate arrangements and vocal layers. “Let It Go” was a great leadoff track, and “Bringin’ On The Heartbreak/Switch 625” was the centerpiece of the record. As the lyric to one of their future songs went, “the best was yet to come” for these guys. And some of the worst, too…
THE POLICE—Ghost In The Machine Easily my favorite Police platter, this was another one I pretty much wore out in the ol’ automobile tape deck in ’81. Loved “Demolition Man”, “Spirits In The Material World” and “Invisible Sun” and the horns on “One World (Not Three)” and “Rehumanize Yourself” were a nice added touch. Great concert tour the following year, too.
THE CARS—Shake It Up The Cars responded to the inconsistent Panorama from ’80 with a record that is quintessential ‘80s in Shake It Up. There wasn’t a bad track on this one, and it was a fun album from start-to-finish. “Since You’re Gone”, the title track and “Cruiser” were standouts on side one, and the trippy “A Dream Away” was a great lead-off to side two (remember when albums had sides, kids?). The late Ben Orr’s “Think It Over” should’ve been a hit single, too, IMHO.
THE GO-GO’S—Beauty And The Beat Oh, what a breath of fresh air this was in the fall of ’81! As good as the music was that year, I was tired of seeing nerdy guys in skinny neckties (no offense, Ric Ocasek!), thus an all-chick band in mini-skirts was just the ticket, especially an all-chick band in mini-skirts that could write and perform their own music. The hits “Our Lips Are Sealed” and “We Got The Beat” were dandy, but even better were tracks like “This Town”, “Lust To Love”, “Can’t Stop The World” and the witty “Skidmarks On My Heart”. I lusted after Belinda Carlisle and Jane Wiedlin mightily during this time. Still do, sometimes...
ROLLING STONES—Tattoo You Mick and Keef and the boys rebounded rather nicely from the almost stillborn Emotional Rescue from the year before with the album that contained their classic “Start Me Up” as well as “Hang Fire” and the underrated “Waiting On A Friend”. Love the sax solo by Bobby Keys on the latter song. This would be the last time (pun partially intended) that the Stones would release new studio albums in successive years.
ROD STEWART—Tonight I’m Yours Rod the Mod was coming off a bad 1980 album too (the one with the faggy-looking polka-dotted cover—I forget the title) and fared much better with this one, which yielded the big hit “Young Turks”. The title track was fun romp, as was “Tora! Tora! Tora! (Out With The Boys)”, and I really liked Rod’s touching tribute to late cancer victim/advocate Terry Fox on “Never Give Up On A Dream”.
JOHN ENTWISTLE—Too Late The Hero The Ox’s much-anticipated fifth solo album was a commercial flop, but it was certainly far superior to The Who's 1981 release (see below). Guitarist Joe Walsh guest-starred on Hero and stood out on tracks like “I’m Comin’ Back” and “Love Is A Heart Attack” (an eerie omen for Enwistle himself, as it turned out), and Big Johnnie Twinkle’s bass rumbled throughout, especially on the album’s best track, “Talk Dirty”.
GENESIS—Abacab Probably my favorite Genesis record, I remember when it came out how my friend Tom and I tried to divine the meaning of “Abacab”, trying things like matching musical notes up to the individual letters and such. Sometimes things don’t mean anything! Anyway, beyond the title track, I really liked “Like It Or Not” and I remember “Man On The Corner” being one of the first videos I ever saw on this new thing called MTV.
============
THE BOMBS
This is not to say that everything that came out in 1981 was like the popular TV show of the day "Solid Gold"—there were a few clunkers from some of my favorite groups as well…
KISS—Music From The Elder Ah yes, the final installment of what I like to call the “Lost Weekend Years” for Kiss, in which they tried to impress all the critics with how smart they were by making a concept album whose story the band members themselves didn’t even understand. Guitarist Ace Frehley was so disgusted with the record that he soon left the band, and when it came out, most of us die-hard fans were like “What the fuck is this?” upon hearing Paul Stanley singing lines like "a child in a sun dress," etc. The critics naturally liked Elder, of course, and like most Kiss fans, even I have a soft spot in my heart for it, and there are a couple pretty cool tracks that sound great on my iPod—namely “The Oath”, “Escape From the Island” and "I"—but overall, the album was just plain weird. Not-so-long ago, the Kiss tribute band Kiss attempted to resurrect “I” in concert. Funny how Gene Simmons can’t remember how the song goes, even though he co-wrote the bloody thing!
THE WHO—Face Dances Expectations were higher than your average Grateful Dead fan for The Who’s first studio album since the death of drummer Keith Moon, to the point where Circus magazine dubbed Face Dances as “The Fiery Return of The Who,” in one article. Uhhh, put the hoses away, fellas, you coulda blown this fire out with your own breath. By this time, Pete Townshend was hoarding his best songs for his solo albums, so the material was pretty bland here, especially as watered-down by erstwhile Eagles producer Bill Szymcyzk (where the hell was Glyn Johns?!?). Kenney Jones’ rather pedestrian drumming style (which Roger Daltrey often criticized) didn’t exactly help, and only John Entwistle’s tracks—the anything-but-quiet “Quiet One” and “You”—truly rocked out here. Of Townshend’s tunes, “You Better You Bet” hasn’t aged well with me at all, "Cache Cache", "Don't Let Go The Coat" and "Did You Steal My Money?" were pure caca and only "Daily Records" and “Another Tricky Day” were really worth writing home about. Easily one of the most disappointing Rock albums of all-time.
TED NUGENT—Intensities In 10 Cities Given the outstanding quality of Nugent’s 1978 live opus, Double Live Gonzo!, I was very excited when it was announced that Ted was making yet another live record in ’81. I incorrectly assumed Intensities would be Nugent’s Kiss Alive II, so to speak, and feature live versions of his post-Gonzo! stuff off Weekend Warriors, State Of Shock and Scream Dream, and what a colossal flop this thing turned out to be! Alas, the Rev. Theodosius Atrocious let his Alpha-male ego get the best of him and he put out a bunch of lame new songs, many with macho-man titles like “The Flying Lip-Lock” and “My Love Is Like A Tire Iron”, along with an absurd cover of Wilson Pickett’s “Land of 1,000 Dances”. About the only acceptable tracks were “Heads Will Roll” and the instrumental “TNT Overture”. True, Intensities was merely contractual-obligation stuff that Nugent owed Epic Records, but he could’ve made a better effort than this steaming pile of yak excrement, and his career never has fully recovered from it. He'd have been much better served to just release the 1979 "King Biscuit Flower Hour" show from Hammersmith Odeon that eventually came out on CD about ten years ago.
MOLLY HATCHET—Take No Prisoners Molly Hatchet came roaring out of the chute with two excellent albums in 1978 and 1979, and they appeared to be the heir-apparent to Lynyrd Skynyrd as the big-cheese Southern Rock band until late lead singer Danny Joe Brown jumped ship in 1980. Their first release without him, Beatin’ The Odds, wasn’t all that terrible, but new singer Jimmy Farrar didn't quite experience the same smooth transition enjoyed by Brian Johnson when he replaced the late Bon Scott in AC/DC the same year. Farrar had a decent voice, but sounded so radically different than Brown, and the vibe just wasn’t the same. Take No Prisoners was a step further backwards for Hatchet, and it was just a really bland record except for one really good track, “Bloody Reunion”, which sounded every bit as good with DJB singing it in concert upon his return. MH’s next album, 1983’s vastly overlooked No Guts…No Glory (with Danny Joe back in the fold) was a major improvement.
ABBA—The Visitors The bored looks on the faces of ABBA on the album cover of The Visitors should’ve been a red flag to record buyers that they were just playing out the string by this time. There were no more new worlds left to conquer for Sweden's greatest export since Volvo, and it showed in the dull material here, plus the vocals were beginning to sound awfully robotic in places. A creative rest might’ve suited Björn and Benny a little better…
BLACK SABBATH—The Mob Rules The surprising success of post-Ozzy Black Sabbath on 1980’s classic Heaven And Hell, plus the excellent title track here promised great things, but sadly, the rest of Mob Rules was fairly forgettable. From this point onward, Ozzy would have the last laugh as his career soared and Sabbath began its lead singer carousel period—Ian Gillan, David Donato, Glenn Hughes, Tony Martin, Ronnie James Dio (again), Rob Halford, Tony Martin (again), ad nauseam...
Thursday, March 5, 2009
1981 - Year of the Album, Part I
Back during my junior and senior years in high school, there was a plethora of good new music to be had on vinyl, and the year 1981 was a particularly stellar one in Rock. More than any other year, 1981 seemed to have more major comebacks, breakout releases by bands on the rise, albums that were consistently great from start-to-finish, and numerous releases that wound up being my favorite albums by my all-time favorite bands. It was certainly a very formative year for my musical collection, and with that in mind, here’s a look back at some dandy record albums from that magical year (in no particular order):
R.E.O. SPEEDWAGON—HI inFIdelity A carryover from late ‘80, Speedwagon dominated the radio with this monster for most of 1981. R.E.O.'s classic power ballad "Keep On Lovin’ You" undoubtedly brought more than a few bodies closer together over the winter of ’80-’81, and the album also yielded a boatload of hits, including "Tough Guys", "Take It On The Run", "Don’t Let Him Go" and "In Your Letter". "Out of Season" was a great track too, and "Shakin’ It Loose" wound up being pretty good audience-participation number in concert. R.E.O. went on to have more success in the ‘80s, but Hi inFI was clearly the pinnacle of their career.
STYX—Paradise Theater Styx rebounded nicely from their mediocre 1979 release, Cornerstone, and 1981 saw them duplicate the breakout success of their friendly Illinois rivals Speedwagon with their outstanding Paradise Theater album and its accompanying triumphant concert tour, one of the best Rock shows I ever attended. Even though they were already squabbling internally, the members of Styx still managed to string together some standout songs like "Rockin’ The Paradise", "Too Much Time On My Hands", "Snow Blind" and "The Best Of Times". If only Styx had quit while they were ahead…
OZZY OSBOURNE—Blizzard of Ozz Another carryover from ’80, no one expected a thing out of Ozzy (least of all, Ozzy himself) after being booted from Black Sabbath, so what a pleasant surprise this killer record was with its Heavy Metal classics like "Crazy Train", "Suicide Solution" and "I Don’t Know". If the late Randy Rhoads hadn’t come into the Osbournes’ lives, Ozzy and Sharon might well be on skid row today. RR was the Stevie Ray Vaughan of Heavy Metal, and one can only wonder what he might’ve gone on to do—one of the biggest (and most senseless) tragedies in Rock history.
JEFFERSON STARSHIP—Modern Times Starship continued to ride the momentum from their successful rebound on 1979’s Freedom At Point Zero with another solid effort here and reunited with an old friend in the process. Erstwhile singer Grace Slick returned from some much-needed time on the wagon to duet with Mickey Thomas on the hit "Stranger" and she can also be heard backing the underrated "Save Your Love" as well as on the penultimate "Fuck You" song, "Stairway To Cleveland". While the album did have a couple horrors like "Mary" ("I don’t want to marry Mary"—P.U.!) and "Alien", it did yield the radio-friendly hit "Find Your Way Back".
VAN HALEN—Fair Warning Clearly, Van Halen’s self-titled debut album from 1978 was their finest, but Fair Warning has always been my favorite. Cousin Eddie was just shredding licks all over this record from the get-go on opening track "Mean Streets" and he never let up throughout. This album was loaded with underrated classics like "Sinner’s Swing!", "Hear About It Later", "Dirty Movies" and "So This Is Love", and this was the period during which VH was white-hot in concert (as "Unchained" easily attests) before David Lee Roth’s burgeoning ego blew everything to hell. My only problem was the album was way too short, barely clocking in at 30 minutes, but you could say that about nearly every VH album during the DLR era.
RUSH—Moving Pictures Finally, Geddy Lee learned how to sing after shrieking like a banshee all those years. And finally, a consistent long-player from the boys from the Great White North. "Tom Sawyer" was about all you heard on FM Rock radio in the spring of ’81, and the rest of the album weren’t too shabby either, with cuts like "Red Barchetta", "Limelight" and the underrated "Vital Signs". The 10-minute-plus "The Camera Eye" is pretty cool too, with its various tempo changes and moods. From what I understand, Rush dusted that one off and played it on tour last summer. MP was the first in a very consistent string of albums during what was my favorite Rush era, up to and including 1987’s Hold Your Fire.
APRIL WINE—Nature Of The Beast Another album from a group of Canucks who finally hit their stride in 1981, Beast turned out to be one of my favorite records of the year. April Wine’s prior two albums yielded decent-sized radio hits with "Roller", "I Like To Rock" and "Say Hello", but NOTB blew away all of their previous efforts with rockers like "Future Tense", "Big City Girls", "Caught In The Crossfire", "One More Time" and my personal fave, the short-but-sweet attitude piece "Wanna Rock". "Just Between You And Me" and "All Over Town" were big hits on the radio too, and AW seemed to be well on their way to becoming the next Foreigner or Loverboy, but it appears they shot their wad on Beast because none of their subsequent output even came close to equaling it.
BLUE ÖYSTER CULT—Fire Of Unknown Origin This was the last really good studio record BOC ever made, in my opinion. "Burnin’ For You" was the big radio hit, but Fire yielded some classic BOC thinking-man’s fare like "Veteran Of The Psychic Wars", the title track and the irrepressible "Joan Crawford".
THE TUBES—Completion Backward Principle After years of being a campy (and borderline porn) stage act, Fee Waybill and the boys tried to get everyone to take them seriously as musicians, and whaddya know—it worked! Great stuff here like "Attack Of The 50-Foot Woman", "Sushi Girl" and the big radio hit "Talk To Ya Later". Even better was the underrated power ballad "Don’t Want To Wait Anymore", which is one of my all-time favorites of that genre.
GIRLSCHOOL—Hit And Run I was introduced to this all-chick band from England during the summer of ’82 and was totally blown away by this wicked slab of Heavy Metal that easily rivals anything Judas Priest or Iron Maiden ever did. They played hard, fast and lean throughout this album on tracks like "Kick It Down", "C’Mon, Let’s Go", "Future Flash", "Yeah Right!" and their killer remake of "Race With The Devil". Not bad for a bunch of girls, eh?
AC/DC—For Those About To Rock…We Salute You No way in hell were Angus and the boys going to top Back In Black, so anything they put out would’ve been a comedown, anyway. Still, this one had its moments, like "Let’s Get It Up", the underrated "Put The Finger On You" and of course, the cannon-fodder laden title track.
NAZARETH—‘Snaz Before double-live albums totally went out of style like rotary-dial phones, platform shoes and Pong games, Nazareth snuck this one out, and it featured wicked live versions of classics like "Expect No Mercy" and "Hair Of The Dog", as well as a cool cover of the Yardbirds classic "Shapes of Things" (aka, "Come Tomorrow") for an encore. They also tacked on a nice studio cover of Tim Rose's "Morning Dew". I categorize Nazareth as a good-but-not-great band, and ’Snaz was a nice document of their career to that point.
J. GEILS BAND—Freeze-Frame Any group that has a Magic Dick in it can’t be all bad! After years of toiling in obscurity and having only a cult following, the critically-acclaimed J. Geils Band finally hit pay dirt with this album, which was aided and abetted by heavy rotation on the then-fledgling MTV thing. "Centerfold" was all over the radio, as was the title track, and "Flamethrower" even made the R&B charts as I recall. My favorite track is the intrepid closer, "Piss On The Wall". Unfortunately, success went to singer Peter Wolf’s big fat head, though, and he left the band for a solo career in 1983, and they were never the same.
SAMMY HAGAR—Standing Hampton This was quite possibly Sammy’s finest hour as a solo act before joining Van Halen, with the radio-friendly hit "I’ll Fall In Love Again" and his trademark "There's Only One Way To Rock". The album title, btw, is a British euphemism for hard-on, as "Hampton" refers to one’s manhood. ‘Tis better to be Standing Hampton than Little Hampton…
DIRE STRAITS—Making Movies As much as I like Straits, nothing from their first two albums really blew me away, apart from "Sultans Of Swing", and it wasn’t until album number three came along that I really found something to chew on. "Tunnel Of Love" and "Romeo & Juliet" have grown on me a lot over the years, and "Solid Rock" should’ve been a bigger radio hit than it was. The closing track, "Les Boys", was a fun little piece of pastiche by Mark Knopfler too.
PAT BENATAR—Precious Time Pat’s third album was every bit as good as her first two with cuts like "Promises In The Dark", "Fire And Ice" and the title track, not to mention a nice cover of Paul Revere & The Raiders’ "Just Like Me". However, she went to the cover well once too often with her unnecessary remake of The Beatles’ "Helter Skelter"—somehow a sexy babe singer in a leotard and tights singing a song about death and mayhem just doesn’t quite register! Then again, Motley Crue and U2 wasted their time covering this one too, even though there’s no need to improve on the original.
BILLY SQUIER—Don’t Say No Young master Squier had it clicking on all cylinders here and scored no less than four pretty good-sized radio hits with "The Stroke", "My Kinda Lover", "Lonely Is The Night" and "In The Dark". My personal favorite is the frenetic "Whaddya Want From Me?" and "Too Daze Gone" didn't suck either. Billy’s next album, Emotions In Motion was even more successful in terms of sales, but I think DSN was the better of the two. Then it all went downhill a couple years later when Squier more or less outed himself in the disastrous "Rock Me Tonite" video. Too bad—this guy had the chops on guitar and wasn’t too shabby a songwriter either.
More to follow in Part II, coming soon...
R.E.O. SPEEDWAGON—HI inFIdelity A carryover from late ‘80, Speedwagon dominated the radio with this monster for most of 1981. R.E.O.'s classic power ballad "Keep On Lovin’ You" undoubtedly brought more than a few bodies closer together over the winter of ’80-’81, and the album also yielded a boatload of hits, including "Tough Guys", "Take It On The Run", "Don’t Let Him Go" and "In Your Letter". "Out of Season" was a great track too, and "Shakin’ It Loose" wound up being pretty good audience-participation number in concert. R.E.O. went on to have more success in the ‘80s, but Hi inFI was clearly the pinnacle of their career.
STYX—Paradise Theater Styx rebounded nicely from their mediocre 1979 release, Cornerstone, and 1981 saw them duplicate the breakout success of their friendly Illinois rivals Speedwagon with their outstanding Paradise Theater album and its accompanying triumphant concert tour, one of the best Rock shows I ever attended. Even though they were already squabbling internally, the members of Styx still managed to string together some standout songs like "Rockin’ The Paradise", "Too Much Time On My Hands", "Snow Blind" and "The Best Of Times". If only Styx had quit while they were ahead…
OZZY OSBOURNE—Blizzard of Ozz Another carryover from ’80, no one expected a thing out of Ozzy (least of all, Ozzy himself) after being booted from Black Sabbath, so what a pleasant surprise this killer record was with its Heavy Metal classics like "Crazy Train", "Suicide Solution" and "I Don’t Know". If the late Randy Rhoads hadn’t come into the Osbournes’ lives, Ozzy and Sharon might well be on skid row today. RR was the Stevie Ray Vaughan of Heavy Metal, and one can only wonder what he might’ve gone on to do—one of the biggest (and most senseless) tragedies in Rock history.
JEFFERSON STARSHIP—Modern Times Starship continued to ride the momentum from their successful rebound on 1979’s Freedom At Point Zero with another solid effort here and reunited with an old friend in the process. Erstwhile singer Grace Slick returned from some much-needed time on the wagon to duet with Mickey Thomas on the hit "Stranger" and she can also be heard backing the underrated "Save Your Love" as well as on the penultimate "Fuck You" song, "Stairway To Cleveland". While the album did have a couple horrors like "Mary" ("I don’t want to marry Mary"—P.U.!) and "Alien", it did yield the radio-friendly hit "Find Your Way Back".
VAN HALEN—Fair Warning Clearly, Van Halen’s self-titled debut album from 1978 was their finest, but Fair Warning has always been my favorite. Cousin Eddie was just shredding licks all over this record from the get-go on opening track "Mean Streets" and he never let up throughout. This album was loaded with underrated classics like "Sinner’s Swing!", "Hear About It Later", "Dirty Movies" and "So This Is Love", and this was the period during which VH was white-hot in concert (as "Unchained" easily attests) before David Lee Roth’s burgeoning ego blew everything to hell. My only problem was the album was way too short, barely clocking in at 30 minutes, but you could say that about nearly every VH album during the DLR era.
RUSH—Moving Pictures Finally, Geddy Lee learned how to sing after shrieking like a banshee all those years. And finally, a consistent long-player from the boys from the Great White North. "Tom Sawyer" was about all you heard on FM Rock radio in the spring of ’81, and the rest of the album weren’t too shabby either, with cuts like "Red Barchetta", "Limelight" and the underrated "Vital Signs". The 10-minute-plus "The Camera Eye" is pretty cool too, with its various tempo changes and moods. From what I understand, Rush dusted that one off and played it on tour last summer. MP was the first in a very consistent string of albums during what was my favorite Rush era, up to and including 1987’s Hold Your Fire.
APRIL WINE—Nature Of The Beast Another album from a group of Canucks who finally hit their stride in 1981, Beast turned out to be one of my favorite records of the year. April Wine’s prior two albums yielded decent-sized radio hits with "Roller", "I Like To Rock" and "Say Hello", but NOTB blew away all of their previous efforts with rockers like "Future Tense", "Big City Girls", "Caught In The Crossfire", "One More Time" and my personal fave, the short-but-sweet attitude piece "Wanna Rock". "Just Between You And Me" and "All Over Town" were big hits on the radio too, and AW seemed to be well on their way to becoming the next Foreigner or Loverboy, but it appears they shot their wad on Beast because none of their subsequent output even came close to equaling it.
BLUE ÖYSTER CULT—Fire Of Unknown Origin This was the last really good studio record BOC ever made, in my opinion. "Burnin’ For You" was the big radio hit, but Fire yielded some classic BOC thinking-man’s fare like "Veteran Of The Psychic Wars", the title track and the irrepressible "Joan Crawford".
THE TUBES—Completion Backward Principle After years of being a campy (and borderline porn) stage act, Fee Waybill and the boys tried to get everyone to take them seriously as musicians, and whaddya know—it worked! Great stuff here like "Attack Of The 50-Foot Woman", "Sushi Girl" and the big radio hit "Talk To Ya Later". Even better was the underrated power ballad "Don’t Want To Wait Anymore", which is one of my all-time favorites of that genre.
GIRLSCHOOL—Hit And Run I was introduced to this all-chick band from England during the summer of ’82 and was totally blown away by this wicked slab of Heavy Metal that easily rivals anything Judas Priest or Iron Maiden ever did. They played hard, fast and lean throughout this album on tracks like "Kick It Down", "C’Mon, Let’s Go", "Future Flash", "Yeah Right!" and their killer remake of "Race With The Devil". Not bad for a bunch of girls, eh?
AC/DC—For Those About To Rock…We Salute You No way in hell were Angus and the boys going to top Back In Black, so anything they put out would’ve been a comedown, anyway. Still, this one had its moments, like "Let’s Get It Up", the underrated "Put The Finger On You" and of course, the cannon-fodder laden title track.
NAZARETH—‘Snaz Before double-live albums totally went out of style like rotary-dial phones, platform shoes and Pong games, Nazareth snuck this one out, and it featured wicked live versions of classics like "Expect No Mercy" and "Hair Of The Dog", as well as a cool cover of the Yardbirds classic "Shapes of Things" (aka, "Come Tomorrow") for an encore. They also tacked on a nice studio cover of Tim Rose's "Morning Dew". I categorize Nazareth as a good-but-not-great band, and ’Snaz was a nice document of their career to that point.
J. GEILS BAND—Freeze-Frame Any group that has a Magic Dick in it can’t be all bad! After years of toiling in obscurity and having only a cult following, the critically-acclaimed J. Geils Band finally hit pay dirt with this album, which was aided and abetted by heavy rotation on the then-fledgling MTV thing. "Centerfold" was all over the radio, as was the title track, and "Flamethrower" even made the R&B charts as I recall. My favorite track is the intrepid closer, "Piss On The Wall". Unfortunately, success went to singer Peter Wolf’s big fat head, though, and he left the band for a solo career in 1983, and they were never the same.
SAMMY HAGAR—Standing Hampton This was quite possibly Sammy’s finest hour as a solo act before joining Van Halen, with the radio-friendly hit "I’ll Fall In Love Again" and his trademark "There's Only One Way To Rock". The album title, btw, is a British euphemism for hard-on, as "Hampton" refers to one’s manhood. ‘Tis better to be Standing Hampton than Little Hampton…
DIRE STRAITS—Making Movies As much as I like Straits, nothing from their first two albums really blew me away, apart from "Sultans Of Swing", and it wasn’t until album number three came along that I really found something to chew on. "Tunnel Of Love" and "Romeo & Juliet" have grown on me a lot over the years, and "Solid Rock" should’ve been a bigger radio hit than it was. The closing track, "Les Boys", was a fun little piece of pastiche by Mark Knopfler too.
PAT BENATAR—Precious Time Pat’s third album was every bit as good as her first two with cuts like "Promises In The Dark", "Fire And Ice" and the title track, not to mention a nice cover of Paul Revere & The Raiders’ "Just Like Me". However, she went to the cover well once too often with her unnecessary remake of The Beatles’ "Helter Skelter"—somehow a sexy babe singer in a leotard and tights singing a song about death and mayhem just doesn’t quite register! Then again, Motley Crue and U2 wasted their time covering this one too, even though there’s no need to improve on the original.
BILLY SQUIER—Don’t Say No Young master Squier had it clicking on all cylinders here and scored no less than four pretty good-sized radio hits with "The Stroke", "My Kinda Lover", "Lonely Is The Night" and "In The Dark". My personal favorite is the frenetic "Whaddya Want From Me?" and "Too Daze Gone" didn't suck either. Billy’s next album, Emotions In Motion was even more successful in terms of sales, but I think DSN was the better of the two. Then it all went downhill a couple years later when Squier more or less outed himself in the disastrous "Rock Me Tonite" video. Too bad—this guy had the chops on guitar and wasn’t too shabby a songwriter either.
More to follow in Part II, coming soon...
Wednesday, March 4, 2009
Me and you and a blog named Boo
PAUL HARVEY, 1918-2009
Legendary broadcaster Paul Harvey turned his last page over the weekend. True, he was a conservative, but at least he was a fair one, and I enjoyed his work, esp. "The Rest Of The Story", which I usually only got to hear on road trips since AM reception at my workplace is non-existent because of our MR magnet, plus his show was dropped in K.C. years ago anyway. I always loved his oddball delivery style, and I’ll even admit to imitating Harvey (poorly) in a couple junior high "radio shows" in speech class. I even had the honor of running the board for "Paul Harvey News And Comment" on a rare weekday shift I worked at KKJO in St. Joseph back in the day. He was one of the last throwbacks to a better vanished time in radio, and it’s pretty amazing that he was able to continue working and doing what he enjoyed right up until almost the end of his life. A legend, indeed…good day!
AND NOW, THE WORST OF THE STORY…
"I am an average citizen…I have a microphone."—Rush Limbaugh
Oh really, Rush? Well, I’m an average citizen and I have a microphone too, but I sure’s hell don’t get paid $38 million a year to use it, you pompous prick!
As for radio personalities I dearly wish we could throw back, the Big Fat Idiot has now been deemed the de facto leader of the Republican Party. Does anyone besides me find it just a tad disconcerting that even Republican politicians find themselves apologizing for criticizing Limbaugh because the BFI now holds so much sway? Makes me almost feel pity for the GOP. As for Limbaugh, why doesn’t he get off his fat posterior and run for President himself, if he’s such an all-knowing, all-seeing political badass? Why, because he’s got it too good as it is, that’s why. It seems I’ve been low-balling Limbaugh on his salary in my previous posts at a mere $10 million a year. $38 million a year?!? Just to talk on the fucking radio?!? Nobody’s that good at any profession to rate that kind of salary! Is it any wonder this gasbag opposes increased taxes for the wealthy? I sure don’t see him volunteering to take a pay cut anytime soon in this economic climate.
LET ME UP, I’VE HAD ENOUGH!
I’m getting to the point where I almost can’t bear to watch all the talking heads on the TV news outlets yapping about the economy anymore. One "expert" says the stimulus package will work, while another shoots it down in flames, and no one can seem to agree on anything that will get us out of this mess. And Ben Stein and Donald Trump as financial experts? Puh-leeze! What’s worse, neither this Federal Reserve guy Bernanke nor Treasury Secretary Geithner seem to have a freakin’ clue what to do, either. Oh, and another thing: Fuck AIG!
Sorry if that paragraph wasn’t well-thought-out and didn't live up to my usual standards—it was pure stream-of-consciousness and I just had to vent…
ALMOST HEAVEN, WEST VIRGINIA?
Gee, kids, let’s all move to West Virginia because apparently all their major crises have been solved, being’s how one of their state representatives has time to introduce a bill to ban Barbie. You heard that right, folks, Barbie, as in the plastic doll beloved by gazillions of little girls the world over. They must not have any more economic strife in the Appalachians if all they’re concerned about is how Barbie’s image impacts the prepubescent girls of that region, hence the attempted ban. Here’s the story if you want to waste your valuable time with it.
What I wouldn’t give to be able to repeatedly smack politicians like this clown over the head with a rubber hose...
JIM DANDY NEEDED A RESCUE?
Here’s a rare nugget I unearthed the other night on YouTube that I wasn’t even aware existed. It features the overhauled Black Oak Arkansas lineup—known as just plain Black Oak at that point—performing "Race With The Devil" on "Midnight Special" in early 1978. Killer song, but sadly, Black Oak’s time had already come and gone, and being mired in the heart of the Disco era didn’t help their cause at all. Only singer Jim "Dandy" Mangrum and guitarist Jimmy Henderson (far left in the video) remained from the original BOA lineup, as they tried to shed their Southern-fried boogie-band image and prove to the critics what great musicians they were by playing more mainstream hard Rock. Didn’t work, and it was really strange to see Dandy without his trademark washboard and wearing a shirt, no less! Black Oak made one more album after Race With The Devil before hanging it up a year later.
FRIGGIN’ BRILLIANT!
Also while YouTubing the other night, I came upon this hidden gem from my man John Hiatt that I had never heard before called "Since His Penis Came Between Us", which he performed on PBS many moons ago, but has never actually recorded (to my knowledge, anyway). Nothing pornographic here or anything, just a damn funny song…
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #109
"Thank God I’m A Country Boy”—JOHN DENVER (1975) “My days are all filled with an easy Country charm...” I somehow managed to mangle this line up as something like "an easy cut of chaw," as in tobacco. I'm pretty certain JD holds the all-time record for the repeated use of the word "fiddle" in one song here.
BLURRING THE LINES
While I'm on the subject of Oldies music, what used to be our main Oldies station in KC, 94.9 FM, is gradually moprhing into a Classic Rock station. They still play a fair amount of ‘60s and ‘70s stuff like Dusty Springfield, Chicago, The Beatles and Elton John, but anymore, 94.9 sounds more like Classic Rock with the likes of Don Henley, Bob Seger and John Mellencamp dominating their playlist. Hell, they even play Boston now! That’s all fine, but now K.C. is totally devoid of a true old-school Oldies radio station, which I think kinda sucks. Even when 9.49 was a true Oldies format, they played a tad too much Four Seasons, Beach Boys and Motown for my liking, while ignoring classics from Little Richard, Fats Domino and Buddy Holly, et al. Methinks there might be room on the AM dial for a good '50s/'60s Rock 'N' Roll heritage station.
In a related topic, if radio stations are in such dire financial shape, then why on earth do they air meaningless baseball exhibition games on weekday afternoons when no one’s listening anyway? About as pointless as selling snow blowers on Maui...
IF A HOCKEY GAME IS PLAYED IN THE WOODS, DOES IT MAKE A SOUND?
Okay, I realize the National Hockey League is still trying to regain its status on the sporting ladder in the wake of the 2004-05 labor stoppage and all, but you’d think they rate slightly better TV coverage on Versus than they get. Versus only airs NHL games on Mondays and Tuesdays during the regular season, which makes very little sense, as the NHL doesn’t gain much by going up against "Monday Night Football" in the fall and ESPN’s "Big Monday" college bassit-ball in the winter and spring. Not to mention that Mondays are typically light nights, schedule-wise, for the NHL, thus the only choice they had this past Monday was the Colorado/New York Islanders game, featuring two teams already hopelessly out of the playoff race. Last night’s Pittsburgh/Tampa Bay broadcast wasn’t a much better match-up, even though they could’ve aired Boston/Philadelphia, a game loaded with playoff implications. It’s not like Vs. has a lot of riveting programming the rest of the week that would be pre-empted, so if nothing else, how about pirating the CBC’s "Hockey Night In Canada" on Saturday nights instead?
Legendary broadcaster Paul Harvey turned his last page over the weekend. True, he was a conservative, but at least he was a fair one, and I enjoyed his work, esp. "The Rest Of The Story", which I usually only got to hear on road trips since AM reception at my workplace is non-existent because of our MR magnet, plus his show was dropped in K.C. years ago anyway. I always loved his oddball delivery style, and I’ll even admit to imitating Harvey (poorly) in a couple junior high "radio shows" in speech class. I even had the honor of running the board for "Paul Harvey News And Comment" on a rare weekday shift I worked at KKJO in St. Joseph back in the day. He was one of the last throwbacks to a better vanished time in radio, and it’s pretty amazing that he was able to continue working and doing what he enjoyed right up until almost the end of his life. A legend, indeed…good day!
AND NOW, THE WORST OF THE STORY…
"I am an average citizen…I have a microphone."—Rush Limbaugh
Oh really, Rush? Well, I’m an average citizen and I have a microphone too, but I sure’s hell don’t get paid $38 million a year to use it, you pompous prick!
As for radio personalities I dearly wish we could throw back, the Big Fat Idiot has now been deemed the de facto leader of the Republican Party. Does anyone besides me find it just a tad disconcerting that even Republican politicians find themselves apologizing for criticizing Limbaugh because the BFI now holds so much sway? Makes me almost feel pity for the GOP. As for Limbaugh, why doesn’t he get off his fat posterior and run for President himself, if he’s such an all-knowing, all-seeing political badass? Why, because he’s got it too good as it is, that’s why. It seems I’ve been low-balling Limbaugh on his salary in my previous posts at a mere $10 million a year. $38 million a year?!? Just to talk on the fucking radio?!? Nobody’s that good at any profession to rate that kind of salary! Is it any wonder this gasbag opposes increased taxes for the wealthy? I sure don’t see him volunteering to take a pay cut anytime soon in this economic climate.
LET ME UP, I’VE HAD ENOUGH!
I’m getting to the point where I almost can’t bear to watch all the talking heads on the TV news outlets yapping about the economy anymore. One "expert" says the stimulus package will work, while another shoots it down in flames, and no one can seem to agree on anything that will get us out of this mess. And Ben Stein and Donald Trump as financial experts? Puh-leeze! What’s worse, neither this Federal Reserve guy Bernanke nor Treasury Secretary Geithner seem to have a freakin’ clue what to do, either. Oh, and another thing: Fuck AIG!
Sorry if that paragraph wasn’t well-thought-out and didn't live up to my usual standards—it was pure stream-of-consciousness and I just had to vent…
ALMOST HEAVEN, WEST VIRGINIA?
Gee, kids, let’s all move to West Virginia because apparently all their major crises have been solved, being’s how one of their state representatives has time to introduce a bill to ban Barbie. You heard that right, folks, Barbie, as in the plastic doll beloved by gazillions of little girls the world over. They must not have any more economic strife in the Appalachians if all they’re concerned about is how Barbie’s image impacts the prepubescent girls of that region, hence the attempted ban. Here’s the story if you want to waste your valuable time with it.
What I wouldn’t give to be able to repeatedly smack politicians like this clown over the head with a rubber hose...
JIM DANDY NEEDED A RESCUE?
Here’s a rare nugget I unearthed the other night on YouTube that I wasn’t even aware existed. It features the overhauled Black Oak Arkansas lineup—known as just plain Black Oak at that point—performing "Race With The Devil" on "Midnight Special" in early 1978. Killer song, but sadly, Black Oak’s time had already come and gone, and being mired in the heart of the Disco era didn’t help their cause at all. Only singer Jim "Dandy" Mangrum and guitarist Jimmy Henderson (far left in the video) remained from the original BOA lineup, as they tried to shed their Southern-fried boogie-band image and prove to the critics what great musicians they were by playing more mainstream hard Rock. Didn’t work, and it was really strange to see Dandy without his trademark washboard and wearing a shirt, no less! Black Oak made one more album after Race With The Devil before hanging it up a year later.
FRIGGIN’ BRILLIANT!
Also while YouTubing the other night, I came upon this hidden gem from my man John Hiatt that I had never heard before called "Since His Penis Came Between Us", which he performed on PBS many moons ago, but has never actually recorded (to my knowledge, anyway). Nothing pornographic here or anything, just a damn funny song…
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #109
"Thank God I’m A Country Boy”—JOHN DENVER (1975) “My days are all filled with an easy Country charm...” I somehow managed to mangle this line up as something like "an easy cut of chaw," as in tobacco. I'm pretty certain JD holds the all-time record for the repeated use of the word "fiddle" in one song here.
BLURRING THE LINES
While I'm on the subject of Oldies music, what used to be our main Oldies station in KC, 94.9 FM, is gradually moprhing into a Classic Rock station. They still play a fair amount of ‘60s and ‘70s stuff like Dusty Springfield, Chicago, The Beatles and Elton John, but anymore, 94.9 sounds more like Classic Rock with the likes of Don Henley, Bob Seger and John Mellencamp dominating their playlist. Hell, they even play Boston now! That’s all fine, but now K.C. is totally devoid of a true old-school Oldies radio station, which I think kinda sucks. Even when 9.49 was a true Oldies format, they played a tad too much Four Seasons, Beach Boys and Motown for my liking, while ignoring classics from Little Richard, Fats Domino and Buddy Holly, et al. Methinks there might be room on the AM dial for a good '50s/'60s Rock 'N' Roll heritage station.
In a related topic, if radio stations are in such dire financial shape, then why on earth do they air meaningless baseball exhibition games on weekday afternoons when no one’s listening anyway? About as pointless as selling snow blowers on Maui...
IF A HOCKEY GAME IS PLAYED IN THE WOODS, DOES IT MAKE A SOUND?
Okay, I realize the National Hockey League is still trying to regain its status on the sporting ladder in the wake of the 2004-05 labor stoppage and all, but you’d think they rate slightly better TV coverage on Versus than they get. Versus only airs NHL games on Mondays and Tuesdays during the regular season, which makes very little sense, as the NHL doesn’t gain much by going up against "Monday Night Football" in the fall and ESPN’s "Big Monday" college bassit-ball in the winter and spring. Not to mention that Mondays are typically light nights, schedule-wise, for the NHL, thus the only choice they had this past Monday was the Colorado/New York Islanders game, featuring two teams already hopelessly out of the playoff race. Last night’s Pittsburgh/Tampa Bay broadcast wasn’t a much better match-up, even though they could’ve aired Boston/Philadelphia, a game loaded with playoff implications. It’s not like Vs. has a lot of riveting programming the rest of the week that would be pre-empted, so if nothing else, how about pirating the CBC’s "Hockey Night In Canada" on Saturday nights instead?
Saturday, February 28, 2009
I'm bloggin' here! I'm bloggin' here!
Yes, I’ve been watching Midnight Cowboy again…
NORM VAN LIER, 1947-2009/JOHNNY "RED" KERR, 1932-2009
Former NBA All-Star Norm Van Lier was found dead Thursday in Chicago. Along with Jerry Sloan, Chet Walker and Bob Love, Van Lier was part of the nucleus of those Bulls teams of the early/mid-‘70s that were perennial playoff contenders but couldn’t quite get over the hump. I remember having an intense dislike for “Stormin’ Norman” whenever he played against our dreaded Kansas City-Omaha Kings because of his hard-nosed style of play—your basic Dennis Rodman without the piercings, tattoos and day-glo hair—and he always seemed to be starting shit with one of our players or lipping off to one of the refs. He was a fan favorite at the old Chicago Stadium, though, and I learned to respect him a lot more as an NBA analyst via his appearances on ESPN’s “Mike & Mike In The Morning” radio show.
My brother from another mother, Randy Raley, posted a very interesting quote from NVL that sheds even more light about his on-court modus operandi: “I primarily play defense, and to me, that means that if keep my player from catching the ball and scoring, I have done my job. If my player scores an average of 16 points a game and he only gets 3 on me, that means I've scored 13 points that you will never see in the box score. I not only don't want my guy to score, I'll work my hardest to make sure he doesn't touch the ball." Guess he wasn’t such a dastardly villain after all—just a smart and dedicated player. Oddly enough, Van Lier could easily have been a KC-O King, as he began his career with the Cincinnati Royals, but was traded to the Bulls the year before the Royals moved here (and Omaha).
Thursday was a bad one all-around for Bulls fans, as their longtime TV color analyst (and the franchise’s first head coach) Johnny “Red” Kerr also passed away later in the day, although not unexpectedly, as he’d been suffering from pancreatic cancer for quite some time. Kerr had a pretty good NBA career as a center-forward, mostly with the Syracuse Nationals/Philadelphia 76ers in the early and mid-’60s. I don’t know all that much about Red’s announcing style, but I gather he was the Bulls’ equivalent of Harry Caray—part announcer/part cheerleader. Sad day in Chi-town, indeed.
WENDY RICHARD, 1943-2009
The Grim Reaper was a busy bastard Thursday, as he also claimed actress Wendy Richard at age 65. Regular PBS viewers should know Wendy from the ‘70s BBC 'Britcom' “Are You Being Served?” as the junior saleswoman at Grace Bros. department store with the dynamite legs, the voluptuous Miss Shirley Brahms. I always loved her exaggerated working-class dialect on the show, which presaged Daphne Moon's on “Frasier” by 20 years, and Wendy was quite the hottie back in the day. She went on to spend 22 years on the BBC nighttime soap opera “EastEnders” before her character was killed off in 2006. WR's off-screen life wasn’t always peachy-keen, though—she was married four times and endured three bouts with breast cancer, the last of which she succumbed to Thursday, bless her heart. Rest in peace, Wendy—you were a real cutie…
OUR NEW CASTLE'S GOT A CASSEL!
Enough bad news—in conjunction with the renovations at Arrowhead Stadium, general manager Scott Pioli has begun to make over the K.C. Chefs into the K.C. Patriots by trading for upstart quarterback Matt Cassel and veteran linebacker Mike Vrabel for the mere pittance of a second-round pick in this year’s NFL draft. What a strange twist of fate it is that in the first quarter of the first game of the 2008 season, a Chief (Bernard Pollard) inadvertently ended Tom Brady’s season with the P-Men, subsequently giving the untested Cassel a chance to prove himself a worthy NFL quarterback, and now he’s the field general of the Chefs. Considering what K.C. gave up for these two, this deal is a steal, especially if Vrabel still has some gas left in his tank. Plus, it frees K.C. up to address other needs with their #3 pick in this year’s draft, especially on defense, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Pioli trades down for more draft choices, as per their usual in Foxboro over these past few years. More wheeling and dealing to come, no doubt…
HE’S BAAAAACK!
I was very pleased to see my man Martin Brodeur, goaltender for my beloved New Jersey Devils, come back in style Thursday night by skunking the Colorado Avalanches 4-0 after spending most of the season on the DL with an elbow injury. MB was also back between the pipes this afternoon as my boys in red and black whooped Florida 7-2. Oddly enough, the Devils have done mighty fine without Monsieur Brodeur this year, as they now lead their division, and with Marty back in the fold, they look loaded for bear to make another run at Lord Stanley’s Cup. Brodeur’s shutout was #99 in his sure-shot first-ballot Hall of Fame career, and he’s now just five away from breaking the late Terry Sawchuk’s record for most all-time in NHL history, which to me is in the same realm as baseball’s home run record. And unlike America’s pastime, they don't need no stinking asterisks in Canada’s pastime’s record books! To wit (to what?), there ain't no steroid problem in hockey, thank you very much...
AY, CARRUMBA!
Fox TV says it’s renewing “The Simpsons” for two more seasons, which will surpass the record held by “Gunsmoke” for being the longest-running prime-time tee-vee series on earth in this hemisphere (22 seasons). Have to admit, I don’t tune in to my good friend Homer J. Simpson all that much anymore, as “Family Guy” has more or less supplanted “The Simpsons” as my favorite animated prime-time show, but I guess the show is still relevant, although there seems to be a difference of opinion amongst longtime fans as to whether the show has overstayed its welcome or not. By the time it’s all said and done, there should be at least 493 “Simpsons” episodes, which would rank them #3 all-time. By my count, if you ran every episode of “The Simpsons” back-to-back 24/7, it would take well over 10 days to get through all of them—there could almost conceivably be a Simpsons cable channel somewhere down the road. Anyway, a round of Duffs on me in celebration...
Here are the current standings of most episodes of a prime-time series:
1) "Gunsmoke" (1955-75)—633
2) "Lassie" (1954-73)—588 [includes all of her/its various incarnations]
3) "The Simpsons" (1989-Present)—493 [projected through 2012]
4) "Ozzie And Harriet" (1952-66)—435
5) "Bonanza" (1959-72)—430
6) "My Three Sons" (1960-72)—369
7) "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" (1955-65)—361
8) "Dallas" (1978-91)—357
9) "Knots Landing" (1979-93)—344
10) "Make Room For Daddy" (1953-64)—336
Technically, the original ABC run on “Monday Night Football” (1970-2005) could be considered the all-time prime-time champ at 36 seasons and 557 episodes (and not one single rerun!).
NEVER SEND A BOY TO DO A MAN’S JOB
The Republican Party has skidmarks in its collective pants/panties in the wake of the disastrous rebuttal speech by Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal to Pres. Obama’s speech to Congress the other night. To me, this guy had all the charisma of Mark the ticket-taker from Fast Times At Ridgemont High as he rambled on for 15 minutes, although he did make one or two lucid comments (see below) while prematurely ending his 2012 Presidential bid. And personally, I think he looks kinda French, too…
“MOSTLY SAY ‘HOORAY FOR OUR SIDE‘…”—REDUX
“The people on our side are making a real mistake if they go after Bobby Jindal. We cannot shun politicians who speak for our beliefs just because we don’t like the way he says it.”—Rush Limbaugh
Meantime, the BFI (Big Fat Idiot) was shitting bricks because some Republicans had the unmitigated gall to criticize that which young master Jindal uttered in his speech. Uhhh, Rush, buddy, if you’d listened at all to what your boy Jindal was saying, he actually advocated what B. Obama’s been promoting all along about both sides working together to find solutions to this economic crisis—ergo, you need to knock off all this "people on our side" jingoism, as well as all this blame-game crap. Even though I’m left-leaning, if someone from the conservative wing can concoct a way out of this mess, I might just kiss the son-of-a-bitch on the lips, but I sure don’t see a whole lot of bright ideas coming from the right these days. As my man Bob Walkenhorst of The Rainmakers once brilliantly wrote: “The generation that would change the world is still looking for its car keys.”
By the way, Rush Limbaugh is once again a big fat idiot, literally. The one thing I often did praise him for was when he lost all that weight a few years back and kept it off for quite some time, but he’s reverted back to his previous Jabba T. Hut size. I guess making $10 mil a year will do that to a person…
HOW’S THAT WORKIN’ FOR YA, DOC?
Since the whole potential Britney Spears residual TV ratings bonanza tempted him last year, you knew it was only a matter of time before Dr. Fool—er uh—Dr. Phil got involved in this whole whacko octuplet chick hoop-de-doo. He claims this gross ignoramus (that‘s 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus) actually called him—as if an unemployed mother of 14 on food stamps just happens to have his number on her speed-dial—to intervene on her behalf. Seems that hospital officials are balking at releasing her flotilla of newborns to her because of concerns about the living quarters they’d be residing in, which is on the verge of foreclosure because her mother owes $23,000 in mortgage payments. Hell, if Octuplet Mama likes, I have some empty shoe boxes she can have to use as cribs.
Meanwhile, do you really think Dr. Fool is just doing all this out of the goodness of his pea-pickin’ heart? Anyone who believes that, stand on your head…
THIS MIGHT BE BLATANTLY OBVIOUS, BUT…
…if so many of these people on TV Land’s “High School Reunion” show are such connivers, drama queens and assholes, why would anyone even want to see them again, anyway?
PRAISE THE LORD AND PASS THE DOOBIE?
As I‘ve previously discussed here, .38 Special played a concert last night at a retirement community here in the K.C. area, which was weird enough. Now I hear that next Friday, Kansas City’s own ‘70s duo Brewer & Shipley (of “One Toke Over The Line” fame) is scheduled to play at the Community Christian Church on the Country Club Plaza. Strange venue indeed for an act whose greatest hit (pun only partially intended) is a tune about smoking pot. Then again, they do sing “sweet Jesus” several times in that song, so I guess there’s a Biblical connection there somewhere…
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #108
“The Boys of Summer”—DON HENLEY (1984) “I can see you, your brown skin shining in the sun…” Or as my feeble brain originally interpreted it, “Your broad’s skin shining in the sun…”
“DA RAIDAS!” UPDATE
A few more nuggets from the Paul Revere & The Raiders video treasure trove have been unearthed by some wonderful soul on YouTube. First off, here’s a little sampling of the PR&TR version of “(I’m Not Your) Steppin’ Stone” that wasn’t available on YouTube a couple weeks ago when I did my Raiders tribute post. This rascal blows the Monkees’ version away, IMHO. And just for shits and hoots, here's an optimisic Raider ditty from the same 1966 LP as "Steppin' Stone" that didn't even make my Top 25 called "There's Always Tomorrow", sung by late Raider drummer Mike "Smitty" Smith. And for good measure, here's the long-lost Mark Lindsay 1970 minor solo hit, "Miss America", which I believe was aired on the 1971 TV special "Make Your Own Kind Of Music", which also featured The Carpenters, among other '70s luminaries. Memories, light the corners of my mind...
HERE’S ONE FOR JAY LENO
Small headline I saw in the paper the other day read: “Zoo loses elephant”. As in ‘misplaced’? Now, that would be a piece of work!
NORM VAN LIER, 1947-2009/JOHNNY "RED" KERR, 1932-2009
Former NBA All-Star Norm Van Lier was found dead Thursday in Chicago. Along with Jerry Sloan, Chet Walker and Bob Love, Van Lier was part of the nucleus of those Bulls teams of the early/mid-‘70s that were perennial playoff contenders but couldn’t quite get over the hump. I remember having an intense dislike for “Stormin’ Norman” whenever he played against our dreaded Kansas City-Omaha Kings because of his hard-nosed style of play—your basic Dennis Rodman without the piercings, tattoos and day-glo hair—and he always seemed to be starting shit with one of our players or lipping off to one of the refs. He was a fan favorite at the old Chicago Stadium, though, and I learned to respect him a lot more as an NBA analyst via his appearances on ESPN’s “Mike & Mike In The Morning” radio show.
My brother from another mother, Randy Raley, posted a very interesting quote from NVL that sheds even more light about his on-court modus operandi: “I primarily play defense, and to me, that means that if keep my player from catching the ball and scoring, I have done my job. If my player scores an average of 16 points a game and he only gets 3 on me, that means I've scored 13 points that you will never see in the box score. I not only don't want my guy to score, I'll work my hardest to make sure he doesn't touch the ball." Guess he wasn’t such a dastardly villain after all—just a smart and dedicated player. Oddly enough, Van Lier could easily have been a KC-O King, as he began his career with the Cincinnati Royals, but was traded to the Bulls the year before the Royals moved here (and Omaha).
Thursday was a bad one all-around for Bulls fans, as their longtime TV color analyst (and the franchise’s first head coach) Johnny “Red” Kerr also passed away later in the day, although not unexpectedly, as he’d been suffering from pancreatic cancer for quite some time. Kerr had a pretty good NBA career as a center-forward, mostly with the Syracuse Nationals/Philadelphia 76ers in the early and mid-’60s. I don’t know all that much about Red’s announcing style, but I gather he was the Bulls’ equivalent of Harry Caray—part announcer/part cheerleader. Sad day in Chi-town, indeed.
WENDY RICHARD, 1943-2009
The Grim Reaper was a busy bastard Thursday, as he also claimed actress Wendy Richard at age 65. Regular PBS viewers should know Wendy from the ‘70s BBC 'Britcom' “Are You Being Served?” as the junior saleswoman at Grace Bros. department store with the dynamite legs, the voluptuous Miss Shirley Brahms. I always loved her exaggerated working-class dialect on the show, which presaged Daphne Moon's on “Frasier” by 20 years, and Wendy was quite the hottie back in the day. She went on to spend 22 years on the BBC nighttime soap opera “EastEnders” before her character was killed off in 2006. WR's off-screen life wasn’t always peachy-keen, though—she was married four times and endured three bouts with breast cancer, the last of which she succumbed to Thursday, bless her heart. Rest in peace, Wendy—you were a real cutie…
OUR NEW CASTLE'S GOT A CASSEL!
Enough bad news—in conjunction with the renovations at Arrowhead Stadium, general manager Scott Pioli has begun to make over the K.C. Chefs into the K.C. Patriots by trading for upstart quarterback Matt Cassel and veteran linebacker Mike Vrabel for the mere pittance of a second-round pick in this year’s NFL draft. What a strange twist of fate it is that in the first quarter of the first game of the 2008 season, a Chief (Bernard Pollard) inadvertently ended Tom Brady’s season with the P-Men, subsequently giving the untested Cassel a chance to prove himself a worthy NFL quarterback, and now he’s the field general of the Chefs. Considering what K.C. gave up for these two, this deal is a steal, especially if Vrabel still has some gas left in his tank. Plus, it frees K.C. up to address other needs with their #3 pick in this year’s draft, especially on defense, and I wouldn’t be surprised if Pioli trades down for more draft choices, as per their usual in Foxboro over these past few years. More wheeling and dealing to come, no doubt…
HE’S BAAAAACK!
I was very pleased to see my man Martin Brodeur, goaltender for my beloved New Jersey Devils, come back in style Thursday night by skunking the Colorado Avalanches 4-0 after spending most of the season on the DL with an elbow injury. MB was also back between the pipes this afternoon as my boys in red and black whooped Florida 7-2. Oddly enough, the Devils have done mighty fine without Monsieur Brodeur this year, as they now lead their division, and with Marty back in the fold, they look loaded for bear to make another run at Lord Stanley’s Cup. Brodeur’s shutout was #99 in his sure-shot first-ballot Hall of Fame career, and he’s now just five away from breaking the late Terry Sawchuk’s record for most all-time in NHL history, which to me is in the same realm as baseball’s home run record. And unlike America’s pastime, they don't need no stinking asterisks in Canada’s pastime’s record books! To wit (to what?), there ain't no steroid problem in hockey, thank you very much...
AY, CARRUMBA!
Fox TV says it’s renewing “The Simpsons” for two more seasons, which will surpass the record held by “Gunsmoke” for being the longest-running prime-time tee-vee series on earth in this hemisphere (22 seasons). Have to admit, I don’t tune in to my good friend Homer J. Simpson all that much anymore, as “Family Guy” has more or less supplanted “The Simpsons” as my favorite animated prime-time show, but I guess the show is still relevant, although there seems to be a difference of opinion amongst longtime fans as to whether the show has overstayed its welcome or not. By the time it’s all said and done, there should be at least 493 “Simpsons” episodes, which would rank them #3 all-time. By my count, if you ran every episode of “The Simpsons” back-to-back 24/7, it would take well over 10 days to get through all of them—there could almost conceivably be a Simpsons cable channel somewhere down the road. Anyway, a round of Duffs on me in celebration...
Here are the current standings of most episodes of a prime-time series:
1) "Gunsmoke" (1955-75)—633
2) "Lassie" (1954-73)—588 [includes all of her/its various incarnations]
3) "The Simpsons" (1989-Present)—493 [projected through 2012]
4) "Ozzie And Harriet" (1952-66)—435
5) "Bonanza" (1959-72)—430
6) "My Three Sons" (1960-72)—369
7) "Alfred Hitchcock Presents" (1955-65)—361
8) "Dallas" (1978-91)—357
9) "Knots Landing" (1979-93)—344
10) "Make Room For Daddy" (1953-64)—336
Technically, the original ABC run on “Monday Night Football” (1970-2005) could be considered the all-time prime-time champ at 36 seasons and 557 episodes (and not one single rerun!).
NEVER SEND A BOY TO DO A MAN’S JOB
The Republican Party has skidmarks in its collective pants/panties in the wake of the disastrous rebuttal speech by Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal to Pres. Obama’s speech to Congress the other night. To me, this guy had all the charisma of Mark the ticket-taker from Fast Times At Ridgemont High as he rambled on for 15 minutes, although he did make one or two lucid comments (see below) while prematurely ending his 2012 Presidential bid. And personally, I think he looks kinda French, too…
“MOSTLY SAY ‘HOORAY FOR OUR SIDE‘…”—REDUX
“The people on our side are making a real mistake if they go after Bobby Jindal. We cannot shun politicians who speak for our beliefs just because we don’t like the way he says it.”—Rush Limbaugh
Meantime, the BFI (Big Fat Idiot) was shitting bricks because some Republicans had the unmitigated gall to criticize that which young master Jindal uttered in his speech. Uhhh, Rush, buddy, if you’d listened at all to what your boy Jindal was saying, he actually advocated what B. Obama’s been promoting all along about both sides working together to find solutions to this economic crisis—ergo, you need to knock off all this "people on our side" jingoism, as well as all this blame-game crap. Even though I’m left-leaning, if someone from the conservative wing can concoct a way out of this mess, I might just kiss the son-of-a-bitch on the lips, but I sure don’t see a whole lot of bright ideas coming from the right these days. As my man Bob Walkenhorst of The Rainmakers once brilliantly wrote: “The generation that would change the world is still looking for its car keys.”
By the way, Rush Limbaugh is once again a big fat idiot, literally. The one thing I often did praise him for was when he lost all that weight a few years back and kept it off for quite some time, but he’s reverted back to his previous Jabba T. Hut size. I guess making $10 mil a year will do that to a person…
HOW’S THAT WORKIN’ FOR YA, DOC?
Since the whole potential Britney Spears residual TV ratings bonanza tempted him last year, you knew it was only a matter of time before Dr. Fool—er uh—Dr. Phil got involved in this whole whacko octuplet chick hoop-de-doo. He claims this gross ignoramus (that‘s 144 times worse than an ordinary ignoramus) actually called him—as if an unemployed mother of 14 on food stamps just happens to have his number on her speed-dial—to intervene on her behalf. Seems that hospital officials are balking at releasing her flotilla of newborns to her because of concerns about the living quarters they’d be residing in, which is on the verge of foreclosure because her mother owes $23,000 in mortgage payments. Hell, if Octuplet Mama likes, I have some empty shoe boxes she can have to use as cribs.
Meanwhile, do you really think Dr. Fool is just doing all this out of the goodness of his pea-pickin’ heart? Anyone who believes that, stand on your head…
THIS MIGHT BE BLATANTLY OBVIOUS, BUT…
…if so many of these people on TV Land’s “High School Reunion” show are such connivers, drama queens and assholes, why would anyone even want to see them again, anyway?
PRAISE THE LORD AND PASS THE DOOBIE?
As I‘ve previously discussed here, .38 Special played a concert last night at a retirement community here in the K.C. area, which was weird enough. Now I hear that next Friday, Kansas City’s own ‘70s duo Brewer & Shipley (of “One Toke Over The Line” fame) is scheduled to play at the Community Christian Church on the Country Club Plaza. Strange venue indeed for an act whose greatest hit (pun only partially intended) is a tune about smoking pot. Then again, they do sing “sweet Jesus” several times in that song, so I guess there’s a Biblical connection there somewhere…
CLASSIC MISHEARD LYRIC #108
“The Boys of Summer”—DON HENLEY (1984) “I can see you, your brown skin shining in the sun…” Or as my feeble brain originally interpreted it, “Your broad’s skin shining in the sun…”
“DA RAIDAS!” UPDATE
A few more nuggets from the Paul Revere & The Raiders video treasure trove have been unearthed by some wonderful soul on YouTube. First off, here’s a little sampling of the PR&TR version of “(I’m Not Your) Steppin’ Stone” that wasn’t available on YouTube a couple weeks ago when I did my Raiders tribute post. This rascal blows the Monkees’ version away, IMHO. And just for shits and hoots, here's an optimisic Raider ditty from the same 1966 LP as "Steppin' Stone" that didn't even make my Top 25 called "There's Always Tomorrow", sung by late Raider drummer Mike "Smitty" Smith. And for good measure, here's the long-lost Mark Lindsay 1970 minor solo hit, "Miss America", which I believe was aired on the 1971 TV special "Make Your Own Kind Of Music", which also featured The Carpenters, among other '70s luminaries. Memories, light the corners of my mind...
HERE’S ONE FOR JAY LENO
Small headline I saw in the paper the other day read: “Zoo loses elephant”. As in ‘misplaced’? Now, that would be a piece of work!
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