Dragon is a New Zealand rock band which was formed in January 1972 and relocated later to Sydney, in May 1975.
“Body and the Beat” is album number seven. The album was released in June 1984, peaking at number 5 on the Australian charts and gained a platinum certification.
But it’s their first album since 1979.
At the time, Dragon was on the verge of breaking through worldwide but vocalist Marc Hunter was out of control with his heroin addiction and on stage antics, offending everyone, including audiences, other acts and label heads.
They had a US tour opening up for Johnny Winter that went pear shaped when Hunter called Winter’s blues rock audience rednecks and faggots. Then again it was another stupid decision to place Dragon on this bill, it’s like Imagine Dragons opening up for Iron Maiden.
Actually when I watched Maiden on the “Somewhere Back In Time”, the opening act “Behind Crimson Eyes” was the support. Now they are an Australian metalcore band with screaming vocals and they got booed after each song, until they played a cover of “Ace Of Spades” and the crowd cheered. Again, another misplaced opening act.
Anyway, back to Dragon, the band which included his brother Todd, fired him. This brought to an end the first period of Dragon which also involved the heroin overdose of drummer Neil Storey in 1976.
Hunter went solo and had some success and then the band got together again.
“Rain” was the output in 1983. Written by Johanna Pigott, Marc Hunter and Todd Hunter, it’s 3 minutes and 40 seconds of hard rock glory. Make sure you stick around for the “if you go out in the rain” melody.
Due to its success, the band went into the studio to record an album worth of songs.
It’s worth noting that the songwriting team of Johanna Pigott and her partner, Todd Hunter (Dragon bass player) also wrote the smash hit title track “Age Of Reason” for John Farnham.
The album kicks off with “Rain”. “Promises” and “Wilderworld” are melodic rock songs perfect for a summers day.
If it wasn’t for “Rain”, then “Cry” would be a favorite.
“Body And The Beat” has a bass groove and a feel that bands like INXS were making popular.
“Magic” feels like a driving song, with the window down and the warm winds blowing through.
But.
Apart from “Rain”, this album is forgotten.
Everyone told the band the album would break the band overseas. But it didn’t. Within a year they were back in the studio recording another album..
A year after this album came out, keyboardist Paul Hewson and the writer of their classic songs “April Sun In Cuba” and “Are You Old Enough” was found dead in a friends car, hours after he told the band he wanted to leave.
Dragon continued and released the super successful (in the Australia market), “Dreams Of Ordinary Men” in 1986 and my favourite “Bondi Road” in 1989. A few greatest hits and acoustic re-recordings hit the shelves. And then tragedy struck again.
Marc Hunter was diagnosed with throat cancer in November 1997 and he died on 17 July 1998. Dragon have continued on with Todd Hunter still the driving force.
It’s the album that defined the Hetfield, Ulrich, Hammett and Burton line up. By 1986, they had been together for three years and the musical creativity between the guys was at an all-time high.
I can’t believe I haven’t posted any Metallica reviews at all. When I started this blog I tried to focus on artists who didn’t get a lot of love and stayed away from acts like Metallica because the internet is littered with stories and reviews. But each story and review is personal to the person who wrote it.
For me, Hetfield and his commitment to down picking and writing killer riffs is a huge influence when it comes to guitar playing. The lyrics he wrote, living in corporate Reagenomics showed a maturity far surpassed for his young years. There is and never was, no tease and please in his lyrical lines.
The cover foreshadows that other unseen masters control our lives from the cradle to the grave. Designed by Metallica and Peter Mensch and painted by Don Brautigam, it depicts a cemetery field of white crosses tethered to strings, manipulated by a pair of hands in a blood-red sky.
With “Master Of Puppets”, Metallica took the diverse musical elements of “Ride The Lightning” and raised the bar even higher. Live, they performed even faster and looked like your friend standing next to you watching the show, so far removed from the image put out by Ratt and Motley Crue, to name a few.
“Battery”
The ominous Ennio Morricone themed intro kicks off this monster track. It’s even classical sounding in nature as James Hetfield creates a melody that moves from F to E to D while the low notes move up chromatically from E to F to F# and to G. And while those chords ring out, a subtle harmony guitar outlines a different melodic idea.
Eventually, the power chords start crashing in and those subtle harmony guitar licks come to the fore.
Then all hell breaks loose at the 1.05 mark, when a chainsaw galloping riff smashes through the boundaries and James starts singing with his four day alcohol infested throat. The song isn’t pretty, but its message is about a light that burns within despite the violence and darkness around.
It could be seen as a bastard, a collision between punk and metal.
“Smashing through the boundaries / lunacy has found me / cannot stop the battery”
And a sea of bodies run, circle and smash each other into bits, creating scars to prove that the battery cannot be stopped.
How good is that hard rock like groove and lead from 2.58 to 3.18 before the breakneck solo section.
And make sure you bang your head on the military foot stomping chromatic riff from 3.49 to 4.00.
Which also closes the song. I guess battery is found in me.
“Master Of Puppets”
They wanted to write another “Creeping Death”.
Hetfield grew up in a Christian Science house. The person here is controlled by the religion first, then the family, the social circles of the family and the cultural values of the family and their circle of friends. Hetfield explored these themes of control and subjugation in “Dyers Eve” and “The Unforgiven”.
In its essence, it’s asking for sanity to prevail in a control-freak society/world. Then again, it could be seen as a band saying to their audience, “taste our music and you will see, more is all you need”, because once everyone got a taste of em, they more or less stayed hooked and agreed with Hetfield.
After a few descending and chromatic power chords, the intro riff kicks in at the 3 second mark. Hetfield’s combination of syncopated chromatic lines with a driving low E pedal at 220 beats per minute creates an urgent feeling.
The verse riff has so much power because of the vocal line. They complement each other.
The song could have ended at the 3.32 mark. A 3 minute thrash-a-thon. But this was Metallica, and suddenly we get a haunting Em arpeggio riff, with harmony guitars and James Hetfield breaking out into an individual solo before joining back up with the harmony lead.
Then the clean tone arpeggio riff is played menacingly with distortion while power chords crash down around your senses, while Lar’s just keeps building into the “master, master” chant section.
“The Thing That Should Not Be”
An ominous D to E clean tone chord rings out. On this they drop the E down to D and all the other strings remain the same. It was my first exposure to the DADGBE tuning.
Lyrically, I read a track by track analysis book from Mick Wall and Malcolm Dome, who said the song is about the madness that lives at the bottom of the well of all human souls. And it stuck with me, because even though it could be about the mythical creature Cthulhu, I always saw lyrics from a personal and social point of view.
“Welcome Home (Sanitarium)”
This song is the definition of taking the best things of what has come before and merging those things all together to come up with something unique, original and innovative.
INTRO (0.00 to 0.20) Back in 1971, Yes released “Roundabout”. The intro is more or less a droning note, with some harmonics and a hammer on/pull off lick on the E string.
Take something from the past and make it better.
INTRO 2 and VERSE (0.21 to 1.48) and (2.10 to 3.10) Anyone heard of a New Wave of British Heavy Metal (NWOBHM) band called Bleak House?
If the answer is NO, then you are in the majority. However, a certain person called Lars Ulrich has heard of this band. James Hetfield has even said in an interview that the band shall remain anonymous.
So Bleak House release a song called “Rainbow Warrior” as a seven-inch single in 1980 via Buzzard Records. By 1982, the band called it a day. The intro riff of “Rainbow Warrior” is catchy. It was so good that James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich are influenced by it. They start to jam on it and they start to tweak it into “Welcome Home (Sanitarium)”.
Hetfield and Ulrich made this riff the centrepiece, as Hetfield arpeggiates a serious of 5th power chords on the A and D strings, surrounding them with the Open G and E strings, which forms like a double pedal point. The lead break from Hammett is phrased perfectly.
Metaphorically, I saw the world as a lunatic asylum and you know how truth is meant to set you free, but in this song, truth actually imprisons you. In a cruel twist of fate, knowledge is maddening, instead of being powerful. I’ve definitely overanalyzed the lyrics, but god damn, what else was I meant to do during this time except listen to music, analyse the music, read the interviews in the mags I purchased and since I played an instrument, learn the music and write my own music.
In the “Guitar Legends” #108 issue, Hetfield said that the idea for the song came from the move “One Flew Over The Cuckoo’s Nest” and that “the riff was lifted from some other band, who shall remain anonymous.”
OUTRO (4.05 to 4.26) and (04.48 to end) Metallica have taken the intro from “Tom Sawyer” and used it as their outro. The feel and the phrasing of the two songs are almost identical.
Again, take what has come before and make something new.
“Disposable Heroes”
One of the most underrated cuts on the album. This song is a blast to play on guitar with so many different movements and bone crunching riffs, like the open string palm muted chugging riff after the power chords intro.
And that open string palm muted riff comes back in the verses.
At 8 plus minutes, it’s a tour de force, another metal classic, the way metal should sound.
“Back to the front / you will die / when I say / you must die” as even in war, the soldiers are controlled by masters. These kind of concepts Hetfield explores a little bit more in “One”.
Make sure you stick around for the various lead breaks between the 4.50 and 5.25 mark.
And the lyric, “I was born for dying” scared the hell out of me, because it’s true. Everything that is born will die eventually.
“Leper Messiah”
The song is written by James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich. The title comes from a David Bowie lyric in “Ziggy Stardust”.
It’s worth noting that Dave Mustaine claimed he wrote the song’s main riff and was not given credit by Metallica. Hammett denies this, saying that just before the guitar solo there is a less than 10 seconds of music that could be his and that it was actually Lars Ulrich that came up with the main motif.
For all of those haters that said Metallica had sold out with the “Black” album obviously didn’t know that Metallica had similar style songs on their earlier albums. “Leper Messiah” is one of those songs.
The best part comes in around the 30 second mark. Cliff’s trademark bass lines just rumble along while James lays down palm muted staccato power chords.
“Send me money, send me green / Heaven you will meet / Make a contribution / And you’ll get a better seat / Bow to leper messiah”
Turn on the TV and you see some evil right there. These TV evangelists made some serious bank, using heavy metal and hard rock music as topics of discussion, while spending a lot of their time in seedy motels doing drugs and hookers.
Make sure you check out the section between the 3.20 to 3.35 mark.
“Orion”
The drums are stock standard while the bass plays phased out chords, but when the distorted guitars kick in, that riff is head banging, back breaking and desk breaking worthy.
At the 4 minute mark, the song slows down into a Sabbath like blues rock riff courtesy of Burton and the guitars really shine here, with their harmonies. From the 5.13 mark, a lone lead starts but its quickly harmonised. This whole section was written by Burton.
At the 5.41 mark, there is another melodic lead which keeps on repeating and it builds into a single lead break. Then you get a bass solo. At the 7 minute mark its back to the thrashing mad lead sections, but here Hammett is all Michael Schenker like.
“Damage Inc.”
I will leave this review with the following lines from “Damage Inc.”;
“Following our instinct / not a trend / go against the grain / until the end”
I had no idea who Steve Vai was until I saw him in the “Yankee Rose” clip, making his guitar answer questions that Dave Lee Roth put forward. And if you think it was a fluke, make sure you check out the cat/kitten noises Vai did for the intro on “Kittens Got Claws” on the Whitesnake “Slip Of The Tongue” album a few years later. The way Vai could manipulate the guitar with the whammy bar, bends and slides and effects to create animal and human like voices is unique.
“Eat ‘Em and Smile” is the debut full-length solo album by original Van Halen vocalist David Lee Roth, released on July 7, 1986. The band on the album is Steve Vai on guitars, Billy Sheehan on bass and Gregg Bissonette on drums.
Produced by Ted Templeman, it’s got all the bells and whistles of a party about to go out of control.
“Yankee Rose”
Penned by David Lee Roth and Steve Vai. The intro is iconic with the walking bass line and of course the “talking guitar” which seems to have a conversation with David Lee Roth.
From a musical viewpoint, Vai is in cruise control here, making a very simple guitar riff sound interesting with his additions of arpeggios, legato lines, bends and whammy bar manipulations towards the end of the fourth bar of the riff.
The video clip was also designed with MTV in mind, with moves orchestrated to show the technical abilities of the individual band members.
“Shyboy”
The Talas track penned by Billy Sheehan got some added muscle on this album with Vai’s virtuosic playing complimenting Sheehan. And of course, Gregg Bissonette on drums is in his element here.
“I’m Easy”
From Aussie artist, Billy Field who he co-write the song with Tom Price. The whole big band sho-be-bop is not my thing however I don’t mind when rock artists take a song from that style and rock-ify it.
But this isn’t really rock-i-fied.
“Ladies’ Nite In Buffalo?”
Another Roth and Vai cut, this one sounds like it came from the fingertips of Joe Walsh.
The blues rock boogie from Sheehan and Bissonette is excellent and the funky guitar riff by Vai compliments it perfectly. It’s tracks like this that made Dave Lee Roth’s solo career interesting and exciting.
And that lead break from Vai is outta this world.
“Goin’ Crazy!”
It’s another Roth/Vai penned song.
Vai brings the goods with an iconic guitar riff to kick it off. If you think the riff sounds like something you’ve heard before, I always said that the riff in “Finish What Ya Started” which came a few years after, is very similar to this.
The synths compliment instead of detracting.
Check out Vai’s solo and then go to YouTube to watch the video clip put together from the movie that never came to see the light of day.
“Tobacco Road”
A cover song written by John D. Loudermilk, it’s got that big blues rock feel and the way the DLR and the guys in the band do it, is excellent.
“Elephant Gun”
Another track penned by Roth/Vai and this one is full of great Van Halen inspired riffs. Vocally, Roth sings in a deep baritone, something which Axl Rose would do a lot within the Guns catalogue.
The solo section starts off with an impressive bass solo, which keeps happening, when Vai starts shredding the guitar lead.
“Big Trouble”
The “Big Trouble In Little China” film always come to mind when I see this song title.
Does anyone remember the Kurt Russel and Kim Cattral film?
The song has nothing to do with the film except that it’s a sleazy little rumble, written by Roth/Vai with a rap like vocal melody in the verses and a progressive like Chorus.
Check out the blistering Vai solo full of his trademarks fast legato lines with finger taps.
“Bump And Grind”
Another Roth/Vai composition.
Great title with a riff which bumps and grinds its way through the song and Roth is being Roth, having fun and talking his way through the song.
“That’s Life”
A big band cover song written by Dean Kay and Kelly Gordon. What can I say, is Roth being Roth.
And this line up wouldn’t do another album again or perform together once the tour ended. However a reunion show was planned recently, and it was killed seconds before the band took the stage by a fire marshal who was worried at the size of the venue and the amount of people in the venue.
The free spirited nature of “Eat ’Em and Smile” is attractive and exciting as it feels like the whole album could just go off the rails and crash at any time.
At 31 minutes, man, its short for a release, which was strange for a highly anticipated and expected album. But the impact it left behind is huge, introducing Steve Vai and Billy Sheehan to large rock audiences, along with drummer Gregg Bissonette.
After this, Vai and Roth would do one more album in “Skyscraper” while Sheehan formed Mr Big with another ace guitarist in Paul Gilbert. Both acts had huge success with their releases.
Vai would finally release his second solo album “Passion and Warfare” and he also got a chance to decorate the songs that Adrian Vandenberg wrote for the “Slip Of The Tongue” album after a cool million dollar advance.
Meanwhile Roth hooked up with various guitarist to write the follow up, eventually settling on 19-year-old guitar virtuoso Jason Becker to replace Vai.
“A Little Ain’t Enough” was released in 1991, produced by Bob Rock. It did okay business in sales but before the tour started, Becker was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig’s disease, rendering him unable to perform onstage. Guitarist Joe Holmes stood in for Becker during the tour.
But the audience just wasn’t there for DLR to fill arenas in 1991, After 15 years in the spotlight, Roth’s brand of hard rock became unfashionable.
And the original era of Roth’s solo career fractured shortly after.
P.S. this is the second part of a post that was meant to be just one post. Here is the link to the Maiden post covering “Somewhere In Time”.
I was waiting for my CD to come in before I did this post.
The debut album was released in 2002, but the story goes back to 1995 when Claudio Sanchez and Travis Stever had a band called “Toxic Parents” which then became “Beautiful Loser”.
Three months later, Stever left and the remaining members renamed the band, “Shabutie”.
Michael Todd was recruited in 1996 and would remain the bassist until his arrest for break and enter circa 2010/11.
As Shabütie, the band released their first studio demo “Plan to Take Over the World” in 1999 and “The Penelope EP” in 1999, shortly after which Stever rejoined the band.
The original drummer left in 1999 and Josh Eppard was the replacement. He would be the drummer on the first three Coheed albums and while he was out of the band between 2006 and 2011 he returned for “The Afterman” albums and is still the drummer at this point in time.
The band went on to release another EP called “Delirium Trigger” in 2000 and several songs that appeared on it, were based on a series of science fiction comics written by Claudio Sanchez called “The Bag.On.Line Adventures”, which were later renamed “The Amory Wars”.
This science fiction story was Sanchez’s side project. Eventually, the band would rename themselves as Coheed and Cambria, after two of the story’s protagonists.
In a nutshell, and spoiler alert, Coheed and Cambria are dead by the end of it. Coheed by now had already killed off his children except Claudio and Cambria had to kill Coheed as he unleashed a virus and then unable to live without Coheed, she killed herself. In the process her energy/sacrifice then saved the dying star that Coheed was trying to destroy. Their son Claudio, is left to pick up the pieces.
A lot of pieces of the puzzle are put into place, and backstory’s are told. The fan wiki page does a great job detailing it.
“Second Stage Turbine Blade”
It’s a minute of ambient noise and an ominous sombre piano riff.
“Time Consumer”
The feel of this song in the first minute feels like a Pink Floyd/U2 jam mash up. It is raw and gritty as it grooves its way to the exploding of distorted guitars at the 1.14 mark.
“Devil In Jersey City”
It’s got that pop punk feel, almost happy like but the subject matter is disturbing involving a bashing and a rape by the gang called “Jersey City Devils” on the daughter of Coheed and Cambria and her partner.
“Everything Evil”
This moves into “Everything Evil,” which is arguably the most proggy track on the album. The ending of the song has that piano riff which becomes the first song on subsequent albums
“Delirium Trigger”
The heaviest song on the album.
“Hearshot Kid Disaster”
It has a funky riff.
“33”
A pop song which is 3.30 long. Coincidence.
“Junesong Provision”
“Junesong Provision” Heavy guitar and impressive vocals and lyrics make up this noteworthy song.
“Neverender”
The bass is excellent and the riffs are rooted in hard rock. Claudio’s vocals are the most confident on this one and it shows.
“God Send Conspirator” A clean guitar riff starts the song off, which sounds like an indie song. The bass grooves and funks it’s way throughout.
The first thing that grabs you is the Bladerunner style cover. Bruce Dickinson mentions the same in his book, “What Does This Button Do?”
Apart from buying the album, the fan is also buying a great piece of art by Derek Riggs, who took 3 months to come up with the painting.
During this 80s era, the UK government decided to tax the entertainment industry over 80% of what they earn so this meant that the band and other UK artists had to go into exile and were caught somewhere, far away from home for nine months of the year. So the album ended up being written and recorded in different places and in different studios.
When the sessions started, Bruce Dickinson wanted to do something different, which made everyone laugh. He wanted Maiden to lead instead of delivering just another Iron Maiden album.
But, the fans got “just another Maiden album”. And we loved it.
Steve Harris contributed “Caught Somewhere In Time”, “Heaven Can Wait”, “The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner” and “Alexander The Great”. Adrian Smith contributed “Wasted Years”, “Sea Of Madness” and “Stranger In A Strange Land” while Dave Murray brought in “Déjà Vu”.
A chord is strummed, a synth chord rings out and a harmony lead is heard. This repeats for a few times and then a drum groove comes in. Subdued it percolates, changes key and at the fifty two second mark, it explodes.
“Caught Somewhere In Time” had really started. And that exploding intro comes back in the solo section at the 4.50 mark. As Harris once said, it’s about a nightmare trip through time due to a malfunction in the time machine.
The iconic open E pedal point riff starts off “Wasted Years”, Maiden’s contribution to the tales of touring and being on the road for a long time. It’s no surprise that this song was written straight after their biggest and longest tour for the “Powerslave” album which resulted in the “Live After Death” album.
The intro lead riff was rejected by Smith but Harris heard it and told him to work on it.
And the whole solo section is head banging, fists in the air, desk breaking material. Check out the way they build up the intro E pedal point riff into the solo section.
The solo section of “Sea Of Madness” is one of my favourite pieces of music on this album.
“Heaven Can Wait” is the story of a person who is struggling to transition to Heaven. The song just moves along, but when the whole “Take my hand, I’ll lead you to the promised land” section starts off, its pay attention time. Then those “woh oh oh” chants kick in and its desk breaking time. And how good is the clean tone guitar riff under the “woh-oh-oh”.
The guitar intro to “The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner” is inspiring, There is a film with the same title and Harris once said in an interview something like, “you always have to run in life, move forward, and you do it alone.”
The way Bruce Dickinson carries the vocal melody for the Chorus is excellent, and then the harmony leads kick in while Nicko McBrain is doing double time on the drums.
Then at the 3.30 mark, a blues rock like lead kicks in with pentatonic bends before it morphs into a metal like solo. And the song ends the way it started, with a tonne of memorable harmony leads.
The open E bass shuffle of “Stranger In A Strange Land” gets me interested, but it’s the Adrian Smith riff that seals the deal.
And how good is the lead break.
While the title shares the same name as the Robert Heinlein book, Adrian Smith based it on a story he read about an old sailor John Torrington, a member of the mysterious 1845 Sir John Franklin expedition that attempted to find the Northwest Passage from America to Asia. More than a century later in 1984, he’s perfectly preserved body was found in the ice of the North Pole.
Check out “Déjà Vu” from the 30 second mark, when that harmony lead kicks in. It’s like “The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner” part 2 and it morphs into a riff that reminds me of “Die With Your Boots On”.
How good is the pre chorus vocal melody when Dickinson starts to sing, “cause you know this happened before”?
And that harmony lead from the 2.50 mark. Brilliant.
There is blowing wind, a slow military march tempo and a clean guitar solo. That is how the album closer, “Alexander The Great” starts, and it percolates musically, until it explodes into the verses.
The lyrics are somewhat like a children’s encyclopaedia article however there is enough detail there line by line.
And that groove and feel change at the 4.50 mark is excellent, with more leads and more harmonies.
Not bad for just another album.
But.
For all its excellence, the tracks on “Somewhere In Time” (apart from “Wasted Years” and “Heaven Can Wait”) are really underplayed when it comes to the set lists.
P.S. This issue of Guitar Legends is one of my favorites with a heap of information. But that will be for another day.
BB Steal was Australia’s entry for world domination in the hard rock movement. But did the world need a new Def Leppard.
Their association with the band wasn’t just inspiration. They opened up for Def Leppard during the “Adrenalize” Tour and Def Leppard guitarist Phil Collen produced the title song on their “Heartbeat Away” EP and co-produced their first full-length album “On The Edge”, which also features a version of the song “Heartbeat Away”. Collen also played some guitar and sang backing vocals on the album, but is not credited.
BB Steal (otherwise known as Beg Borrow Steal) was spawned from the NWOBHM sounding “Boss” band. In typical Australian hard rock fashion, they lived in development EP hell for at least 4 years before the album came out. 4 years is a long time in the music and recording industry.
And the album definitely racked up the bills as recording took place in Los Angeles and Montreal with various engineers and studio players.
Formed in 1987, they released the 4 song EP “Heartbeat Away” in 1988. The title track of this EP set the tone for the sound and feel the band would pursue. The Def Leppard “Hysteria” album sound.
So, “On The Edge” was released in 1991. It’s one of those should have and would have and could have stories. It should have done better commercially, and it would have if Grunge didn’t come, and it could have done great numbers if it came out a few years earlier.
If you love Def Leppard then you will love BB Steal. Critics praised em and also drilled em, calling em a poor version of Def Leppard. But the band was a lot more than the Def Leppard comparisons.
“On The Edge (Lizzy Town)” has this “Led Zeppelin III” acoustic vibe before it moves into a Def Leppard like groove and vocal.
“Big On Love” is probably the best song not written by Def Leppard that sounds like it belonged on “Hysteria”. At one stage I thought it was “Animal”.
Then “Hysteria” starts. Wait, it’s called “Ride On”. They are similar but derivative enough to stand on its own.
“Suffer In Silence” is another track which is very Def Leppard like.
“Live It Up” has a guitar intro that could have come from a Van Halen album, before it goes into an AC/DC like groove. The vocals of Craig Csongrady on this album are just too much like Joe Elliot, in the same way that Marc Storace from Krokus was too much like Bon Scott.
“Shot Full Of Love” feels like a cut from Babylon AD. “Precious Love” has that “Stand Up” vibe.
“Don’t You Love Me and Leave Me” is an AC/DC song musically, with a bit of The Cult added in vocally and musically.
“Heartbeat Away” is from the Phil Collen produced EP, released in 1988 and “Troubled Child” closes the album, with a Journey like feel musically and a Joe Elliot like vocal.
In the 2019, re-issue, it comes with three songs from the original 1988 EP in “I Believe” (very Journey like), “Hold On” (has a guitar hero solo moment) and “Heartbeat Away” (the Phil Collen produced and the song which set the stone for the album to come a few years after).
And when the album did nothing commercially, the band disappeared along with thousands of other hard rock bands.
But in 2012, they returned with a new album called “Resurrection”. But that’s for another day and another “Australian Method Series” post.
When I did the previous record vault post for “No World For Tomorrow” I did mention that I didn’t have the CD anymore. So I went searching at the usual local sellers but found one on eBay.
How good is the artwork by Ken Kelly, who also created the artwork for “Love Gun” and “Destroyer” by Kiss.
Here is the Holiday 2007, Guitar World issue and article that got me to commit and check out the music of Coheed and Cambria.
Coming into the “No World For Tomorrow” recording cycle, the band was down to two with drummer Josh Eppard and bassist Michael Todd exiting due to the familiar story of drugs and dysfunctionality within rock and roll bands. Claudio Sanchez and Travis Steer remained. And for the first time, they really collaborated together.
With an uncertain future, the manager of Sanchez put him into contact with two songwriters in Sam Hollander and Dave Katz, and together they came up with a pair of songs for Hollywood. The songs “Running Free” and “The Road And The Damned” were written for the soundtracks of “Transformers” and “Ghost Rider”. But they didn’t get picked. Instead they provided the spark for the album.
“The Running Free” is described as “uplifting with its U2-esque chorus” and it even became the albums leadoff single. Sanchez further mentions that “even though this is a dark album and all hell is about to break loose, there is still hope. At the other side of the tunnel there is a light. And I feel “Running Free” expresses that.”
So Sanchez and Steer decided to keep the band alive. Rick Rubin had just joined Sony/Columbia and he became the album’s A&R supervisor, like how John Kalodner was listed as the same on so many albums in the 80’s and early 90’s.
The band had their previous albums produced by Chris Bittner and Michael Birnbaum, however that relationship turned sour, so Rubin hooked em up with Nick Raskulinecz. Since Raskulinecz worked with Foo Fighters, he brought in Taylor Hawkins to drum. Meanwhile bassist Michael Todd came back into the fold, clean and sober, however he would depart again a few years later after he was arrested for break and enter. The song “Domino The Destitute” from “The Afterman” releases is about Michael Todd.
After the album was done, Chris Pennie from “Dillinger Escape Plan” joined as the permanent drummer. He kept this role for the next album, “Year Of The Black Rainbow” and then was replaced by Eppard, who returned for “The Afterman” releases and he’s been there since.
The guitar riff in “Mother Superior” is now known as the guitar riff, but it was written on a synth/piano first. The whole song was synth heavy until Raskulinecz advised them to make the rhythm guitar progression the main focus. This is what Sanchez said about it, “I wrote the song on synthesizer, but on the finished version, the synth doesn’t show its face until halfway through the second verse. It emulates a Mellotron and has a “Strawberry Fields Forever” vibe. This was one of those songs where I wanted to take it from a different perspective and see how a keyboard could ultimately dictate what I would play on the guitar. So on the finished track, the guitar jumps around, just like the original keyboard part did.
Coheed and Cambria were back in the Amory Wars universe when they announced the 5 part Vaxis series.
This is Act 1.
Otherwise known as “Vaxis – Act I: The Unheavenly Creatures”, the ninth album, released on October 5, 2018.
As soon as it was announced, I was interested and Pre-Ordered the limited edition deluxe box set which includes an 80+ page hardcover, full color book with custom illustrations and complete ACT I story.
The Book also houses the CD of “The Unheavenly Creatures” as well as the exclusive BONUS CD, “The Crown Heights Demos”.
The box set also includes a replica Creature mask, a fold out poster of the cover art, the usual VIP/Black Card which allows card holders early access to tickets and early entry to Coheed and Cambria headline shows.
And the pre order also came with access to a digital site to download the album and the demos on release day.
So, the story.
Set sometime after the events of “No World for Tomorrow”, (their 2007 album, as the three subsequent albums were all prequels), the planets that formally made up Heaven’s Fence are scarred and cracked after an event known as “The Great Crash.”
A group of elites known as the Five Houses of the Star Supremacy have converted these worlds into prison planets, with one planet being called The Dark Sentencer.
The album tells the tale of two new characters, Sister Spider and Creature as they struggle with being imprisoned on The Dark Sentencer and fight to secure the safety of their unborn son, Vaxis.
At 78 minutes, it’s a monster of an album.
The album opens as usual, with a short music and spoken intro called “Prologue”. The voice over talks about “the five houses”, “the planet prisons”, and “a love story”. And the voice ends the narrative with, “It begins with them, but ends with me, their son, Vaxis.”
Then the “Domino The Destitute” inspired riff kicks off “The Dark Sentencer”. You get the big chants like a prison riot is taking place, the big rock riffs and the progressive feel of the arrangement. Like all Coheed albums, song number 2 is the epic.
The title track “Unheavenly Creatures” has a riff that sounds like it was written on the TonePad app. When the guitars come crashing in, it’s major key pop rock.
I like how Coheed always makes riffs in a major key sound heavy, like in “Toys”. If anything it could have come from the fingertips of Mark Tremonti.
The spirit of “Mother Superior” is evident on “Black Sunday”.
“Queen Of The Dark” starts off with a sad piano riff and then a digital delay strummed riff comes in before the window shattering drum groove sets the mood and tone.
“True Ugly” feels like a power pop punk song, full of melody and aggression.
“Love Protocol” has an arena rock Chorus that needs to be heard.
“The Pavilion (A Long Way Back)” has a simple palm muted arpeggio guitar riff and a drum groove that demands attention. It’s one of the best songs on the album and it was the first song written for the album.
“Night-Time Walkers” feels like a “Halloween” or “Escape From New York” soundtrack in the intro. Or a scene from “Stranger Things”. Then the crunching guitars kick in and the drumming becomes more dominant before it moves into a massive Chorus.
“The Gutter” could have come from “A Night at the Opera”. And how good are the violins in this song.
“All On Fire” feels like “No World For Tomorrow”.
“It Walks Amongst Us” has this Middle Eastern exotic soundscape to start off, before it moves into a metal like riff that is played with an 80s keyboard synth sound.
“Old Flames”, is the second last track, and it’s a massive song. You can see it in the same way that the second last episode of each season of “Game Of Thrones” was the biggie.
This feels like classic rock as a piano starts it, before the Cheap Trick like riff kicks in and a massive Arena rock Chorus.
The whole “Naa / Na na na na na-ah” feels like a Cheap Trick song. Even My Chemical Romance have sections like this. As the guitars and drums end, the piano riff starts and it’s the “Prologue” riff.
“Lucky Stars” is an acoustic number that closes the record. It’s like the aftermath. Make sure you stick around for the Clapton like lead break.
And the guys toured hard on this album and now we wait for “Act 2”, in between Claudio’s side project The Prize Fighter Inferno, named after a character in the Amory Wars story.
Without even realizing, it’s a special U.K edition.
Bush – Razorblade Suitcase
I got this album a few years after it came out on cassette tape, via a 3 for $10 bin, so it was a no brainer.
Gavin Rossdale got a lot of crap from journalists and critics.
Like he was too handsome to be considered grunge but then he’s labelled a Nirvana clone. And when the debut album sold in the multi-millions, the band was labelled as slick rock.
He got worse treatment in his homeland. As the U.K ignored them initially, Bush landed a U.S deal and became successful in the North American market first before their album was released in their home country.
He mentioned that Pixies are an influence, and the press called him a Kurt Cobain poseur as Cobain also said that the Pixies are a massive influence. So he said “fuck it”.
“Swallowed” is the lead single. My favorite on the album.
“Greedy Fly” is basically an artist writing a song, without a thought of it being a hit. And somehow it gets released as a single and it’s seen as a hit.
“Cold Contagious” has a cool drum groove, with the guitars decorating the song in a nice way, as Rossdale is singing, “you will get yours” with the volume and intensity increasing. And at six minutes long, it’s the anti-single, but it still got released as a single.
And the band toured for 14 months to promote the album. In the process they moved 6 million copies of the album in the U.S alone.
But with every peak, there is a valley waiting below.
A fight with the label delayed “The Science Of Things” and when the album came out, their sound was suddenly seen as “old” by the press, in the same way that hard rock became old circa 1991/92.
Deep Purple – Purpendicular
It’s not on Spotify but YouTube has it. It’s ridiculous why some albums are missing from digital services.
“Purpendicular” is the fifteenth studio album. It is their first album with guitarist Steve Morse. His injection was seen a breath of fresh air.
“Vavoom: Ted the Mechanic”
The blues boogie is excellent and the Mixolydian lead break from Steve Morse is guitar hero worthy.
What a way to introduce yourself to the Purple fans.
“Loosen My Strings”
Arpeggios kick off the song, but its Roger Glover’s bass line that takes this song to a new level and then Morse starts to play a distorted chord riff which complements the bass riff.
The riff before the lead break is excellent, but make sure you check out the lead break and the outro lead break, which sounds like a Boston outro, ala “Don’t Look Back”.
“Soon Forgotten”
It’s a strange song, with a riff that sounds a little bit exotic and a bizarre staccato like vocal melody on top of it. The organ work on this track is stunning and you are reminded why Jon Lord is regarded as one of the greatest players of all time.
“Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming”
The intro guitar from Morse is haunting and sad. He then plays this melodic lead in between the verses which is memorable.
The guitar solo is amazing.
It’s one of their best and should be known with their classic songs.
Did I mention that the guitar solo is amazing?
It is.
Do yourself a favour, check it out and start playing air guitar to it.
And did I mention there is an outro guitar solo as well?
There is. So check that one out as well. In other words, Steve Morse rules on this track.
“Cascades: I’m Not Your Lover”
The churchy organs of Jon Lord kick it off, while Steve Morse plays a bendy melodic lead, before it takes a left turn and a U-turn and becomes a hard rock song with a “Highway Star” like vibe.
The guitar/organ harmony solo from 2.15 to 3.15 is one of the great moments on this album as Lord/Morse go to town playing arpeggios, in a similar way that Lord and Blackmore did for “Burn”, just a lot faster.
“The Aviator”
Morse brings out the country and folk influences to create a major key “good vibes” medieval arrangement. Make sure you check out “Highland Wedding” from Steve Morse’s “High Tension Wires” from 1989 as Morse has been dabbling with these kind of melodies previously.
“A Castle Full of Rascals”
The beginning sounds like a cross between ELP and Led Zeppelin in the blues rock vein.
And the song changes at 1.58 mark with a bass groove, lush keys and a progressive like vocal melody. Morse at first is playing single note lines before crashing in with power chords and distorted single notes, paving the way for Jon Lord and his Hammond Organ solo.
“A Touch Away”
It’s got that feel good 70’s progressive vibe.
“Hey Cisco”
It sounds like “Hit The Road Jack” on steroids. Hell, it could have come from a Van Halen album. Make sure you stick around for the guitar and organ harmonies from about 4.08 and then Morse breaks loose with his fast alternate picked Mixolydian lines.
“Somebody Stole My Guitar”
What a riff to introduce the song. It grooves, its heavy and bluesy. I haven’t mentioned the swing and soul feel of Ian Paice yet, but man, this dude can play.
At the 2 minute mark, Morse starts this palm muted arpeggio riff, while Lord plays these Organ chords before Morse launches into the solo, while Lord plays the palm muted arpeggio riff on the Organ.
Brilliant.
“The Purpendicular Waltz”
It’s a blues shuffle built around a cool groove and a great closer to the album.
For all the debate about Blackmore and Morse, forget it.
Listen without prejudice.
Bruce Dickinson – Skunkworks
I didn’t like this album when I first heard it. And it stayed on the shelf for a long time before I pulled it out and re-listened. I still didn’t like it and back on the shelf it went. But over the last 8 years, the album has taken a life on its own.
I didn’t get it back then, but goddamn this album sounds progressive. The cover design from Storm Thorgerson (RIP) should have been an indication of its progressive intentions, but it escaped me.
It was meant to be a band album but the label wouldn’t release it under anything except Bruce Dickinson. Jack Endino a Seattle producer who worked on Nirvana’s “Bleach” is producing. The sound is like an amalgamation of 80’s Rush with alternative rock and metal.
And I’ve never heard of Alex Dickson again after this album but he does a stellar job on the guitar and as a co-writer on all the songs. But as Rod Smallwood said, “Bruce Dickinson is a heavy metal singer and that will never change”. His attempt to shake off the image of his Maiden past was futile.
“Back From The Edge” has double time drumming over a jangly chord progression, but it’s the bridge and solo section which gets me interested.
“Inertia” could have come from any Maiden album, past or future.
How good is the riff to kick off “Faith”?
At times I feel like I am listening to a Dream Theater cut from the “Falling Into Infinity” album with this song.
Make sure you check out the solo section.
“Dreamstate” in the verses sounds like a Nirvana cut. Yes, that’s right folks, Bruce is channeling Cobain.
How good is “I Will Not Accept The Truth”. Listen to the repeating arpeggios in the verses. Sinister and melodic in the same breadth.
The whole mood and groove in the interlude/solo section of “Strange Death In Paradise” while Dickinson sings the title is a must listen for any Dickinson fan.
In the end, unless you were interested in what Dickinson was up to, there was nothing really here to get you to commit. Then again, the 90’s was an interesting time for 80’s artists and the fans of those artists.
Steve Perry was back with Jonathan Cain, Neal Schon, Ross Valory and Steve Smith and Journey was rocking again after a 10 year gap, thanks to no small part to John Kalodner. Kevin Shirley is producing and this album is a return to form.
“Message Of Love” has a Chorus inspired by “Separate Ways”. As far as opening tracks go, it’s excellent, a great way to re-introduce the band in the 90’s and while other bands were removing guitar solos, no one told Neal Schon about it as he goes to town on this one and re-introduces the world to guitar solos.
“One More” has a groove that could have come from a Faith No More album. And what made Journey famous originally is how they could change styles within an album, as “When You Love A Woman” shows a their R&B Ballad roots.
“Forever In Blue” has this “Best Of Both Worlds” style riff to kick it off before a familiar Journey like Chorus kicks in.
“Castles Burning” has the guitar front and centre. A sleazy bluesy rock song with an arena rock like Chorus. It’s by far the heaviest track on the album.
“Still She Cries” has some wonderful guitar playing on it for a ballad and Perry as usual delivers a stellar vocal.
The second half of the album didn’t rock as hard as the first half, but each song has some cool Schon moments.
“When I Think Of You” is a ballad, and not a favourite, but Schon is playing some memorable melodic licks.
“Can’t Tame the Lion” is a great rock song with excellent guitar passages that remind me of Vito Bratta.
“Trial By Fire” feels like a jam over a Smith/Valory groove with Schon playing jazz like leads and chords.
A back/hip injury to Perry derailed the subsequent tour and by 1998, Perry was out of the group and Journey went into different versions before settling in with Arnel Pineda.
Then there was a fight over the Journey brand, as Ross Valory and Steve Smith tried to take control of the band name. While that was happening, Neal Schon and Jonathan Cain also fell out as Cain found religion and didn’t want to play the Journey songs anymore as it went against his faith, which infuriated Schon.
But hey, money talks and they made up and Journey is rocking again.
destroyerofharmony 