That Cat Named Hercules, Part I

Being as Elton John is tied for #2 with The Who on my all-time favorite Rock group/artist list (2A and 2B behind Kiss, essentially), I’m surprised I’ve never done an official blog tribute to Captain Fantastic, as his music is as big a part of the soundtrack to my life as anyone’s.  I paid tribute to Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and the first time I ever saw Sir Elton in concert in previous posts, and now I feel compelled to do a more complete job after finishing a wonderful book by Elizabeth J. Rosenthal called His Song.  In her book, Rosenthal chronicles both Elton’s personal life and his music, with very comprehensive details about the inspiration for and recording of virtually each and every song from all of his albums through 2001 when the book was published.  Ms. Rosenthal also did a much better job of covering Elton’s personal life than any other biographies I’ve read on him, and I learned way more about that "Cat named Hercules" than ever before.

So, I decided to rank all of EJ’s albums from worst-to-first, similar to what I did with Kiss a couple years ago.  I cover all of his studio releases and official live albums, but omitted any greatest hits and compilation albums (Love Songs, for instance), as well as the 1994 Duets CD, which I didn’t really think was relevant (nor did I much care for it!) and the 1991 Two Rooms tribute CD, which Elton didn’t actually participate on.  I think I’m pretty kind to Elton too—only two of the 35 albums received less than a C-minus from me.  And I think you can pretty much already guess which album is #1, but my other rankings might surprise you a bit.

On with the countdown…

35) VICTIM OF LOVE (1979) F   One of the dangers of the type of superstardom Elton John achieved is he was able to indulge himself in anything he damn well pleased by the late ‘70s.   EJ was/is a fan of all different types of music, which is well-reflected in his overall musical catalog, everything from Country to Gospel to edgy Rock to R&B, and in 1979, he got the urge to do a Disco album—never mind that Disco was already passé and on its way to a very timely death by that time.   This is the only Elton John album on which he doesn’t play a note—he chose to merely sing on it and more or less just phoned that in.   The only halfway-inspired track was "Street Boogie", but like most Disco songs, it gets boring after the first three minutes.   And a Disco version of Chuck Berry’s "Johnny B. Goode"?   Sacrilege.   Even Sir Elton himself now freely admits Victim was a soulless turd, and he had reached the nadir of his career.   Happily, things improved steadily after that…

34) LEATHER JACKETS (1986) D+   EJ has similar feelings toward Leather Jackets, which he has deemed his least-favorite of everything he’s ever put out.  This one came out while Elton was in one of his creative "comfortable ruts" during which all the songs kinda sounded the same.   The only thing that saved Jackets from receiving an F from me was "Go It Alone", an underrated favorite of mine featuring a catchy riff and some edge from Davey Johnstone’s guitar.  The rest of it is pretty much half-hearted excrement, including the single "Heartache All Over The World".   It also didn’t help that Johnstone, lyricist Bernie Taupin and the rest of Elton’s band at the time are featured on the back cover posing in leather and/or seated on motorcycles looking like a bunch of third-rate Fonzies performing in Branson.  Just a very ill-starred effort from someone I’ve come to expect much better from.

33) THE COMPLETE THOM BELL SESSIONS (1978) C-
I hesitated even including it on the list, since it’s not really a full-length album, and I may be a bit harsh giving this one a C-.   I truly enjoy some good Soul/R&B music now and then—when it’s done by black guys, that is.   When a white dude attempts it, the results are usually unsatisfying.   "Mama Can’t Buy Your Love" was a fair-sized hit for Elton, but I just never grooved to Thom Bell, and was getting frustrated with John’s inconsistency in the late ‘70s following his halcyon days.   I will say this, though—Thom Bell was way better than the Disco album Captain Mediocre put out next (see #35 above).

32) 21 At 33 (1980) C-   Elton was still making his way back out of the musical wilderness in 1980, following three years of unfocused mediocrity and substandard releases (two of which I just covered), and 21 At 33 reflects the baby steps he was taking after briefly reconnecting with Taupin following their unplanned sabbatical from collaborating with one another.  "Little Jeannie" yielded John’s first legitimate hit in quite a while, but it always came across to me as kinda wussy-sounding.   About the only other noteworthy tracks were "Chasing The Crown" and "White Lady, White Powder", the latter half of which Elton had been indulging too much in during that period.   Even the title confounded me for the longest time—it was supposed to signifying his 21st album at age 33, but every time I tried to tally up his album catalog, I kept coming up with 20, greatest hits packages and live albums included. I didn’t realize it referred to his British releases, which had more compilations and such than his US stuff did.   Overall, a rather forgettable album, but at least it was a step in the right direction, considering where Elton had been wallowing the past few years prior to it.

31) ICE ON FIRE (1985) C-   Elton’s momentum stalled on this album following his wonderful early ‘80s comeback, and it heralded yet another "comfortable rut" he found himself in where most of the songs sounded too similar.  True, Ice On Fire yielded two hits, "Nikita" and "Wrap Her Up", but this album as a whole lived up to the first half of its title with me—it sounded too cold and plastic most of the time.   Even the cover photo seemed cool and distant, which featured Elton looking like a snooty aristocrat (as he also did on A Single Man in '78).   The video for "Wrap Her Up" featured a mulleted Elton duetting with George Michael—two renowned gay men inanely singing the praises of famous women—meh.   Far and away this album’s saving grace is the forgotten gem "Act Of War", a comic duet with R&B siren Millie Jackson, and one of my all-time favorite "fuck you" songs.  Featuring a Davey Johnstone guitar riff that sounded dangerously close to Glenn Frey’s "The Heat Is On" (also on the charts long about the same time) this track wasn’t even available on vinyl copies of IOF (only as a bonus track on cassettes and these new things called compact discs, which had just hit the marketplace in ‘85), but it blew away everything else on the album (pun intended).   Elton originally had Tina Turner in mind for the song, but she politely passed, so Jackson joined the melee instead, and almost sounded (and in the video kinda looked like) RuPaul in places.   "We’re living on the front line, you and me/Fightin’ on this battleground of misery/Oh, go ahead/Bring the artillery, and we’ll make this an act of war!"


30) THE BIG PICTURE (1997) C-   Mr. Taupin cites this release his least favorite of all his collaborations with Sir Elton.   EJ had slipped back into another comfortable rut at that point, following his 1990s comeback that featured two of his strongest albums in many years back-to-back, 1992’s The One and 1995’s Made In England.   TBP isn’t all that bad an album really, but it features way more slow-tempo tracks than its immediate predecessors, and sadly, doesn’t really wake up from its slumber until the closing song, "Wicked Dreams".  Apart from the somewhat-predictable hit single "There’s Something About The Way You Look Tonight" and a personal lyrical favorite of mine, "Recover Your Soul", there isn’t anything terribly memorable about The Big Picture, which was also overshadowed by the world-record selling "Candle In The Wind ‘97" and the tragic event which triggered it. 

29) FRIENDS (Soundtrack) (1971)  C   Elton and Bernie’s songwriting partnership was still in the formative stages at this point, but this wasn’t a bad effort for relative newcomers to the music scene, and the album was actually better than the movie it came from.   I contemplated giving Friends an incomplete grade instead of C since it’s not all Elton and Bernie here, as parts of the record feature orchestral instrumentals by Paul Buckmaster, who worked on several E. John albums in the early ‘70s.   The title track, a minor hit, is a bit of a forgotten gem here, as was "Can I Put You On"?, an underrated Elton classic which merely served as incidental background music on a radio in the film, but was a real showstopper when he rocked the house with it during his live act at that time.

28) PEACHTREE ROAD (2004) C   Comfortable rut time again, but this one wasn’t quite so bad. This album had a Country tinge to it similar to 1971’s Tumbleweed Connection, and it had some decent tracks on it like the pseudo Elvis tribute "Porch Swing In Tupelo" and the somewhat-personal "Weight Of The World".

27) SONGS FROM THE WEST COAST (2001) C   Not sure what the significance of the album title is, but Peachtree’s comfortable rut actually originated on this album, where Elton became more piano-oriented again.  Nothing wrong with that, but I’ve always been more partial to Elton’s albums that have a mix of guitar and piano, so a little more 6-string magic here from Davey Johnstone would’ve enhanced things a skosh.   Nonetheless, the songs are a bit more memorable than Peachtree, especially "American Triangle", all about the hate-crime murder of gay Wyoming student Matthew Shepard.   I liked "Look Ma, No Hands", "This Train Don’t Stop Here Anymore", "Dark Diamond" and "Emperor’s New Clothes", as well. 

26) THE CAPTAIN & THE KID (2006) C   The comfortable rut continued with Elton and Bernie’s pseudo sequel to Captain Fantastic & The Brown Dirt Cowboy 31 years hence.   Once again, very piano-oriented, the tune on the title track for this Captain sounds almost identical to the one from the original Captain, only it has different lyrics and comes at the end instead of being the leadoff hitter.   "The Bridge", "Postcards From Richard Nixon" were the other standout tracks, as was a nice EJ tribute to New York City, "Wouldn’t Have You Any Other Way".   Still, there seemed to be that nagging sameness to the material here that bogs things down.   I realize Elton is older, wiser and drug-free now, but I’d still like to see him rock out a bit more than he has in recent years.

25) A SINGLE MAN (1978) C   The bottom had to fall out sometime—Elton had such an unprecedented rise to stardom in the ‘70s, but even he couldn’t keep it going.  A creative rest might’ve suited him better, but record companies being as they are, MCA demanded more product, and for the first time since his early days, EJ’s magic touch just wasn’t there.   Everything seemed different here, right down to Elton ditching his (in)famous trademark crazy eyewear in favor of contact lenses for the cover photo (as well as getting his right ear pierced), and ASM also marked Elton’s first recording without songwriting partner Bernie Taupin, and it showed.   Most of the album was co-written with Gary Osborne, and it’s not that the album totally sucked, but it wasn’t all that memorable, either, even with highlights like the pleasingly-apathetic "I Don’t Care", the mostly-instrumental "Song For Guy" and the single "Part-Time Love".   EJ’s trek through the musical wilderness had begun…

24) SLEEPING WITH THE PAST (1989) C   This was E. John’s final studio album recorded under the cloud of alcohol and drugs.   It’s surprising this one turned out as well as it did, considering that Elton’s personal life was a train wreck, he was overweight—"as big as Luther Vandross at his worst", he later admitted—and he had bleached white hair, which made him look 20 years older than he truly was.  Hell, he could've doubled for Truman Capote!  He went for a mostly R&B sound on SWTP, "Healing Hands" being the centerpiece, while "Club At The End Of The Street" was kinda funky, and "Sacrifice" wound up being a surprise hit, especially in England, where it became EJ’s first #1 in his homeland.  The real hidden gem is the beautiful closer, "Blue Avenue".  It’s not a bad album, I suppose, but just not a big EJ favorite of mine, for some reason.

23) THE UNION (w/Leon Russell) (2011) C   Brother Leon is one of Elton’s idols, but I can’t fathom a more unlikely duo, given their divergent musical and vocal styles, not to mention their looks.  Critics went ape-shit over this album, and it’s great for the type of music it is, I suppose, but for some reason it doesn’t blow me away like it did the critics.  Leon sounds way too much like Willie Nelson here and practically looked like an invalid in the making-of documentary, so it appears Elton did all the heavy lifting, although the closing track, "In The Arms Of The Angels" features only Russell singing very poignantly and moving Elton to tears in the studio as he recorded it.   "Monkey Suit" and the bluesy opening cut "If It Wasn’t For Bad You’d Be Good" are standouts, and at least it sounded like these two enjoyed working together. Coulda used a bit more guitar for my liking, though.  More cowbell, too…

22) LIVE IN AUSTRALIA (1987) C+   Touring with the Melbourne Symphony Orchestra during a mightily successful trek through Oz in 1986 was a brilliant masterstroke, considering how many of Elton’s early recordings contained string arrangements and this double live album would’ve made a wonderful souvenir thereof—IF Elton’s voice hadn’t been torn to shreds by that time.  He would soon opt to have surgery to remove polyps from his vocal chords, but throughout most of this record, he sounded more like Redd Foxx than Captain Fantastic.  "Candle In The Wind" even resurfaced here as a hit single, but between Elton’s hoarseness and the dour instrumentation, it came off more like a dirge than a celebration of Marilyn Monroe—give me the Yellow Brick Road original any day.  Still, the rest of the album contained highlights like the underrated "Have Mercy On The Criminal" (from Don’t Shoot Me), "Take Me To The Pilot" and "Madman Across The Water".  My grade would be substantially higher if Elton’s voice had been in top form.

21) ONE NIGHT ONLY: THE GREATEST HITS (2000) C+   As great a performer as Elton John is, he has yet to put out a truly quintessential live concert album.  The expanded re-release of Here And There probably comes the closest (read on in Part II), and this one isn’t bad, but there just seems to be something missing here.  One Night is career-spanning, giving us the first "official" live versions of "Philadelphia Freedom" and the thumping "I’m Still Standing", as well as Elton’s more recent hits like "Can You Feel The Love Tonight" and "Sacrifice", and it was also wonderful to have longtime drummer Nigel Olsson back behind the skins once again.  Elton doesn’t even try to do the falsetto "La la la la la’s" on "Crocodile Rock" anymore, but it still rocks out, as does "Bennie & The Jets".  Still, apart from Kiki Dee in her rightful place duetting on "Don’t Go Breaking My Heart", I honestly could’ve done without the guest singers featured throughout the album, especially Mary J. Bilge-water ("Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me") and Anesthesia—er uh, Anastacia caterwauling on "Saturday Night’s Alright For Fighting", which sounds totally silly with a woman singing it.  My other issue here is apart from introducing his guests, they omitted most of Elton’s between-song on-stage patter, which often can be as fun and entertaining as the songs themselves.  Overall, not a bad live release, but this could’ve been way better with a little tweaking…

20) BLUE MOVES (1976) C+   Critically-acclaimed for the most part, this one just always left me a bit flat, but you can attribute that to my own overly-high expectations for Blue Moves. When I heard Elton John was making another double-album in ‘76, visions of Goodbye Yellow Brick Road II danced in my 12-year-old head, but such was not to be.  As with most double-albums from the ‘60s and ‘70s that weren’t concept records like Tommy, Quadrophenia, The Wall, et al, you could lop off the filler tracks and create a pretty decent single-album with Blue Moves.  Just as the case was with the Stones’ Exile On Main Street, The Beatles’ White Album and Jimi Hendrix’ Electric Ladyland, I thought BM had too many throwaway songs that would normally not have made the cut on an Elton John record, to wit:  Bigger ain’t necessarily better!  Which is not to say there isn’t some good stuff here—"One Horse Town" and "Crazy Water" are two VERY underrated EJ cuts, "Shoulder Holster" has really grown on me over the years, especially Elton’s vocal on it, and even the Disco romp "Bite Your Lip (Get Up And Dance!)" is fairly tolerable.  We even get three rare instrumentals from Elton here:  "Your Starter For…", which segues into the 8:00-long "Tonight", "Out Of The Blue", which meanders around for over six funky minutes, and "Theme From A Non-Existent TV Series", which doesn’t even last a minute-and-a-half, but still gets its point across.  "Sorry Seems To Be The Hardest Word" was the big hit from Moves, but I’ve always found it as depressing as Mr. John’s receding hairline was in the video for it at the time.  Elton has often cited Blue Moves as one of his personal favorites.  Sorry I can’t say the same, although it did have its moments.

19) THE FOX (1981) C+   The baby steps of Elton’s early-‘80s return-to-form got a little bigger on The Fox, his first release on the Geffen label after leaving MCA Records in 1980.  Working more and more with Bernie Taupin again following their unintentional (but probably necessary) hiatus, Elton was beginning to sound like Elton again, on songs like "Heels Of The Wind" and the title track, which closes the album.  The tracks he collaborated on with other songwriters were also quite good, particularly "Chloe", composed by Gary Osborne, whom he’d worked with off-and-on since A Single Man.  That song sounded especially good when Sir Elton played it live on tour in 1982.  The lead-off track, "Breaking Down Barriers", also co-written with Osborne, sounded much more confident and assertive than the wimpy "Little Jeannie" from the year before, and EJ gives his falsetto its best workout since 1975’s "I Feel Like A Bullet (In The Gun Of Robert Ford)".  The most controversial track, "Elton’s Song", was co-written with openly-gay singer-songwriter Tom Robinson, all about a schoolboy crush on another schoolboy, and it took a fair amount of balls on Elton’s part to put it on his record.  For the record, I’ve never had a problem with Elton’s homosexuality and I’ve always admired his honesty and forthrightness about it.  As for the album, Elton was definitely back on the right track at this point…

18) EMPTY SKY (1969) C+   Many folks think 1970’s Elton John is his debut album.  Guess again.  After numerous failed singles circa. 1968-69, Empty Sky was the first official album from Reginald Kenneth Dwight of Pinner, Middlesex, England.  It was only available in Europe until re-issued by MCA in the summer of 1975 (with a different cover) during the height of Elton’s chart dominance.  Although he sounded like the rookie he was in places, Sky is still very listenable and not a bad effort for the first go-‘round.  The lead-off title track clocks in at 8.5 minutes, but holds one’s interest throughout, and Elton almost (intentionally) sounds like Mick Jagger at times.  "Skyline Pigeon" could’ve been a big hit with a bit more backing from the record company, and is one of the first truly memorable John-Taupin compositions.  "Western Ford Gateway" explores the life of vagrants and "Lady What’s Tomorrow" concerns itself with the environment without getting preachy.  "Gulliver" is the sad tale of a dying dog, and it segues into the smart-assedly titled "Hay Chewed", which actually re-caps the entire album with snippets from every song and some trippy late ‘60s feedback to boot.  ES only sold modestly, but Elton at least got to experience what making an album was like and still put out something he could be proud of. 

Kings Without A Throne

I’ve taken yet another trip back in the past during my latest pet project, as I’ve been compiling a data base on the history of the Kansas City Kings bassit-ball franchise the last couple months. It’s easy to think of the Kings as a losing team, but looking back, I’d forgotten that they were indeed a very competitive squad for about a four-year span in the late ‘70s/early ‘80s. Unfortunately, unstable ownership and an inept front office doomed that team to infamy and they wound up moving to Sacramento, California in 1985, only to repeat many of the same mistakes they made here, and they may well be on the move once again pretty soon to Seattle. So, here’s a little tribute to K.C.’s lone NBA franchise that spent 13 seasons here…

Kansas City was actually intended to house one of the original American Basketball Association teams in 1967, but at the last minute, they pulled up stakes and landed in Colorado to become the Denver Rockets and are now known as the Nuggets. Five years later, the Cincinnati Royals were struggling both at the box office as well as on the court, and opted to move west. The team had already relocated once before, having started in the ‘50s in Rochester, NY (also known as "Royals"), and Kansas City was their first choice, but there was one little problem. Even though Municipal Auditorium was/is a venerable basketball venue, availability was a major issue for sizeable hunks of the season because of events like the Ringling Bros. circus and the Ice Capades, et al, and various annual conventions and trade shows the building also hosted in its exhibition hall (in the days before Bartle Hall opened next door), as well as concerts and operas that were staged in the adjoining Little Theater and Music Hall. Kemper Arena was still two years away from opening as well, and there were no other suitable venues in Kansas City to house the team on nights when The Aud was booked, apart from perhaps The American Royal Arena where the Kansas City Blues minor league hockey team played, but it only held about 5,000 fans, well below NBA standards.

Royals ownership took a cue from several ABA clubs who during the early ‘70s were "regional" franchises, staging their home games in multiple cities, like the Carolina Cougars (Greensville/Raleigh/Charlotte/Winston-Salem), Virginia Squires (Norfolk/Hampton/Richmond/Roanoke) and Texas Chaparrals (Dallas/Lubbock/Ft. Worth), so they decided to play about a third of their home games three hours away from K.C. in Nebraska at Omaha's 10,000-seat Civic Auditorium. Bad idea. Kansas Citians were none too crazy about having to share their NBA team with another city and it speaks volumes that the first game in Kings history took place in Omaha instead of Kansas City on October 19, 1972. This team got off on the wrong foot with this town and never fully righted itself in the 13 years it spent here. And, oh by the way, the top six smallest regular season home crowds in K.C. Kings history were in Omaha.

There was also another little problem: Kansas City already had a baseball team called the Royals (as did Omaha, K.C.'s minor-league AAA affiliate), so the basketball team was re-christened the "Kansas City-Omaha Kings". The team kept its basic color scheme of blue and white with red trim, merely altering their script name "ROYALS" into "KINGS", and also retaining their rather unique uniform feature from the Cincinnati days of placing the player’s surname BELOW the numbers on the backs of their jerseys (see left). The Cincinnati Reds also did this in the early ‘50s and the Royals co-opted this look for themselves and were the only NBA team to do so, although it’s common practice in the WNBA today and practical, since many female players have long hair, ponytails or dreadlocks that would shroud their name anyway. The "Kansas City-Omaha" moniker only lasted three seasons before it was shortened to just plain Kansas City Kings in the summer of ’75, following the team’s first season at Kemper Arena. 

Even with the truncated name, the team continued to play half-a-dozen games each season in Omaha through 1977-78, in part because Kemper was tied up for most of November every year with the annual American Royal Rodeo and most of March with the annual NAIA and Big 8 basketball tournaments. The Kings’ front-office didn’t have a clue how to market this team and were totally out-of-touch with their own fan base, and just when Kansas Citians thought they finally had the team all to themselves in ‘78, the Kings’ brain-trust came up with the not-so-bright idea of farming out some home games to St. Louis, of all places. And not just ANY home games, mind you, but major draws like Larry Bird’s Boston Celtics, Kareem and Magic’s "Showtime" L.A Lakers, as well as Dr. J’s Philadelphia 76ers. True, the Kings threw fans a bone by televising these games (as well as most of the Omaha games) back to K.C., but Kansas City already has a bad enough inferiority complex when it comes to St. Louis, so to have its NBA team playing to sometimes-packed houses in its arch-rival city against the league’s marquee franchises three or four times a season was just insulting and ultimately another nail in the team’s coffin. Oh, and then the roofed caved in—literally—at Kemper Arena on June 3, 1979 (see above), necessitating their temporary move back to Municipal Auditorium for two-thirds of the 1979-80 season. It wasn’t until 1980-81—nine years into their existence—that the Kings first played their entire home schedule in Kansas City in their actual HOME at Kemper.

NOTE: The NBA itself wasn’t exactly helpful in promoting the Kings, either. Their Sunday afternoon TV coverage on CBS in the mid-to-late ‘70s included numerous "regional" telecasts featuring the Kings, but we rarely ever got to see our own team on TV, not even during road games because they were almost always blacked-out locally. 

On the court, the Kings were a mixed bag. In their first season, the Kansas City-Omaha Kings were actually quite respectable, all things considered. Even though the roster was comprised mostly of holdovers from Cincinnati, the Kings seemed like an expansion franchise, but didn’t play like one, finishing 36-46, and they actually rose above the .500 mark midway through the season before a 7-game losing streak did them in.  Guard Nate "Tiny" Archibald had a ridiculously good year, setting team scoring records that still haven’t been broken and even landing on the cover of ‘SI’ (see left). Veterans like Matt Guokas, Sam Lacey, Nate Williams, Otto Moore and Jimmy Walker rounded out the roster in those early years, and rookies like Ron Riley, Mike Ratliff and Ken Durrett showed promise. Durrett, in particular, had the look of a star early on until he tore up a knee and was never the same afterward. The team slipped badly in ’73-‘74, leading to head coach Bob Cousy’s dismissal midway through. Cousy was a bit too arrogant to be a coach anyhow, and was replaced eventually by Phil Johnson, who led the Kings to their first playoff berth in ’74-’75. Three poor seasons ensued, Johnson was let go, then "King" Cotton Fitzsimmons took over as head coach in 1978, and he turned this team around in a hurry. The Kings raced to their first and only Midwest Division championship in 1978-79, led by fan-favorite Scott Wedman and rookie Otis Birdsong. Rookie Phil Ford out of North Carolina joined the Kings for the 79-80 season, and the Kings somehow muddled through their tenuous home court situation while Kemper Arena was re-roofed, going an impressive 21-7 at Municipal Auditorium in the interim before returning to the stockyards in February, 1980. That brief stint at "The Aud" also featured the infamous night when Darryl Dawkins of the 76ers shattered the backboard and scared the crap out of late Kings forward Bill Robinzine, who was directly underneath it and wound up picking shards of glass out of his hair for a week afterwards. The Kings finished with a winning record again that year, and just two games behind the Milwaukee Bucks in 2nd place in the Midwest Division.

Another problem that plagued the Kings was playing on the road. There were certain road venues this team couldn’t win at to save their souls, regardless of the quality of the competition at the time.  The MECCA in Milwaukee (4-24), Detroit’s Cobo Arena (3-14), the Philadelphia Spectrum (4-16) and even HemisFair Arena in San Antonio were all houses of horror for K.C., but the two worst of all by far were Portland's Memorial Coliseum and the Fabulous Forum in Los Angeles.  K.C. (and/or Omaha) went 5-27 in Portland in the regular season, which included losing streaks of 13 and 9 games, but ironically, the Kings won the two playoff games they played there.  As for L.A., beginning in 1974, the Kings went on an ignominious road losing streak vs. the Lakers that lasted well into the ‘90s that turned out to be an NBA record for most consecutive losses at a road venue. Granted, the Lakers were always a top-flight team, but surely the Kings should’ve gotten lucky and won there now and then. They came very close on a few occasions at the Forum, but the only other time the Kansas City Kings ever won again in the City of Angels was against the Clippers at L.A. Sports Arena.

The postseason was usually most unkind to the Kings also, as they were one-and-done the first three times they made the playoffs (once to Chicago and twice to Phoenix), but the 1981 playoffs were another story.   Following a mediocre 1980-81 regular season in which they went 40-42 and barely snuck into the playoffs on the last day of the regular season, the Kings shocked the Portland Trail Blazers in a three-game mini-series for their first playoff series win (winning two games ironically at the aforementioned Memorial Coliseum), then followed that up with a seven-game triumph over the Phoenix Suns in the second round. The Kings were one series away from making the 1981 NBA Finals, but ran out of gas and lost to the Houston Rockets in five games.  Oddly enough, the 1982-83 Kings finished eight games OVER .500, but failed to make the playoffs—go figure.  Even so, the 1980-81 postseason was still considered a triumph—far and away the high-point of Kansas City Kings history—and fan interest in the team was at its apex.  Instead of capitalizing on their good fortune and building on it, they pissed it all away. Oh, and then along came this indoor soccer team you’ve heard me talk about…

Just when it looked like the K.C. Kings had a solid nucleus of a team that might rule the ‘80s, general manager "Clueless Joe" Axelson traded away Birdsong and Wedman and others and got bupkis in return for them via trades and/or the draft (Leon Douglas, Hawkeye Whitney, Brook Steppe, anyone?). Lacey was nearing the end of his career, Ford underachieved and the team was never quite the same after that, even after they brought in talented players like Reggie Theus, Joe C. Meriweather, Mike Woodson, Larry Drew and Eddie Johnson. The Kings only made the postseason one other time during their existence in K.C., a quick three-and-out against the Lakers in 1983-84 and fan interest dwindled, despite the efforts of their avid fan club, the "Backcourt Boozers". Again, the front office didn’t have a clue how to market the team, and totally failed to capitalize on the bounce they got from that ’80-’81 playoff run, let alone the resurgence in the NBA’s popularity caused by the emergence of Larry Bird and Magic Johnson in the early ‘80s, and later Michael Jordan, Hakeem Olajuwon, Patrick Ewing, Dominique Wilkins, etc. Had MJ and those other guys come along a little sooner, who knows what may have happened here?
 

Meantime, the Kansas City Comets of the Major Indoor Soccer League hit town in 1981-82 and were an instant sensation, blowing the doors off the Kings in terms of attracting big crowds and leading their own league in attendance in 1982-83, selling out 15 of 24 home dates—downright unfathomable for a sport which theretofore had precious little history here. The stodgy Kings were too old-school to learn from the marketing wizardry of the Comets’ brilliant front office Leiweke brothers (Tim and Tracey) and I truly feel this led to the Kings’ downfall and eventual exit from this city. Kansas City is most definitely a basketball town—there’s too much heritage and history with all the Final Fours and NAIA Tourneys we’ve hosted here to deny that—so there’s no good reason an NBA franchise couldn’t thrive here, but the Kings managed to find a way not to. It just felt like the front office never truly gave a damn about their fans, and that WE owed it to THEM to attend their games. No big surprise that the city didn’t put up much of a fight to keep the Kings during their lame-duck 1984-85 season before they bolted to Sacramento to play in a renovated warehouse. Long about the time the NBA’s next season in KC would’ve begun, the Royals won the World Series, and the Comets were still packing Kemper, thus the Kings were already long forgotten, and they haven’t been terribly missed since then.

After the Kings’ departure, Kansas City spent one season in the minor-league Continental Basketball Association when a team called the Sizzlers played at Municipal Auditorium in 1985-86, but interest in them was tepid at best, and they moved west just like the Kings did—to Topeka. Over a decade ago, the Kansas City Knights were members of the hap-hazard and totally disorganized ABA 2000, a league in which franchises came and went at the drop of a hat on a weekly basis, playing their home games in high school gyms, YMCAs, playgrounds, parking lots, etc., and the Knights usually played to 15,000 empty seats at Kemper. And really, that’s been the extent of professional basketball in this town to date. The advent of the Sprint Center five years ago raised the possibility of the NBA (or even the Kings franchise itself) returning to downtown KC, but that seems to be nothing but false hope, and the University of Kansas men’s basketball team continues to serve as Kansas City’s ersatz "pro" basketball team. As for the Kings, one can’t help but think "what might’ve been", if they’d had some solid ownership and competent people running the team—they coulda been a contender...  

Easy, Catman--You Are Delirious!

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Concert #113

Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band (Saturday, November 17, 2012 at Sprint Center) Ticket price: $47.00

Confession time: For years and years I loathed Bruce Springsteen. It wasn’t a personal thing, really, but in the late ‘70s when I was in my early teens and really getting into Album Rock radio, I was a bit narrow-minded (blame Ted Nugent) and wasn’t real impressed with The Boss and his music. I also chafed at how Rock magazines like Creem and Rolling Stone seemingly kept force-feeding this guy to me, making him out to be the greatest thing since Elvis and how he could simply do no wrong in their eyes. It also didn’t help that he was from New Jersey, which might as well have been New York City to me, because I copped an attitude during that time about anything even remotely connected with the Big Apple (except Kiss and "Saturday Night Live"). However, as time passed, I began warming up to Brucie, thanks in big part to 1980’s "Cadillac Ranch", as well as a song he wrote for my man Dave Edmunds in 1982 called "From Small Things (Big Things One Day Come)". By the time Born In The U.S.A. emerged in 1984, Springsteen was impossible to ignore on MTV, and I was especially drawn to the concert video of "Rosalita (Come Out Tonight)" that featured Bruce's legendary band intros and I realized that this is what a band that's having fun on stage looked like. So I figured if you can’t beat him, join him. I STILL think he’s a tad overrated at times even today, but over the years, I’ve embraced his overall body of work, and since I’d always heard what a crowd-pleaser Bruce Springsteen was, I decided it was finally time to get out and see The Boss in concert. I deeply regret waiting too long and missing out on seeing the "Big Man" Clarence Clemons, but apparently the rumors were true—Boss Man puts on one helluva show.

The show began about 40 minutes late and there was no opening act. As I scanned the stage with my binoculars before things got underway, I noted an array of musical instruments scattered about—there were enough violins, guitars, percussion instruments, horns (even a tuba!) and keyboards to open up a music store. Turns out the E Street Band has expanded a bit to 17 members, including a five-piece horn section, three back-up singers and an extra percussionist in addition to Bruce and the usual suspects. This dynamic kinda reminded me of The Who’s 1989 reunion tour ("The Who on ice" as Pete Townshend later deemed it), but instead of being an exercise in overkill as with The Who, the additional deck hands blended right in to the presentation and weren’t a distraction. The sound mix was a bit iffy at first, and it sounded like Bruce was singing into a CB radio early on, but things improved as the night progressed. The name of the venue, Sprint Center, was a misnomer on this night because this was no sprint—this was a marathon!

Bruce kicked things off with an extended rendition of "Kansas City" (a morphing of both the Wilbert Harrison and Little Richard versions) that I might’ve saved for the encore, but hey, he’s The Boss, so what do I know? "Prove It All Night" was next and after that, the E Street band lived up to that title. Over the next three-plus hours, we were treated to 28 songs (29 if you count Buddy Holly’s "Not Fade Away", which Bruce sang the first verse from leading into "She’s The One") and a very energetic performance from a man in his early ‘60s. Apart from the receding hairline, Springsteen looked and acted like he was still 30-something. I was most impressed with the entire band’s stamina, especially that of drummer Max Weinberg, who never wavered once in playing for over three hours straight with no intermission and very short breaks between songs. Their next tour stop after us was Denver—good luck in that altitude! It was fun to watch the interplay between Bruce and the band, and it was obvious they were having fun up there and were feeding off the energy of the crowd as well. Speaking of the crowd, Brucie spent a fair amount of time in it, as he meandered through the audience several times to a platform at mid-floor, and even body-surfed back to the main stage during "Hungry Heart". The man is a trusting soul—I thought for sure they were going to drop him on his head...

I also liked how Springsteen doesn’t mind sharing the spotlight with his bandmates throughout the show. He knows it doesn’t always have to be about him, and it’s cool that he throws a bone to the other E Streeters and allows them do their thing for a bit. This was the first time I got to really watch Mr. Weinberg operate, and the "Mighty Max" was rock-solid with plenty of thump throughout on his Charlie Watts-esque drum kit. I also learned a new respect for long-time guitarist "Miami" Steve Van Zandt on this night. "Little Steven" always appeared to me to be a drunken idiot in the old videos (maybe he was), stumbling around and making faces, but in this show, he remained upright throughout and actually looked like a Rock star, and played well too. "Professor" Roy Bittan sounded phenomenal on the piano, but I really couldn’t hear much from his counterpart, ex-Pat Benatar keyboardist Charlie Giordano on stage right, who replaced the late "Phantom Dan" Federici. You also can never replace the late Clarence Clemons with just one person, so now Bruce employs a phalanx of horn players, led by the "Big Man"’s nephew Jake (Little Big Man?), who acquitted himself quite well on sax. 

The show did seem to drag in places, but that had more to do with me, because I wasn’t totally familiar with some of the songs they played. Some tunes got stretched out a bit too, which I tended to lose patience with, but the crowd didn’t seem to mind, and at least Bruce didn’t pull a Led Zeppelin and take 25 minutes to play just one song. As I expected, Bruce played several songs from his latest CD, Wrecking Ball, and they were all quite good, especially "We Take Care Of Our Own", the title track, "Death To My Hometown" and "Land Of Hopes And Dreams". "Shackled And Drawn" was also from the new one, but it got stretched out into this pseudo church revival bit that I personally could’ve done without, but I was pleased that Bruce, to his credit, didn’t go off on any political tangents during the show—that’s not what I attend Rock concerts for. From what I understand, the Neolithic dipshit Phelpsians from Topeka were outside picketing the show, but they must have been on the main entrance side on Grand Blvd., because we entered from the east side and never saw them. Too bad—I’ve always wanted to flip these turds the bird in person. Come to think of it, "Shackled And Drawn" is a damn good idea for these losers, but I digress…

Springsteen’s core audience almost reminds me of Trekkies because of their fanaticism and utter devotion to The Boss, and many folks were jumping up and down and dancing like it was a Saturday night barn dance and hootenanny. I was also unaware of the Springsteenian custom of fans bringing placards and signs for to place song requests for the set list. This led to the obscure "Incident On 57th Street" getting a spin, as did "Fire" (the big 1979 Pointer Sisters hit), and I longed to hear Elmer Fudd singing it, but no such luck. Oddly enough, in addition to "Fire", Bruce’s songs that other people had big hits with were highlights of the show, namely "Because The Night" (Patti Smith Group) and especially "Light Of Day" (Joan Jett), which rocked the house to end the set. They did omit some of his biggies like "Glory Days", "Rosalita", "My Hometown", "Pink Cadillac" and "Born In The USA", as well as my personal Springsteen faves "Cadillac Ranch", "Human Touch", "Tunnel Of Love" and "Working On The Highway", but then again, Bruce could’ve played another full-length concert the next night and not repeat a single song from this show (apart from the obligatory "Born To Run") and it would’ve been just as well-received—that’s how deep this guy’s catalog goes.

During the lengthy encore, when the band kicked in to "Born To Run", the house lights came up and remained on the rest of the way, which looked kinda weird. I generally don’t approve of Yuletide songs before Thanksgiving, but I’ll make an exception this time for Bruce and Co. doing "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town", which the crowd just ate up. "Dancing In The Dark", which preceded it, sounded way better live than it does on record—punchier and grittier—and not only did Bruce re-create the video bit of pulling a dance partner out of the crowd, he rounded up one for young master Clemons and another for guitarist Nils Lofgren and a mother-daughter combo for himself. I also noticed a woman on the video screen in the front row who made herself up to look like Courteney Cox in that video—right down to the short brown haircut and same t-shirt. "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" closed out the proceedings and Bruce made one last trek through the crowd and proclaimed, "Now this is the important part…" when he got to the line "When the change was made uptown and the Big Man joined the band" and the music stopped for a video salute to the dearly-departed Mr. Clemons and Mr. Federici and the crowd reacted appropriately.

I wisely chose not to imbibe during this concert. I knew it was going to be a long night and I didn’t want to peak too soon, nor did I want to be running to the can every 20 minutes. However, I did invent the Bruce Springsteen Drinking Game during the show. It’s pretty simple, really: Before or during any song, every time The Boss does a "1-2-3..." count-in, take one drink. If he does "1-2-3-4...", take two drinks. You’ll be fucked-up in no time flat!  Seriously, this was a most impressive concert. I’ve never seen a guy work so hard to please a crowd like Springsteen does, even though he really doesn’t need to anymore. Several times I kept thinking he and the band was on its last song of the night, and they’d still come back for another. If I were in a hurry to leave, I would’ve been as bewildered as Apollo Creed was in Round 15 against Rocky Balboa, but the longer the show went on the more I was astonished at the E Street Band’s staying power. Bruce left it all on the stage and won me over for good. Not too shabby for a guy from Jersey whose initials are B.S….

SET LIST: Kansas City; Prove It All Night; Candy’s Room; She’s The One; Hungry Heart; We Take Care Of Our Own; Wrecking Ball; Death To My Hometown; My City Of Ruins; The E Street Shuffle; Fire; Incident On 57th Street; Because The Night; Cover Me; Downbound Train; I’m On Fire; Shackled And Drawn; Waitin’ On A Sunny Day; Raise Your Hand; The Rising; Badlands; Land Of Hopes and Dreams; Light of Day. ENCORE: My Beautiful Reward; Born To Run; Dancing In the Dark; Santa Claus Is Coming To Town; Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out.