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

The Record Vault – Corrosion Of Conformity

They came onto my radar from various interviews other artists did and they mentioned how CoC is one of the current bands they are listening to. The guys from Pantera, Bach and Hetfield come to mind.

Deliverance

It came out in 1994, but I didn’t get into it until I came across a guitar tab for “Albatross” from the Guitar mags I purchase. As soon as I sat down and attempted to play it, I was all in. It’s heavy, it has groove and it’s probably the best Sabbath riff that Tony Iommi didn’t write in the 90’s.

“Heavens Not Overflowing” is a great title and a great way to open an album with.

What a concept.

Let’s merge our love of Southern Rock, Delta Blues and Black Sabbath into a track.

And the lyrics.

“I’ve seen your rising son fall in your mama’s eye / and now the cops got a medal but he calls it a prize”.

Doesn’t it sum up the state of the world, when the police who are meant to protect the citizens take em out like a hunt.

“Clean My Wounds” is more like Thin Lizzy in the verses and I like it.

“Help me Jesus, help me clean my wounds / He said he cannot heal that kind”

Even the mighty Lord has biases. The final juror to pass judgement.

“Without Wings” is a nice short acoustic piece with synth strings, similar to the little acoustic songs that Black Sabbath would incorporate on their albums.

Now “Broken Man” is the song in my opinion that crossed over between the sounds of Pantera and the heavy sounds of Seattle from Soundgarden and Alice In Chains and CoC’s normal groove sludge rock. Because if you liked Pantera, there was no way you could ignore CoC. If you liked Alice In Chains or Soundgarden, there was no way you would ignore CoC.

And how good is the exotic sounding lead break?

“Now I’m a broken man in a broken land… / And don’t they wish they were blessed like you”

If you think that person is winning or popular, behind the surface they are probably troubled or lonely. Read any rockstar bio and you see why they turn to drugs and alcohol.

Time away on the road leads to loneliness and then they get those highs on stage which they try to keep going after the show and drugs end up being found in abundance because everyone is preying on them, to make a dollar and to leech from their success.

“Senor Limpio” is basically ZZ Top all metalled up. Just listen to the riffs.

It moves into “Mano De Mono”, another short instrumental that is sad and heartfelt with a bit of blues and Mexicana chucked in.

“Seven Days” plods along like a person carrying the weight of the world on their shoulders. Then there is another short instrumental, “#2121313” before “My Grain” kicks in.

And how good is that interlude/solo section in “My Grain” inspired by “The Real Me” from The Who. As soon as the chords kick in and the bass solo starts, you know straight away which band inspired it.

Then the title track kicks off with a nod to “Back In Black” before the sleazy riff kicks off.

And how good is “Shelter” a sombre acoustic ballad with some country licks thrown in. The closer “Pears Before Swine” reminds me of the band, Sanctuary. It’s perfect.

Overall “Deliverance” is a perfect hard rock and metal album. And here is a post from Mike Ladano that I totally agree with.

Wiseblood

It came out in 1996 and it kicks off with the excellent titled “King Of The Rotten” and the vocals on this one are very James Hetfield influenced. Track 2, “Long Whip / Big America” reminds of ZZ Top “La Grange” era. Its got that spirit.

“Wiseblood” and “Goodbye Windows” sound like the influences to Black Label Society. And how good is that harmony solo section in “Goodbye Windows” with the vocals over it.

And the bluesy Sabbath like tunes continue, along with the excellent song titles, like “Born Again For The Last Time”, “Drowning In A Daydream” and “The Snake Has No Head”.

Then there is “The Door” and “Man Or Ash”, cuts that would not be out of place on a Metallica “Load” or “Reload” album. And if the vocalist sounds familiar on “Man Or Ash”, it should, it’s none other than James Hetfield.

Then there is the excellent titled “Redepmtion City”.

“Fuel” is a thrash-a-thon and I had to keep telling my friends at the time that it’s not a cover of the other “Fuel” that appeared on “Reload” even though this one came out before.

And post “Wiseblood”, the band got dropped from Columbia Records because “Wiseblood” was seen as a commercial failure and Sanctuary Records picked em up.

In 2000, “America’s Volume Dealer” came out and disappointed the new label in sales. They went on hiatus and reformed, releasing another three more albums, a couple of EP’s, a live album, worked on side projects like “Down” and an compilation album, the most recent album being “No Cross No Crown” in 2018.

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Copyright, movies, Music, My Stories

Streaming And Theaters

There will always be just a few.

Facebook and Twitter control social media at the moment. Snapchat is there and TikTok is rising until Donald Trump got his government to pass a law to suppress it. Regardless who comes, in the end, only a few will remain. Google has search and Trump doesn’t like their dominant market position, so they have an Anti-Trust hearing happening. But no one is rushing to use the other search engines.

Netflix controlled visual streaming, but COVID-19 has shown how versatile Disney can become, pivoting their company to focus on Disney+ within a matter of months. It’s a big F.U to all the theatres who overcharged anyway and Disney has positioned the company as a proper streaming rival to Netflix. They have seen how much money they have left on the table by not being involved in the streaming market. Even Apple and Amazon have seen how much money is to be made by creating original content. And let’s not forget the biggest one, YouTube.

And the only ones who made money and released new content when COVID-19 hit, were the streaming services.

Of course there will always be other players popping up here and there, but they don’t last forever.

Quibi is one that comes to mind, the 10 minute or less mobile video streaming service created by people who watch documentaries on the History channel and suddenly they thought they knew what the young wanted.

Short episodes to watch on your mobile, while you walk.

And they convinced a lot of entities to invest. Well, it’s dead and buried, taking the $US1.75 billion from investors to start up and then shutting up shop, six months later.

The big labels are down to a few when once upon a time it was many.

Music streaming started off with YouTube.

Then others came like Pandora, Grooveshark, Spotify, Tidal, Apple and Deezer. There are others, but only a few will remain in the end. Pandora is entrenched and so is YouTube. Spotify has decent market share and is continuing to expand. The next step for them would be to produce new music themselves, like a label.

Apple is all about their gadgets and streaming is a means to an end. Grooveshark was found guilty of copyright infringement and closed while Tidal is there for the owners Jay Z and other artists to cash in.

Like the movie Highlander, there can be only one. Maybe two.

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

The Record Vault – Cheap Trick

Live At The Budokan

I had a few more records of em, “Lap of Luxury” and “Busted”, but in one of my house moves, I lost a whole box of records and those two were in the box. As crazy as it might seem, it was “The Flame” that got me into Cheap Trick and when I found out they had a back catalogue, well it was like my Whitesnake experience.

But I didn’t purchase much. I taped a few mix tapes from friends and since their music was on radio a fair bit, I used to have blank cassette tapes taping the whole radio show and then afterwards I would go through those cassette tapes and retape the good songs onto another tape.

I know, its hard work, but that’s what I did to have music in possession.

Before “Budokan”, Cheap Trick released three albums which didn’t really set the charts alight, nor did they deliver commercially to the label.

“Cheap Trick”, “In Color” and “Heaven Tonight”. “In Color” is now listed in the “500 Greatest Albums Of All Time” from Rolling Stone but when it was released it was seen as a dud by the same magazine. Then again that mag said similar things about Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and many more acts, whose albums are now in the list.

Cheap Trick took their British influences, Americanised em and off they went to the land of the rising sun, because while their albums didn’t do great business in the U.S, the Japanese market was a different beast.

And “At Budokan’” became bigger than Cheap Trick’s first three albums.

Big Eyes
I reckon the drum intro inspired “Run To The Hills” from Maiden and how good is that interlude riff which becomes the backing riff for the solo section.

I Want You To Want Me
With its “Baby, Please Don’t Go” vibe/influence and that “Radar Love” style drum pattern, and an undeniable melodic line, which merges the best of The Beatles into a hard rock ditty.

Surrender
“This next one is the first song on our new album. It just came out this week and the song is called “Surrender””

This is the song that hooked me in and that addictive chorus.

And Cheap Trick is still relevant today and still rocking.

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Copyright, Derivative Works, Influenced, Music, My Stories

Copyright Ain’t Gonna Take It

Dee Snider and Universal are facing off against the army of lawyers from Clive Palmer over his parody version of “We’re Not Gonna Take It”, which he called “Australia’s Not Gonna Cop It”.

All because he didn’t want to pay the original licence fee.

But Palmer has a team of lawyers, who are really good at getting him out of things and Snider has Universal and it’s lawyers.

And when it comes to entertainment lawyers, Aussies still remember that iiNet case, when the labels and movie studios took one of our favorite ISP’s to court. It was a test case by the entertainment groups to see if a court would find an ISP guilty of copyright infringement on behalf of its users before they took on the big ISP’s in Optus and Telstra. But the labels and movie studios lost their case.

And the entertainment lawyers are usually on the other side of the argument here, defending themselves and trying to weasel their way out of things. But now Palmer is doing the weaseling and the labels need to prove.

Palmer’s legal team is pushing a real grey area of Copyright law around parodies. They are saying that what Palmer did constitutes a parody, which Copyright law allows them to do. And they are saying that since “We’re Not Gonna Take It” is a copy of “O Come All Ye Faithful”, Palmer didn’t need to pay for a licence.

And I don’t think Universal is doing a great job putting their case forward?

Universal are arguing that copyright has been breached and are seeking royalty payments and additional damages.

And Palmer is doing to Universal what the labels normally do to artists or ISP’s. Twist the truth. Mislead.

Suddenly, Palmer is a creative, who has a book next to his bed, to scribble down thoughts and ideas at 4am in the morning, because that’s what creatives like him do. Wake up early and create.

Please.

A rock on the ground is more creative than Palmer.

Even Mariah Carey got thrown into the mix.

And the hearing continues.

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A to Z of Making It, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Unsung Heroes

Can’t Remember How I Got From Here To There

48 years ago and before he found fame with Rainbow, Ronnie James Dio recorded “Never More” which appeared on Elf’s self-titled debut in 1972.

The title of this post are the opening lyric lines.

Musically it’s one of those classic proto-metal cuts, on an album which is more or less blues rock with derivative lyrics.

And it’s not an album that most fans of Dio’s work with Rainbow, Sabbath and as a solo artist will want to listen to often.

Because as we know, 4 years later, Ronnie James Dio became the devil horn saluting Ronnie James Dio we all know when he teamed up with Ritchie Blackmore.

But first, he had dues to pay. And pay then he did. Writing and performing songs that no one would listen to or even knew he did.

No one is born with a “gift” or a “natural talent”. Talent is a skill which is honed and built through passion, perseverance, practice and being uncomfortable.

And you will write a lot of songs before you end up with the songs that connect with people. And sometimes you are a too far ahead of the times for people to truly appreciate what you’ve created.

Hell and Fire burning higher / Now I can see the ever after / Clock is moving only / While I see you down here me in laughter

Never more

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

1977 – Part 7

Blue Oyster Cult – Spectres

Their commercial breakthrough was the album before, “Agents of Fortune”, so it’s no surprise that BoC stuck with the same formula, like Jovi did with “New Jersey” after “Slippery When Wet” or Metallica with “Master Of Puppets” and “Justice For All” after “Ride The Lightning”.

I think for most, Blue Oyster Cult are known for three songs, which their Spotify account confirms. “Don’t Fear The Reaper” at 272 million streams, “Burnin For You” at 77 million streams and “Godzilla” at 37 million streams. And of course, Metallica brought “Astronomy” into the public conversation.

And “Spectres” opens up with “Godzilla”, a monster riff that shuffles and rumbles along like the monster it’s named after.

“Golden Age of Leather” has a crap intro but it’s a pretty good song overall with tempo changes that seem like they don’t even happen. And along with album closer “Nosferatu”, these two songs are like the progressive tracks.

“Death Valley Nights” stands out and is a favourite and “Fireworks” sounds like a re-write of “Don’t Fear The Reaper” and I’m all in, with some nice harmonies.

“R. U. Ready to Rock?” is “American Woman” and “Mississippi Queen” all rolled into one to kick off side 2. “Going Through the Motions” is co-written by Eric Bloom and ex Mott the Hoople member Ian Hunter. It’s got hand claps and it’s like Sweet.

“I Love the Night” has an hypnotic clean tone arpeggio riff. It’s my favourite from the album, a love song to a female vampire when vampires actually scared us and “Nosferatu” continues the vampire theme, with its Mellotron riffs and it reminds me of trippy 70’s art rock.

Riot – Rock City

The first Riot album, with the band unleashing a metal sound that would be seen as the “traditional” sound many years later.

Think of Sweet’s heavier songs, along with Led Zeppelin’s heavier songs and with a little ZZ Top and UFO chucked in for good measure. Judas Priest had this traditional sound on “Killing Machine”.

It’s a shame their covers never matched the awesome covers from other bands of the era, like Maiden, Priest, ZZ Top and so on.

It’s a two punch knockout with “Desperation” and “Warrior”.

As soon as the intro riff starts for “Desperation” I’m thinking of Metallica and their early riffs around “Kill Em All”. But once the verses kick in, its standard hard rock.

Then the riff starts for “Warrior” and I’m not sure who influenced who, Judas Priest or Riot.

And the chorus is so catchy. A future power metal movement is built on this.

When “Rock City” kicks off, the riff is another blues romp.

And there isn’t a bad song on the album.

When people talk about great debut albums, Riot is very rarely in the conversation, but they should be.

Traditional Metal.

That’s Riot on the debut.

Quartz – Quartz

The album is not on Spotify, but YouTube has it.

Quartz are a British heavy metal band.

They came onto my radar when I was doing some research on the past of Geoff Nicholls. For those who don’t know, Nicholls was involved with Black Sabbath and is unofficially credited as the person who came up with the bass groove on “Heaven And Hell”.

They got a deal with Jet Records in the mid 70’s as Bandy Legs and supported Sabbath and AC/DC. In 1977, they changed their name to Quartz and released their self-titled debut album.

This album is produced by Tony Iommi. It wasn’t mentioned on the record because of contractual obligations but it was the worst kept secret. Iommi even mentions them in his “Iron Man” bio. A young Chris Tsangarides is the Engineer. Ozzy even sang on the song “Circles” but Iommi removed Ozzy’s contributions from the final mix and then the song was cut from the album. Brian May even offered to do a Queen type re-mix of the song which didn’t pan out to good.

The band is Mick Taylor on vocals, Geoff Nicholls on guitar and keyboards, Dek Arnold on bass, Mike Hopkins on guitar and Mal Cope on drums.

Writers for various magazines have credited this album as one of the earliest NWOBHM releases even though the phrase NWOBHM came in 1979, via journalist Geoff Barton and Sounds magazine.

“Mainline Riders” kicks it off and it sounds like this track is the inspiration for the songs “Heaven and Hell” and “Holy Diver”.

If you need proof that even our heroes are influenced, then look no further than this song. Tony Iommi was clearly influenced by this.

After reading how Jet Records operated, I would be surprised if Nicholls got any song writing credits or payments for his contributions.

Because Jet Records were in a bad state financially and Quartz suddenly found themselves without a deal.

By 1979, Geoff Nicholls left to join Black Sabbath. He contributed keyboards and song writing to that band from 1980s “Heaven and Hell” to 2004.

“Sugar Rain” is different, more ELO orientated. This one and the next track “Street Fighting Lady” are progressive rock and metal masterpieces. The flute even makes the appearance like Jethro Tull. And I’ve read that Iommi is the flute master.

And the riff to kick off “Street Fighting Lady” is brilliant, bringing back memories of “Woman From Tokyo”. “Hustler” has this hard rock Bee Gees vibe in the verse, which I dig, with layered emotive harmony guitar lines and an angry metal like Chorus.

Four songs in and the guitar work from Hopkins and Nicholls is stellar.

“Devil’s Brew” has an “American Woman” influenced riff, but once the synths come in, it’s a different beast, more like hard rock and a bit progressive. Then the verse kicks in and it feels like a Sweet song with a hard driving Chorus that feels like it came Meatloaf’s “Bat Out Of Hell” album.

“Smokie” is a medieval classical acoustic song. “Around and Around” kicks off with a palm muted riff and some nice harmony guitars.

“Pleasure Seekers” and “Little Old Lady” close off the album and I wonder if this album was the missing link to my ears between “Never Say Die” and “Heaven And Hell” from Black Sabbath.

Uriah Heep

Two albums came out in the same year, “Firefly” and “Innocent Victim” with new vocalist, John Lawton.

The excellent “The Hanging Tree” kicks off the “Firefly” album. “Do You Know” is a loud rocker with a riff that is so fun to play. “Rollin On” is an excellent cut that reminds me of Bad Company and “Sympathy” clearly influenced Europe and their “Wings Of Tomorrow” album. Think of the song “Stormwind”.

“Innocent Victim” did good business in Germany, Australia (especially the single “Free Me”) and New Zealand, however in the U.S market, it disappointed. Actually both albums did terrible in the North American market.

The feel good bass groove of “Keep On Ridin’” kicks off the “Innocent Victim” album. It’s more like a Bad Company song than a Uriah Heep song, but I’ve always been a fan of artists incorporating sounds and feels of what is popular. “Flyin’ High” kicks off with a harmony guitar intro that would rival any Thin Lizzy intro.

I’m all in when “Free ‘N’ Easy” kicks off, it’s basically a speed metal song. I could imagine a young Mustaine or Hetfield listening to those verse riffs, thinking, imagine if I took that and played it even faster. While the next track “Illusion” is hypnotic and more subdued.

Then “Free Me” starts and it’s got that C-Am-F-G style chord progression. I don’t think I’ve ever heard a song with that progression that wasn’t catchy. And of course, it charted really well in Australia and New Zealand.

Then “The Dance” starts and that lead to kick it off is brilliant, while the guitar plays a jazzy staccato style riff in the verse.

And then “Choices” starts and what is it with this band and their god damn excellent intros that keep hooking me in. Lee Kerslake owns this song on the drums and Mick Box solos tastefully, while Ken Hensley lays down a wall of synths.

Eric Clapton – Slowhand

How good is this album?

Triple Platinum in the U.S and nothing in the Australian market, but Clapton was always in the Guitar Mags I used to buy, so it was only a matter of time before he became an influence.

“Cocaine” kicks it off before it moves to one of Clapton’s most emotive leads in “Wonderful Tonight”. This is Clapton’s second song to Pattie Boyd. The first one is the famous “Layla” when she was married to George Harrison, and when she divorced Harrison, she became Clapton’s muse.

“Lay Down Sally” is one of those blues songs that has a snare shuffle as it rolls along, something that Dire Straits did a fair bit off. “Next Time You See Her” is like a Bad Company song, merging folk and rock.

Then “The Core” starts and that funky bluesy riff has me picking up the guitar.

Colosseum II – Wardance

I’ve already done a post for this album in my Record Vault posts.

In case you are not aware, Gary Moore is on guitars and vocals, Don Airey is on all things piano related, John Mole is on drums and John Hiseman on drums. It’s basically all instrumental except for one forgettable vocal track.

My favourites are “Wardance” which is one of those gladiatorial tunes, ready to inspire you to gear up and go to war.

“Inquisition” is like an Al DiMeola track and I love it. Gary Moore really shreds on this on both electric and acoustic. And at 6 minutes long, I wasn’t bored.

And the closer.

“Last Exit”. The guitar solo from Gary Moore is one of my favourites of his.

Colosseum II – Electric Savage

Album number 2, which came out earlier in the year. Not sure how acceptable the album cover would be today, a semi nude dark skinned lady with fluro lights shining on her body, especially on her breasts and the words “Electric Savage”.

Check out “The Scorch” which has a pulsing bass from John Mole and Don Airey shredding away for the first 2 minutes and then its Moore’s time. The drumming from John Hiseman is busy, more jazz improv but it all works. At the end of the 6 minutes I’m still blown away that this is Gary Moore.

“Lament” has this doom feel with bells, a slow bass and a drum beat so simple. But when Gary Moore starts playing it sounds like an Irish folk ballad. Its moving and heartfelt.

“Am I” is my favourite. The way it starts, with that bass groove and those quite drums, with Moore and Airey playing these little two note melodic arpeggios over it. It’s perfect, its haunting and its memorable. Then Moore lets lose. Bringing in some Mixolydian Blues into the mix.

The closer “Intergalactic Strut” is one of those hard rock jazz fusion gems. Just listen to it and you will know what I mean. And remember, its Gary Moore playing like this, a mixture of art rock, progressive rock and whatever else he had in his arsenal.

Well that’s a wrap for Part 7. We move back to 2000 for Part 8.

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

The Record Vault – Concrete Blonde

“Joey” went to Number 1 in Australia and suddenly Concrete Blonde was talked about as an overnight sensation by the press.

But “Bloodletting” is the third studio album, released in 1990. In Australia it charted pretty good and was certified gold. And Johnette Napolitano got the chance to show the world what a brilliant songwriter she is.

Produced by hard rock and NWOBHM producer Chris Tsangarides. Interesting choice.

“Bloodletting (the Vampire song)” opens the album. At 6 minutes long, you get the feeling that Concrete Blonde didn’t have any ambitions to write big hits, just songs to make up an album. Anne Rice and her Vampire Chronicles of Lestat did big business in the books box office, so it’s no surprise to see songs about em.

And “Bloodletting” has that chromatic “you are been followed” feel in the riff. “Caroline” is almost six minutes as well, as it jams out the ending with a new wave rock style vocal.

But “Joey” is the star here. It’s so memorable and it has that “Stand By Me” C-Am-F-G progression (in a different key) which brings to the listeners, a sense of familiarity.

And we like the familiar. It’s the reason why AC/DC has had a career for almost 50 years.

Napolitano on vocals and bass guitar cemented her status as a producer and songwriter, while James Mankey on guitars showed a different style of guitar decorating and Paul Thompson holds down the drums.

“Bloodletting” started a five year period, that includes “Walking in London” released in 1992 and “Mexican Moon” released in 1993 and its these albums that gave the band a chance for a few victory laps later on.

I didn’t get “Walking In London” and then I heard the intro to “Heal It Up” on radio and I purchased “Mexican Moon”.

The groove is fantastic, the vocal line of Napolitano is infectious and the music so memorable. And how simple is the guitar lead, but so effective.

And the album is more hard rock than the previous ones.

It irks me how it’s not on Spotify as it’s my favourite album.

I pressed play on the cassette and I was greeted by the haunting arpeggios of “Jenny I Read” and this drum and bass groove which allows Napolitano to deliver an awesome vocal melody while guitarist James Mankey decorates it so nicely with volume swell riffs and melodic motifs and backward guitar effects.

“Mexican Moon” has Napolitano singing about a failed romance and fleeing into Mexico. The strummed acoustic guitar, the guitar melodic decorations, the bass and drum groove and the vocal melody all come together into a catchy song.

The intro/verse riff for “Rain” is hypnotic. The the vocal melody from Napolitano is excellent and the lead break is simple but so effective.

Then you have the hard driving and funky “Jesus Forgive Me (For The Things I’m About To Say)” which is similar to what In This Moment sounds like on the last few albums.

And “Mexican Moon” still did good business in Australia, but not as good as the previous two. Feeling the pressures to repeat past successes from the label, Napolitano broke the band up.

I never heard from them again, although Wikipedia tells me that the band got back together, did a few more albums, broke up again and got back together again.

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The Record Vault – Gilby Clarke

Rubber was released in 1998.

I don’t know what I was expecting with this. I just assumed that since he was in Guns N Roses, he could write songs as well. And I didn’t get this album expecting to hear Guns N Roses like tunes, as I knew that Clarke was in a Black Crowes style band before Gunners.

And when I saw that this album clocked in at 36 minutes, especially in the CD age I was like “okay, what’s this”. Nice and fast, wham bam.

I couldn’t remember any of the songs at all.

When I saw “Kilroy Was Here” as a title I remembered Styx, but nothing from the Gilby Clarke version. It always comes back to the argument that one sale equals a fan. It doesn’t. I purchased this album, heard it a few times and never listened to it again until 22 years later.

So I pressed play to reacquaint myself with the album.

The sound reminds me of old time rock and roll mixed with all the sounds that became popular in the 90’s. Like a little bit of Seattle, and a little bit of Manchester. Second track “The Haunting” is a great example of this. It has this great solo section with a lot of fuzzed out guitar over an acoustic guitar riff that reminds me of Bad Company.

“Kilroy Was Here” kicks off the album. It has a dissonant verse but a melodic chorus.

“I’m selling you, what you sold me”

In other words, give me crap and crap will be returned. More so when I was younger. As I got older, it became easy to just delete the persons number and move on. I’m not interested in a spade for a spade anymore. It never solved anything in the first place, because it didn’t matter how many facts or truth i would have on my side, the argument could never be won.

“The Hell’s Angels” sounds sleazy and is classic Gunners, and the most heaviest track on the album. “Saturday Disaster” continues the heavy and sleazy grooves.

And how good is the riff to kick off “Technicolour Stars”?

Vocally, Clarke is okay. More pop punkish in his style and delivery.

Overall, it’s a nice listen but once it goes back onto the shelve, that would be it for the album, plus it’s not on Spotify Australia, so I can’t even add the songs I like to a playlist to have em circulating.

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Rise To It

31 years old.

Man time goes by.

“Hot In The Shade” now has a full time job, a drinking problem and is paying taxes to keep the economy going. Plus it’s got a woody problem.

Read on.

I purchased it from a store called Brashs. It specialised in sound systems and then it started to bring in musical product.

It had a decent metal and rock section but I felt that everything was way overpriced and hardly any discounts.

Then again, the price was pre-determined by the labels but who knew that kind of stuff back then. But it was the only store that had “Hot In The Shade”. So I purchased it for $20.

$20 back in 1989 is worth about $42 today with inflation added on. Which is about the price of Vinyl these days on average.

Anyway, I’ve been on a Bob Halligan Jr kick lately and he co-wrote two tracks here. “Rise To It” and “Read My Body”.

And this era of Kiss has its critics but it’s Bruce Kulick’s finest moments. His guitar work on “Crazy Nights” and “Hot In The Shade” is very underrated.

And Kulick really rose to it here and delivered a great solo.

“Rise To It” opens up with some slide guitar and a Mississippi Delta blues feel. But once the distorted guitars kick in, it’s melodic rock all the way.

But.

Listen to the riff in the Chorus.

It’s ZZ Top like. Think “Sharp Dressed Man”.

Lyrically, it’s typical Kiss, talking about hard ons or wood. Like when Paul sings “When you’re lying next to me, baby, I can guarantee, I’m gonna rise to it” he’s not talking about waking up in the morning.

And that got me thinking about ZZ Top and there song, “Woke Up With Wood”.

The lyrics, “when I woke up this morning, I was feeling mighty good, my baby understood had to do what she should, laying near a pile of wood”.

“God damn good times” is what I say. I’ve been in those morning wood situations a lot of times.

Suddenly I’m listening to “Sport’n A Woody” from Dangerous Toys. “Sport’n a woody, when you’re titties fly” and how they wish the lady was sedated so they penetrate her.

Then Ace Frehley comes to mind and how his baby is on her knees and she’s begging please for a ride on his rocket.

Ahhh, rock and roll music.

It never took it self seriously and it allowed us all to have a laugh and a good time.

I’m gonna raise my glass to Rock And Roll.

Oh wait, that’s another Kiss song. For a different time.

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A to Z of Making It, Copyright, Influenced, Music, My Stories, Stupidity, Treating Fans Like Shit

Theater Of Copyright

It looks like the “Stairway To Heaven” case going to die?

For those that don’t know, Michael Skidmore (from here on in, known as “The Trustee”), is the trustee for the Randy Craig Wolfe Trust, which has the rights to the songs written by Randy Wolfe and his time in the rock band Spirit. The song in question here is “Taurus” and the similar feel and structure that both songs have.

My view on this is easy, a dead artist cannot hold a copyright and the law which changed copyright terms to last the life of the artist plus 70 years after death is a stupid one.

Because this is the rubbish you get. But Jimmy Page didn’t win because of the silliness of dead people holding copyrights.

Jimmy Page won because the sheet music is different. But “The Trustee” believes that the court should have been able to hear the sound recordings. But that rule allowing sound recordings came into place in the mid 70’s and the songs in dispute here are under old laws.

Anyway, the case got booted.

But for how long will “artists of the now” be taken to court over copying claims from the trustees or heirs of dead artists. Institutions cannot charge fees to the dead, so how can the dead claim a copyright and be paid for it and whoever passed a rule to allow copyright to be transferred to others has committed a wrong to the public domain.

Did you see that Universal Music Group announced a $1.2B Hotel, Performance Venue and Casino in Mississippi? It’s also going to do a similar venture in Atlanta and Orlando.

You see, this is what happens when artists give away all of their rights to the labels. It gave the labels power. They used that power to lock up culture for the life of the artist plus 70 years after the death.

But David Crosby still tells everyone streaming is the enemy. Gene Simmons as well. The enemy to an artist is ignorance and a fixed mindset. There is a lot of money in recorded music. As long as you hold the copyright to the recorded music.

Otherwise why would companies spend a lot of money buying the copyrights to popular songs. The return on these songs because of streaming payments is always going up, while stocks on Wall Street go down.

And look no further than Frontiers Records from Italy. They are releasing a lot of product compared to other labels because their President knows that music scales and will keep paying forever.

And the Labels, they are pieces of work. It’s a power play. You know how artists are trying to reclaim their copyrights back from the labels after 35 years, which is legislated in Copyright Law, but the labels are fighting hard to keep the rights. So while those court cases are ongoing, the labels are now counter suing the artists for selling their own albums on their websites or for using the album art on their websites.

So the artist make the labels rich and somehow the artists are the problem.

And Copyright keeps getting very ugly because artists sue each other.

You see an idea is an idea. I could have an idea for a song here in Australia, and there is a very high probability that other people would have a similar idea, somewhere else in the world. And when one song becomes a hit, then expect a writ, because even though ideas are not copyrightable, there is also someone who believes they are.

But.

And there is always a but when it comes to Copyright.

If there isn’t a court case for similar ideas, then there are cases over licensing, samples and whatever else lawyers can fit into the grey world which is Copyright.

Not sure if you have seen the stories about Tracy Chapman suing Nicki Minaj over a sample from Chapman’s song “Baby Can I Hold You” which appears on an unreleased track from Minaj called “Sorry”.

The song “Sorry” was pulled from the album’s release because the label couldn’t get clearance to use the sample. Minaj even begged Chapman over Twitter to approve it, but Chapman is anti-samples.

And even though the song was pulled, it still didn’t stop the song from getting played on radio stations and once the song was aired, the fans quickly ripped it from the broadcast and sent it out onto the worldwide web.

Hence the court case. Chapman wants payments and Minaj says there are none.

And the arguments have all gone off track and no one really knows what the hell they are arguing and counter arguing over. Anyway, Minaj won the case.

And labels just keep doing wrong on behalf of the artists. Here you have a label called Trax Records who specialise in dance and house recordings being accused of fraudently filing sound recordings to the U.S Copyright Office of other artists and claiming the recordings as their own.

Sony Music is also doing everything it can to keep as much money from old artists in the Sony bank account. Sony paid $12.7 million to settle a case and is allowed to deny any wrongdoing. It’s amazing what $12 million buys. The fact that these old songs are still under copyright, long after the artist has passed away is an issue for me.

I guess Copyright just lives on and on and on and the courts are kept busy with cases and the labels keep ripping creators off, while they invest in start-ups, make billions and then build casinos.

All in the name of Copyright.

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