Author Archives: destroyerofharmony

A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Music, My Stories

NFT’s

I read that Kings Of Leon are making history to be the first band to release their album as an NFT.

Apart from getting the album, there are six “golden tickets” on auction, which will give the fans who get these tickets, front row tickets to a Kings Of Leon show for life. In addition, there is another package that includes art from the album and Kings Of Leon past. The band is hoping that these rare and scarce items will go for a large price at auction.

And I was curious as to what an NFT is. Here is a great article over at The Conversation which explains the concept of NFT’s.

NFT’s are Non Fungible Tokens, a digital certificate like those authenticity certificates that collectors require for items they buy. This certificate gives the holder a claim of ownership to the asset and it can be transferred or sold onto others. It’s all underpinned by the blockchain technology.

But things are not what they seem. The person who has paid for an NFT, believes they have “ownership” of a digital asset. But this asset can be copied, pasted and shared, such as a movie or JPEG file or any other file. So in relation to the artwork, the Kings Of Leon fans are bidding for, they will only be owning the digital copy of it.

With any new tech, the carbon footprint is also analysed and NFTs are massive energy consumers, as they depend on a lot of computer power to encrypt the tokens.

Marketing Guru, Seth Godin believes NFT’s are a dangerous trap for people.

His blog post starts with the most ominous of warnings, “Like most traps, they’re mysterious and then appealing and then it’s too late.”

Because if you owned a rare baseball card, you had it in your possession and no one else did. And that is the principle that NFT’s are trying to replicate. The person will own a digital token. And the trap for creators is that most of them would fall into the hustle making their fans believe the art they creat is scarce.

As Godin puts it, “that’s the only reason that someone is likely to buy one–like a stock, they hope it will go up in value”.

But a lot of stocks pay dividends and they come with other benefits and rights, however NFT’s don’t. And people who buy NFT’s may not realise that there’s no limit to the supply. Those lifetime “front row” ticket auctions can be replicated over and over and over again. Godin believes the NFT industry has “bubble” written all over it.

And here is a post over at Vice, talking about the NFT art boom.

While artists deserve the right to make money and monetize their fans, let’s hope that the value the fans believe they are buying remains valuable and it doesn’t get exploited by greed.

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Music, My Stories

The Week In Destroyer Of Harmony History – March 1 to March 7

4 Years Ago (2017)

This period is always busy for me, with getting the football season up and running in Australia, so as a volunteer to my local club, there’s no time for blogging.

“All The Right Reasons” from Nickelback is certified Diamond for sales of over 10 million copies in the United States. Not bad for a Canadian band who started out as a Metallica copy cat in the garage.

8 Years Ago (2013)

Like 2017, this period is always busy for me, with getting the football season up and running in Australia, so as a volunteer to my local club, there’s no time for blogging.

Also in 2013 an important case happened in a Czech court.

Lamb Of God singer Randy Blythe was charged with manslaughter, stemming from a 2010 gig in Prague in which a fan went onto his stage to stage dive and Blythe pushed him off, which is the norm at these kind of concerts.

In this instance, the fan sustained head injuries during the fall, however he still finished watching the concert, but after the concert he didn’t feel well, fell into a coma and died. When LoG toured Prague again, Blythe was arrested and held in jail.

This happened in June 2012.

After spending more than 8 months in jail Blythe was acquitted of manslaughter and returned home to the U.S.

And here is some other music history.

2003 (18 Years Ago)

Who didn’t hear the “Fallen” album from Evanescence (which came out during this period)?

2002 (19 Years Ago)

“The Osbournes” premiered on MTV which showcased a very high or intoxicated Ozzy trying to work out how to use a remote control and his family at home. In the process it became the most-viewed series on MTV.

1999 (22 Years Ago)

It pisses me off when labels do this to artists, because without the artists the labels would have nothing. In this instance, (and according to Wikipedia) Trauma Entertainment filed a $40 million breach-of-contract lawsuit against the band Bush for their failure to deliver a new album.

1994 (27 Years Ago)

Lemmy wrote some of his best lyrics on “I Don’t Want to Change the World” which appeared on “No More Tears”. And it got Ozzy Osbourne a Best Metal Performance with Vocal.

1991 (30 Years Ago)

“The Doors” biopic from Oliver Stone is released, with Val Kilmer playing the role of Jim Morrison. I watched the movie and I felt like it was the real people, compiled of intimate footage found.

I need to rewatch it and see if it’s stood the test of time.

1986 (35 Years Ago)

Some people call it their greatest album. For me, it’s always “Ride The Lightning”. But during this period, “Master Of Puppets” from Metallica was released.

1984 (37 Years Ago)

“This Is Spinal Tap” is released, one of the best movies I have seen. Well at the time, I thought it was a movie, I must have missed the part at the end that said it was fictional and all that.

1974 (47 Years Ago)

Rush (with no Neil Peart) release their debut album, a blues rock influenced album with some progressive overtones. “Working Man” become the anthem.

1973 (48 Years Ago)

“Dark Side Of The Moon” from Pink Floyd is released. It didn’t set the world on fire initially, but word of mouth kept promoting it and its biggest sales happened between 1977 and 1988.

And that’s it for this week.

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

Australian Method Series – Baby Animals

Well, the Australian Summer is over as we move into Autumn. The first day of Autumn was a 33 degree Celsius scorcher and the good folk that is Thunder Bay decided to pack up and leave our shores, taking with em the Australia variant. But the series focusing on Australian artists will not stop. It will continue each week as the Australian Method Series.

The debut Baby Animals album was everywhere in Australia.

Being added to The Angels live show in 1990, when The Angels were the hottest band in Australia, helped build the momentum needed for when the album dropped.

Released in September 1991, the album debuted at number six on the ARIA Album Charts and spent six weeks at number one, eventually going eight times platinum and becoming the highest-selling debut Australian rock album of all time (until the release of Jet’s album, “Get Born” 12 years later).

I saw em live at the Revesby Workers Club on the tour. An up and coming band called Judge Mercy was opening for them, who unfortunately disappeared when the labels started dropping metal and rock acts in a years’ time.

In relation to the live show, the Baby Animals rocked. Drummer Frank Celenza was huge and along with bassist Eddie Parise, they laid a solid foundation for Dave Leslie on guitar and Suze DeMarchi on guitar to shine. Then you had a the bluesy, soulful tones of DeMarchi on vocals.

The album was produced by task master Mike Chapman and engineered by Kevin Shirley, so you know its gonna sound massive.

And my favourite track is “Working For The Enemy”, that whole break down section, lead break and build up is excellent. My second favourite is the metal like “Waste Of Time” with its energetic double kick intro and heavy blues boogie rock riffs.

“One Too Many” is “Rock N Roll Noise Pollution” in spirit and influence, while “Aint Gonna Get” is AC/DC on steroids and highway speed tempos with a Chorus that reminds me of “I Love Rock And Roll”.

And I haven’t even gotten into the singles yet.

How good is the intro to “One Word”?

But DeMarchi didn’t like the song after it was finished and asked the label to keep it off the album. The song went through a transformation, from a country-ish rock feel in the demo (which can be heard on the 25th Anniversary Edition) to the melodic rock beast it became, as Chapman kept asking them to work on it.

Guitarist Dave Leslie is underrated, paying his dues in a Cold Chisel covers band called Swingshift, playing Australian pub rock classics on a nightly basis and he knew what worked with audiences. His chicken finger picked intro to “One Word” is guitar hero worthy.

“Rush You” is the opener as the power chord crashes down and the cymbals ring before it goes into a double time beat and some series riffage and how cool is that “Back in Black” walking chromatic riff just before the verse.

“Early Warning” begins with the drums while a slide guitar plays a rock riff and the music then stops while DeMarchi sings, “Too Young To Know and Too Old To Listen”.

The band kicks in again. Then the verses come and it’s like a Jimi Hendrix song, before it moves into the power of the Chorus.

“Painless” has this funk blues boogie which I like.

If you haven’t heard it, today is a great day for it.

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

2000 – The 13th Post

Here we are, the final 2000 post which brings to an end, the tandem 2000, 1985 and 1977 series before I move on to 2001, 1986 and 1976 series.

Motorhead – We Are Motorhead

Its fast and fast and fast. A perfect statement of intent for the 2000’s.

Certain songs had different producers like Bob Kulick, Bruce Bouillet and Duane Baron.

Phil Campbell on the guitar is phenomenal. Very underrated. And of course, Mikkey Dee on the drums is a metronomic machine when he needs to be and sleazy swingy when he needs to be.

Then you have Lemmy.

Heavy as lead, all fuzzed out with his bass lines and throwing his voice into the concrete and still sounding good.

“See Me Burning” clocks in at 3 minutes as the double kick pattern is relentless from the start to the end. “Wake The Dead” has another fast double kick pattern from Dee. “We Are Motorhead” sounds like it came from the “Ace Of Spades” album. “Stagefreight” and “Heart On Your Sleeve” continue the speed.

“Slow Dance” is the mid-tempo hard rock track and my favourite. The riff is sinister like and I like it. Especially that harmony lead before the lead break.

And my other favourite, is “One More Fucking Time”. At 6 plus minutes it’s the longest song on the album.

Fozzy

I like the idea behind the first Fozzy album and the funny backstory they put into the promo.

They had signed with a record company and moved to Japan to be huge rock stars, but the company went out of business, leaving them stranded in Japan for 20 years, while all their demos were snatched and recorded by other bands. Once they returned to America, they realized that many famous artists had ripped off their songs.

So this album is mostly cover songs (which are like the Fozzy songs that other artists took) however, the album does have two new original songs, so that these thieving bands don’t have enough time or a chance to “rip” off these new songs.

So who is Fozzy.

Well wrestler Chris Jericho (credited as Moongoose McQueen) is on vocals, Rich Ward (credited as Duke LaRüe) on guitars, Dan Dryden (credited as Shawn “Sports” Pop) on bass, Frank Fontsere (credited as KK LaFlame) on drums and Ryan Mallam (credited as The Kidd) on guitar.

Megaforce Records had high commercial hopes for this album, but it disappointed the label heads and they more or less cancelled their support of the album and the band.

One more album would come two years later called “Happenstance” and when it did even less business than the debut, Megaforce ran to the hills.

“Stand Up and Shout” written by Ronnie James Dio and Jimmy Bain and performed by Dio kicks off the album.

“Eat the Rich” is a Krokus cover, written by Butch Stone, Marc Storace, Fernando von Arb and Chris von Rohr.

“Stay Hungry” is a Twisted Sister cover and written by Dee Snider. Less than 3 minutes long, it’s a speed metal cut.

“The Prisoner” is an Iron Maiden, written by Adrian Smith and Steve Harris.

“Live Wire” is a Mötley Crüe cover, written by Nikki Sixx.

“End of Days” is written by Rich Ward and Chris Jericho. It got some fast palm muted picking but it doesn’t have that classic riff like the songs above, but it does have a wicked pre-chorus vocal melody, when Jericho/Moongoose sings “Can you believe in love?”

“Over the Mountain” is an Ozzy Osbourne cover, written by Ozzy Osbourne, Randy Rhoads, Bob Daisley and Lee Kerslake.

“Blackout” is a Scorpions cover, written by Sonja Kittelsen, Klaus Meine, Herman Rarebell and Rudolf Schenker

“Feel the Burn” is another cut written by Rich Ward and Chris Jericho but its forgettable.

“Riding on the Wind” is a Judas Priest cover, written by Glenn Tipton, Rob Halford and K. K. Downing. Like all of the other tracks on the album, they are played with a bit of a pedal to the floor attitude.

The album is basically an 80’s Heavy Metal jukebox under 40 minutes.

Symphony X – V The New Mythology Suite

I read some stuff about this band and how good Michael Romeo is on guitars. But to me, it was Russell Allen on vocals that got me interested, because Romeo was too much like Malmsteen on a lot of the stuff, or maybe he wasn’t like Malmsteen, instead it was the keyboard lines of Michael Pinnella that made it sound like Malmsteen.

Wikipedia tells me it is a concept album dealing with the story of Atlantis, ancient Egyptian mythology, and astrology.

There is a lot of same same here, but “Communion And The Oracle” is a bit different, with its soundtrack like feel and very Kansas feel in certain sections. Its progressive the way I like progressive to be.

Nightwish – Wishmaster

I’m a fan of the riffs. The operatic vocals are hit and miss for me on this album, but they do get better with subsequent releases.

“She Is My Sin” has a kicking intro riff.

“The Kinslayer” has another great riff, but on this one, the vocal line is like that “O Fortuna” vocal line. Brilliant.

If the intro to “Come Cover Me” doesn’t get you playing air guitar then you have no heartbeat.

“Wishmaster” continues that symphonic “O Fortuna” element in the Chorus, when they sing “Mas-ter”, “A-pprent-ice” in that style. Check out the harmony leads as well.

In Flames – Clayman

This is the album that put them on the map for me. Thirteen songs at 50 minutes. No fat whatsoever in the songs.

I really like the melody and aggression in the riffs and those European Minor key harmonies and leads.

Case in point, check out the riffs and leads in “Bullet Ride”. Vocally, its more in the vein of acts like “At The Gates” so if you want to hear a more commercial sounding In Flames, then Ghost AD does a pretty good job as the riffs they use are very similar.

Then you get the fast speed metal of “Pinball Map”. But hang around until the 2.20 minute mark, when it breaksdown into a head banging groove. Then the lead break starts, which copies the Chorus vocal melody before it picks up the speed metal.

How good is the intro melodic lead and that chugging staccato riff for the verses in “Only For The Weak”?

Listen to the lead break in the Chorus for “Square Nothing”.

I wanted Metallica to write a song like “Clayman” around this time. But who knew the dramas that Hetfield was going through during this period.

The clean tone arpeggios and harmony lead to kick off “Satellites and Astronauts” always gets me to pick up the guitar and then the madness starts before it goes back to those clean tone arpeggios for the verses.

The riff at 1.30 in “Brush The Dust Away” reminds me of Lynch/Dokken era. And the lead break starts off with some fast legato lines, some melody, then sweeps and harmonies.

“Swim” sounds like a Europe song from the first two albums, but then it moves into a Dream Theater/Petrucci like riff before the Euro melodic riffs kick in.

Finally “Another Day In Quicksand” feels like it’s the younger brother of “The Fire Still Burns” from Twisted Sister.

Children of Bodom – Follow The Reaper

RIP Alexi Laiho.

A Children Of Bodom album has riffs. A lot of fast riffs and a lot of groove rock riffs and a lot of progressive riffs.

And it has leads plus harmony leads with guitars and keyboards and breakdown grooves.

Check out the intro riff to “Follow The Reaper” and those lead breaks in between.

The verse riff in “Bodom After Midnight” is the best Malmsteen riff that he didn’t write.

How good is the intro to “Children of Decadence” and the 80’s melodic pop grooves for the intro to “Mask Of Sanity”?

Killswitch Engage – Killswitch Engage

For the debut album, Adam Dutkiewicz played drums and he moved to guitars on the albums after. Jesse Leach is on vocals, Joel Stroetzel is solely on guitar and Mike D’Antonio is on bass guitar.

The debut album is way too extreme for me, vocally, with every song in that screaming range. But musically, there are a lot of good riffs in this.

“Temple From The Within” opens the album and listen to that riff at the 1.10 minute mark to 1.33 mark. Then the bass kicks in and its heavy when the guitar kicks in. This track was re-released on the follow up album “Alive And Breathing” in 2002.

Check out the acoustic flamenco section from the 3 minute mark in “Irresversal”, an oasis of melody in the chaos of heaviness and aggression. This track was also re-recorded for “The End Of Heartache” album in 2004.

“Prelude” is only 2 minutes, but that’s enough for an instrumental, with head banging riffs and a sing-a-long lead break. “One Last Sunset” is another instrumental, sad and melancholic.

Nonpoint – Statement

The debut album reminds me of “Sevendust” and “Mudvayne” with a bit of “Tool” on this album. I think it’s a big reason why I gravitated to them.

“Mindtrip” has the vocals kick in start right away and that vocal line “trip inside your mind” reminds me of Tool.

“Endure” is the superior track here, combining melody, aggression and powerful riffs into a cohesive 3 minute track.

“Years” is a cross between clean tone arpeggios, busy drumming and aggressive down picking with a melodic Chorus, very Tool like.

Taproot – Gift

Bands classed as Nu-Metal had a lot of promo in Australia.

But Taproot, while classed in that style had a bit of progressive in them, clean tone vocals, hard core vocals with metal and rock overtones.

“Again And Again” has this groove, which people might say is more Disturbed than anything else, but both bands came out the same time, so let’s just say it’s a 2000 groove. Reminds me of Staind.

“I” is a favourite.

And thats it folks, the year that was 2000 comes to an end.

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Music, My Stories

June 1991, Guitar World – 25 Greatest Rock Guitar Recordings

In this issue they had a list of 25 Greatest Rock Guitar Recordings.

The editors of the magazine worked out a criteria and tried to find albums that met the criteria.

  1. The players technical brilliance
  2. The originality of the performance
  3. The magnitude of the works influence on subsequent artists

So here is there list. I will list the first 10 with my summary of what they wrote.

  1. Jimi Hendrix Experience – Are You Interested (1967)

Everything that Rock and Metal would become is here on this album. And it’s all influenced by Jimi Hendrix’s deep knowledge of Blues and R&B, acquired during his years on the club circuit.

  1. Van Halen – Van Halen (1978)

Another game changer album for originality in sound and experimentation with equipment plus pushing forward the techniques of guitarists in lead playing and riff structures.

  1. Derek And The Dominos – Layla (1970)

This is the outcome of when Eric Clapton and Duane Allman got together. Get into a studio, play live and get the tape rolling. You get a lot of blues rock and some celestial slide playing.

  1. Chuck Berry – The Cheese Box (1989)

When you get a blues player, rocking out with string skipping, chicken picking and a primitive two hand tap approach, then this album is seen as the next progression from the blues music that came before.

This box set released in the late 80s is from previously released recordings made between 1955 and 1973.

  1. Led Zeppelin – IV (1971)

This is Jimmy Page pushing his abilities as a composer, orchestrator and studio wizard. It’s got all the styles in here that would be known as hard rock, heavy metal, acoustic folk rock and blues rock.

  1. Jimi Hendrix – Band Of Gypsies (1970)

This album showcased the two different sides of Hendrix. For all of his pursuits of relentless perfection in the studio, Hendrix liked to jam when it came to playing live and throw caution to the wind. This album captures that live spirit.

  1. The Allman Brothers – Live At The Filmore (1971)

Duane Allman reinvented electric slide guitar. Dicky Betts introduced melodic Western swing and country-tinged lines. Together they gave The Allman Brothers a twin firepower not seen in other bands at this point in time.

  1. Elvis Presley – The Sun Sessions (1976)

Scotty Moore contributed greatly to improving Rock and Roll playing by combining jazz and blues and playing the songs with a pick or his fingers or moving in between both during a song.

  1. Jeff Beck – Blow By Blow (1975)

Pushed the boundaries of what instrumental guitar albums should sound like.

  1. Steve Vai – Passion And Warfare (1990)

A fusion of styles and techniques into a psychedelic hard rock instrumental album.

The rest of the list is made up of the following albums;

  1. The Beatles – Meet The Beatles (1964)
  2. Ozzy Osbourne – Blizzard Of Ozz (1981)
  3. Bo Diddley – The Bo Diddley Box (1990)
  4. Metallica – Ride The Lightning (1984)
  5. Stevie Ray Vaughan and Double Trouble – In Step (1989)
  6. Black Sabbath – Paranoid (1970)
  7. Yngwie Malmsteen – Rising Force (1985)
  8. The Velvet Underground And Nico (1967)
  9. Joe Satriani – Surfing With The Alien (1987)
  10. The Rolling Stones – Exile On Main Street (1972)
  11. The Mahavishnu Orchestra – Birds Of Prey (1973)
  12. Creedence Clearwater Revival – Chronicle (1976)
  13. Yes – Fragile (1971)
  14. AC/DC – Back In Black (1980)
  15. Pink Floyd – Dark Side Of The Moon (1973)

I didn’t see the point in having two Jimi Hendrix albums in the Top 10.

And I was confused to see Steve Vai in the list as I don’t think his “Passion And Warfare” album met the third criteria within 2 years.

And being a rock and Metal fan, I would definitely have AC/DC, Blizzard Of Ozz and Malmsteen further up the list.

So what’s your view?

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

Heartbreak Station

I’ve written about this album many times.

As a Record Vault post.

At 30 Years Old.

The More Things Change

Well, as I normally do I was going through some old magazines and in this case, it was a May 1991 issue of “Guitar For The Practicing Musician”.

Inside the magazine I came across a review by Buzz Morrison of “Heartbreak Station”.

Here it is in italics.

PERFORMANCE: Raw, raspy, rootsy
HOT SPOTS: “Love’s Got Me Doin’ Time”, “Shelter Me”, “Dead Mans Road”
BOTTOM LINE: Knee deep in country-blues loudness

Cinderella is nothing if not daring.

On “Long Cold Winter” they spit in the face of pop metal success with a blast of kickin’ blues rock and still went double platinum.

On “Heartbreak Station”, Cinderella tries even more gender bending, roaming from hard funk to country rock on a visceral, raw record that pays homageto the band’s 60;s and 70’s influences.

Did Buzz mean genre bending?

Not sure, but he definitely had gender bending there.

In severeal places, its more rip-off than tribute, especially “Sick For The Cure” and its “Honky Tonk Woman” aural zerox.

What the fuck is an aural xerox?

Aural means relating to the ear or the sense of hearing.

Xerox is a copy of something written or printed on a piece of paper.

Is that another way to say influences or inspiration.

But the band’s ballsy rocking and bundle of dirty guitar work from Tom Keifer and Jeff LeBar mostly overpower lame songwriting and the big family sound of “Shelter Me” recalls the best of bands like Delaney and Bonnie and Let It Bleed-era Stones.

I had no idea what he meant by Delaney and Bonnie. Thanks to Google, I can tell ya that Delaney & Bonnie were an American duo of singer-songwriters Delaney Bramlett and Bonnie Bramlett.

In 1969 and 1970, they fronted a rock/soul ensemble called Delaney & Bonnie and Friends, whose members at different times included Duane Allman, Gregg Allman, Eric Clapton, George Harrison, Leon Russell, Bobby Whitlock, Dave Mason, Rita Coolidge, and King Curtis.

So I’m calling em up right now on Spotify to hear what they are like.

While this Philadelphia band cops an Aerosmth like attitude, the Memphis funk of “Love’s Got Me Doin’ Time” and the misty mountain blues of “Dead Man’s Road”, along with the addtion of rolling organ and barking horns on many cuts, show they musical influences largely lie south of the Mason-Dixon line.

Led by Keifer’s straight edge vocals, Cinderella makes “Heartbreak Station” another memorable stop on its rootsy soul train.

I like that “rootsy soul train” comment. So if you haven’t heard “Heartbreak Station” yet, there’s no better time than now.

Get yer fix of gender bending rootsy soul train.

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3

It all started in 2007 and a Guitar World interview with Claude Sanchez and Travis Stever. They just dropped the “No World For Tomorrow” album. The interview mentioned hard rock, progressive song structures, concept album, massive sci-fi story and vocals that on occasions sound like they came from Geddy Lee.

But I still didn’t commit.

Then a few months later I was given a burnt copy of “In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3” by an old band member. I was at work and placed the disc into the CD tray of the PC, grabbed the shitty e-training headphones at work and pressed play. I became a fan for life.

Within the space of a few months, I had downloaded their whole catalogue (which at this time was up to 2007) via The Pirate Bay and then started to purchase those releases and I became a day one buyer for all the albums that came after, like “Year Of The Black Rainbow”, “The Afterman”, “The Color Before The Sun” and “Vaxis – Act I: The Unheavenly Creatures”. I went to watch them live and even today, I would drop a couple hundred to get their super deluxe premium releases for each new album.

But it all started with “In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3” released in 2003 and certified Gold by the RIAA for U.S sales.  

It’s their second album about the ongoing saga of the “Keywork” in “The Amory Wars”. It also came with a comic book series and novel. This is how the plot was described in the comic book.

“Ten years after “Second Stage Turbine Blade”, Claudio – the son of Coheed and Cambria, emerges from the depths of Shylos Ten (a barren world located on the edge of the Fence), where the Red Army performs its brutal interrogations and imprisonments.

The Red Army are Wilhelm Ryan’s enforcers, a large force of soldiers and ships he has amassed since the Mage Wars. Claudio finds out that his entire family has been murdered and begins his quest for vendetta. His foes, Supreme Tri Mage Wilhelm Ryan and General Mayo Deftinwolf sense that he is still alive and that he holds special powers.

Meanwhile, Inferno (Jesse Kilgannon) takes up arms against the Red Army in an effort to seek the same kind of vengeance on them. In Claudio’s re-emergence he teams up with Ambellina. The pair along with Sizer, a disassembled IRO-bot, seek out Inferno to find answers as to why his family were killed, but their plans take an unexpected turn in a ship called the Camper Velourium, and a freighter pilot named Al the Killer.”

But you don’t need to be involved in the story to appreciate the album, the music and the melodies as each song stands on its own.

The Ring In Return

A phone rings and a person walks to it. I’m waiting for someone to pick it up and to hear “Mindcrime” on the other line. Fans of Queensryche will know what I’m on about. But the phone keeps ringing, until you hear footsteps walk towards it and eventually the phone is picked up and a woman’s voice says “Hello”. Then some symphony music comes in, sounding hopeful and familiar but it gets dark towards the end, ominous, a forewarning with the words of “Hello Apollo, where should I begin” spoken right at the end. 

In Keeping Secrets Of Silent Earth: 3

How good is that clean guitar intro and the fuzzed lead? 

When I watched the band live in Sydney, the clean tone guitar intro was a sing-a-long moment as we hummed and yelled the intro notes.

Then at the 40 second mark, the whole band kicks in and its head banging time.

At 6 minute and 30 second mark, the intro comes back and the songs builds into a massive wo-oh-oh chant, sort of like the chant in “Heaven Can Wait” from Iron Maiden. In the live arena, this was another sing-a-long moment.

Cuts Marked In The March Of Men

I like the staccato like groove to kick off the song.

Three Evils (Embodied In Love And Shadow)

That section from the 3.20 minute mark. Listen to the music and the vocal melody especially when the lyric goes “Pull the trigger and the nightmare stops”.

The Crowing

There is the middle section which is progressive with metal influences.

Blood Red Summer

This is their pop punk song. The best part is the “what did I do to deserve” section. Listen to the riff, the pentatonic lead section

“The Velourium Camper” suite is divided into 3 sections of over 15 minutes of music.

The Velourium Camper I: Faint of Hearts

It starts off like a modern Kansas song. 

The Velourium Camper II: Backend of Forever

The intro is a favourite, those palm muted notes over a staccato like guitar riff.

The Velourium Camper III: Al the Killer

“Bye bye world, bye bye world/Die white girls, die white girls.” You get an idea what Al The Killer is all about.

A Favor House Atlantic

Another pop punk song like “Blood Red Summer”. 

The words you scribbled on the walls, the loss of friends, you didn’t have, I’ll call you when the time is right

When I look at the words in this verse, I think of this doco I watched on the Columbine School shootings and how the students were hiding out in a closet and waiting for someone to save them when the time was right.

The Light & the Glass

The acoustic arpeggios to start it off make it campfire heartland cut. And throughout its 9 minutes, it rocks and rolls and for the last two minutes, there is a guitar lead and a vocal line that keeps repeating; “Pray for us all”.

2113

It’s got nothing to do with “2112” from Rush even though countless posts would state otherwise. This song reprises two other tracks in “The Amory Wars”, namely “Time Consumer” and “IRO-bot”, both from the previous album “The Second Stage Turbine Blade”. And you need to listen to the section from about 5.15 minutes to about 5.50. I think it’s very Lifeson like.

And because I have some of the super editions from “The Afterman”, the record vault posts for Coheed and Cambria will be single posts for each album.

The standout songs here are the title track and “The Light And The Glass”.

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Copyright, Music, My Stories

And Copyright For All…

There is a great article over at the WSJ on all of these catalogue sales of copyright.

It’s asking the question as to how does the music industry decide who the writer of a song is?

This is more relevant now than ever before, especially since artists are selling percentage points in their catalogues to investment houses and publishing companies.

It’s a double edged sword.

While the artists and songwriters would like to get a lot more in streaming payments, it is because of streaming that their catalogues have become valuable. The Beach Boys even took it a step further by selling their masters and their actual brand.

For the fans its worthwhile knowing that what is on album liner notes could be misleading. “1984” from Van Halen had the original release crediting all songs to Edward Van Halen, Alex Van Halen, Michael Anthony, and David Lee Roth.

In the UK release, “Michael McDonald” was listed as a co-writer for “I’ll Wait” but not the original U.S release. Eventually by the start of the 2000’s, Van Halen re-negotiated the publishing deal for the “1984” album and Michael Anthony was removed from the credits.

Each album will have a band/production agreement in which the actual writers (which could be the artists or a songwriter or a producer) would give a percentage split of their copyrights to other people (like other songwriters, producers, other band members, lawyers or management) in exchange for more work later on.

Bob Rock has a percentage split on the Metallica “Black” album and I’m pretty sure he would have a similar split on the “Load” and “Reload” albums. But the difference is that he’s not listed as a writer of the tracks.

Not sure if anyone remembers Stock-Aitken-Waterman. They had a string of number 1 hits in the 80’s. Judas Priest even worked with them on a batch of songs, which Rob Halford hopes would get released one day.

Well, if you saw any of the writing credits, it was always listed as “Stock-Aitken-Waterman” as the writers. All three would get the equal split but Stock and Aitken did all the song writing and producing, while Waterman did not write music or lyrics instead he acted as a publicist instead.

And while these kind of writers will still get paid in some way (by selling a stake in their songs, royalties, etc.) what about the $435M in unmatched royalties sitting in the bank account of a new government granted organisation/monopoly called The Mechanical Licensing Collective (MLC).

And this new Collective will start the process of reviewing and analysing the data in order to find and pay the proper copyright owners. And once they do find the proper copyright owners (provided they are still alive, still not sure on what happens if they are deceased), there will be an administration fee to be paid and whatever is left gets paid.

There’s always someone getting paid who didn’t contribute anything to the creative process.

P.S. The title of this blog is based on the “And Justice For All” title from Metallica. Because everyone is taking a piece of copyright royalties and the last ones to be paid are the independent artists. All because the labels and the publishing companies didn’t really track or keep a database of who wrote what song.

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Music, My Stories

The Week In Destroyer Of Harmony History – February 20 to February 28

4 Years Ago (2017)

Another Score Card post were I rechecked in with some of the artists I wrote about a few years before, just to see what is happening. Because three years in the music business is a long time.

Bands like Mutiny Within, Evans Blue, Corroded, Another Lost Year, Hell Or Highwater, Heartist, I Am Giant and Fates Warning all got mentioned.

I wrote about dictatorship in bands. My general viewpoint is that each band needs someone to steer the ship otherwise it all goes to hell.

Hetfield and Ulrich steer Metallica. Harris and Maiden. Sixx and Motley. Portnoy and Petrucci with Dream Theater and after Portnoy left, Petrucci took the reins. The Young brothers on AC/DC. And if their wasn’t someone steering the ship, I used Dokken as an example.

I wrote a post, called “Streamline”. It was basically asking the question of “Where do artists want their fans to go?”

Give people too much choice and they don’t buy at all. It’s one of the reason’s why a lot of people are still sitting on the fence when it comes to streaming. They’re not sure if it’s going to stick.

My musical journey started with vinyl and cassettes, then I had to upgrade my vinyl/cassette collection to CD’s, then I ripped all of my CD’s into MP3’s and now I’m doing streaming. I’m just one music consumer from millions.

Look at the band releases these days and how many different offerings they have. A normal Metallica release will have the following packages;

  • CD – normal album
  • Vinyl – normal album
  • CD – Deluxe album
  • Vinyl – Deluxe album
  • iTunes – normal album
  • iTunes – Deluxe album
  • Streaming – normal album
  • Streaming – Deluxe album

Why is there a need to have a normal album release and a deluxe album release these days?

Why is there a need to have bonus tracks added to certain geographical locations only?

Why can’t the album just be the album?

If the band wants to put out three discs, let them put out three discs and call it THE ALBUM…

8 Years Ago (2013)

I wrote a review of a Bullet For My Valentine gig in Sydney and I mentioned that if any band member leaves I won’t be interested as the band is a sum of their parts.

Well since 2013, their bass player left a few years after and then their drummer was told to not return to live duties when he took time out to sort out his personal life and to deal with becoming a father.

And slowly, I started to lose interest.

This one hurt to write as I was a huge fan of the band. But when One Less Reason went the fan funded route, they really needed to deliver to their fans the physical product they paid for. But they didn’t do it in a timely manner.

They basically fucked up the release and sending out of CDs. Some fans waited over 12 months for their CD to arrive, resorting to piracy to hear the album they fan funded. Questions to the band didn’t get answered and no one knew what the fuck was happening.

The band is still around today, I still listen to em but I’m sort of on the outer.

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

Thunder Bay Down Under Summertime Spin Series – The Butterfly Effect

Here is the usual prologue.

My blogger pal Deke over at Thunder Bay had a cool Northern Hemisphere Summertime Series between July and August.

Each week, he wrote about albums he spun during the summer.

Well, the real Earth summer is between December, January and February in the Southern Hemisphere.

So the good act that Thunder Bay is, boarded a Qantas plane, landed in Sydney, survived 14 days quarantine in a Sydney hotel and is finally here to present the “Thunder Bay Down Under Summertime Series”.

“Final Conversation With Kings” is the third studio album by The Butterfly Effect.

On this album, the band moved into a more progressive style of writing, bringing in moods and different ways of organizing the songs structures. And the public liked it, as it went to number 3 on the Australian Charts.

But all was not well within the band.

The previous album “Imago” was completed with a lot of tension between the members.

On the “Imago” touring cycle, it got to the stage when Boge and band co-founder and guitarist Kurt Goedhart did not speak to one another for the entirety of their six-week American tour with Chevelle.

These tensions would resurface and affect the recording sessions for the “Final Conversation of Kings” album. Disagreements happened in relation to which songs to do, the limited budgeted time in the studio they had and the final song selection of the album.

The title is about conflict. The final conversation has happened and the Kings cannot resolve their issues, so the next step is war. The overall theme of the album is about conflict. The title is also a translation of a Latin phrase “Ultima Ratio Regum”.

The last minute of “Worlds On Fire” especially when vocalist Clint Boge starts singing, “I didn’t ask for this at all, when my back’s against the wall, and my face painted for war, I didn’t ask for this at all”.

It’s Brilliant.

And this song to be included as the opener caused tensions. Boge wanted it and the other members thought it was a closer.

“Final Conversation” is my favorite. It starts off slow and it just keeps building and when the section with the vocal line of “Just stay tonight and never leave, Cause in the morning we’re going home, Just stay here” is excellent.

“The Way” has a progressive feel to the song, there’s a sleazy sax on it and it feels like a crime noir soundtrack.

And those last two minutes.

You will notice a trend here, like a good novel that finishes each chapter in a cliffhanger making me want to explore further, TBE do the same with each song. They end em so powerful and so melodic, that I need to explore further.

In the “Window And The Watcher” that whole section from the minute thirty mark to the end.

Brilliant.

“…And The Promise Of The Truth” has this reggae rock feel in the verses with a memorable pre-Chorus and Chorus.

But the last 70 seconds of the song. Brilliant.

“In These Hands” kicks off with a pull off and hammer on lick before moving into a melodic lead which is like a riff.

The last 90 seconds.

Listen to it, from when it quietens down and rebuilds up.

The way “7 Days” starts off I was hooked straight away. That guitar riff, the volume swells and E-bow effects which also sounded reversed just add to the sadness the riff creates.

Like all the other songs, the last two minutes need to be heard. Boge on vocals uses his voice like an instrument, on some occasions it’s like a guitar lead.

“Rain” is more straight forward hard rock with a frantic drum groove.

And in the first chorus, Boge is more baritone in his delivery, hidden in the mix so when he sings “Let it rain down on me” when the chorus appears the second time, there’s impact.

There is this Muse and Tool like section as part of the interlude which gets the head banging.

Album closer, “Sum Of I” has a fast digital delay style riff. Vocally Boge is using his voice like an instrument, and when he starts to sing “how do we stop this again?”, well, it’s perfect.

Of course after this album touring cycle, the band broke up.

But they reconnected around 2017 and in 2018, they released their first new music in ten years, with the single “Broken”.

They went on tour around Australia and performed a run of sold-out shows. Their tunes and their style of music experienced a resurgence in Australia and The Butterfly Effect name was back in the spotlight.

And new music is on its way.

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