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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

Coheed and Cambria – Metro Theater, Sydney 20 April 2013 – A Set List Of Classic Songs To Be Discovered

Parking in the Sydney CBD.  It’s a nightmare, especially if you don’t frequently drive there.   Miss just one turn and you are screwed, caught in an endless maze of one way’s as you try to work your way back to where you should have been.

I had a VIP pass for the show.  I also purchased the VIP sticky pass for my cousin.  Initially, the VIP pass was to allow you inside the venue 30 minutes before normal doors opened for an acoustic show by at least one member of Coheed and Cambria (COCA).  I then saw on Facebook a few days before the show, that all VIP pass holders for the Australian and New Zealand shows will be a meet and greet session instead of the acoustic show.

Due to my issue with the parking, i didn’t know if the meet and greet went on as planned.  When i got into the venue (which was 10 minutes before the doors opened), I was treated to Travis Stever performing an acoustic song from his side project.  I didn’t realize he was such a good vocalist but it wasn’t what I wanted to see.  By the way, the meet and greet didn’t happen in Sydney, however it happened in Brisbane.  Apparently, too many people had VIP passes for the Sydney show, hence the acoustic set.

Coheed and Cambria is Claudio Sanchez.  So when i saw the rule that at least one member of Coheed and Cambria will perform an acoustic song, i always assumed it would be Claudio, since he is the vocalist and the guitarist and the main songwriter for Coheed.

So yeah, Travis played a song from his side project.  This was unfair to the Sydney fans, it was unfair to me.  Australian fans do not get a chance to see Coheed and Cambria all the time, so an acoustic song with Claudio should have been the norm here.  Next time guys, keep us in the loop.  COCA fans are devoted to COCA, but remember it’s a two-way street.  Don’t fall into the one way street train of thought that a lot of bands seem to have.

Then Circa Survive came on.  I haven’t heard a song from them, so i was interested into hearing what they are like.  What a disappointment?  All I can say is that they are the most luckiest band in the world, as Coheed as taken them around the world on The Afterman tour.  I like a song to have a good riff.  Coheed have a lot of songs that fall into this category.  Circa Survive don’t have that.  The last song Get Out and the second last song, The Difference Between Poison and Medicine Is The Dose weren’t bad songs, however that was it.  Actually one of the guitarist’s stormed off the stage pretty quickly.  He was tuning up his guitar the whole night, which was confusing, however there was an incident early on in the set where the singer hit the neck of the guitar, so maybe something got messed up there.

COCA opened up with No World for Tomorrow.  The title track from their 2007 album, Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume Two: No World for Tomorrow.  This is where Claudio (the character) comes to grips with the fact that he is The Crowing and sets out for the ultimate battle with Wilhelm Ryan and Mayo Deftinwolf.  

This is the battle cry.  COCA is the ring master and the fans are the IRObots.  It was the perfect opener.

Bye, bye world, or will our hope still hold on?
Boy, you’re never going see,
The things that will come of these (days.)
Raise your hands high!
Young brothers and sisters,
There’s a world’s worth of work and a need for you.
Oh, a change is coming, feel these doors now closing in.
Is there no world for tomorrow, if we wait for today?

In the whole story arc of The Armory Wars, the characters are tools of fate.  Raise your hands high, young brothers and sisters.  We are at the show, and Coheed and Cambria has come of age.  They opened up with No World For Tomorrow and then took us to the pop/punk – emo tones of A Favor House Atlantic.

A Favor House Atlantic is from In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3.

During the War of the Mages started by Wilhem Ryan, Althaddeus Favor was a Mage that disappeared, and it remains unknown what happened to him. Ryan then moved in on his home, the House Atlantic.  This part of the story came to light during The Year Of The Black Rainbow release.

A Favor House Atlantic is about the death of Al The Killer.  At the start, Al betrays Claudio (the character), as he takes the group to the House Atlantic, which is Wilhelm Ryan’s headquarters.  Al redeems himself at the last-minute, and helps the group to escape, which in turn will cost Al his life.  The Bye Bye Beautiful part is said to Ambellina who Al started to like and it was for that reason he made his last heroic stand.

Bye bye beautiful
Don’t bother to write
Disturbed by your words and they’re calling all cars
Face step, let down.
Face step, step down

It is well-known that Coheed and Cambria songs have dual meanings, referencing real life events that then are woven into the story arc.  There are good arguments put forward on a lot of Coheed blogs, that mention this song is about the Columbine shootings.

Goodnight, Fair Lady was up next continuing with the pop rock feel started with A Favor House Atlantic.  We have gone back in time for the story.  Back to the time of Sirius Armory.  This is another song with a dual meaning.  In the context of the story, this is where Meri, the wife of Sirius is saved from having her drink spiked by a police officer called Grave Colten.  Sirius is presumed dead at this point in time, as his ship had exploded.      In real life, it is about a creepy looking guy at a bar.  The song is on The Afterman; Ascension album.

I’m the snake waiting for you, dear
And eventually you’ll come to me
I know you will

The Crowing kept the pop rock feel going.  This is where Claudio (the character) is woken up by Ambellina, a member of the Prise (a form of guardian angels) who has been sent out to protect Claudio and ensure that he becomes The Crowing, the one foretold in the prophecy, that will be responsible for the end of the Keywork.  It is from the album, In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3.

If I form mistakes, would I take them back
If erasing them could, if erasing them would
But would they be the words that I would say

Next up is Vic the Butcher and the show has moved away from the pop rock feel into a more heavy rock feel.  Key Entity Extraction III: Vic the Butcher, is about Claudio’s and Chondra’s real life relationship.  In relation to the story Vic is a tyrannical general who massacred innocent people for the good of the cause.  The Achilles heel for Vic The Butcher is Sentry The Defiant, the Sargeant that defied Vic and paid the price with his life.  The song is on The Afterman; Ascension album.  

Baby I’m bad company,
And you don’t have a mark
You’re the prettiest thing I’ve ever seen
Come with me, I want to make you dirty

This will cut you down to pieces
One-eighty-four, let’s burn it down
And if I can’t keep from living with this regret
I’ll need to change the way I think

The show now went into the mellow part of the night.  The hair from Claudio was all tied up.

Key Entity Extraction IV: Evagria the Faithful is the opposite of Vic The Butcher.  It’s about loss, when a person that we love is gone, how would we feel.  Evagria pulled Sirius from Vic’s possession and acts as his savior from the souls who want him.  The song is on The Afterman; Ascension album. 

I am not who I seem, who you thought I could be,
The support you could lean up against when you need,
I’m the dark when you want, the lights out at all costs,
This is mine, that is yours, I’m the bricks in your wall.

The Afterman started with the beautiful delay lead written by Travis, that goes throughout the whole song.  The song was written when Claudio’s (singer) wife Chondra, found out that a very close friend passed away via Facebook.  In relation, to the story, this is where Meri, Sirius’s wife hears the news that Sirius Armory is feared dead, after his ship explodes.  

She gave her heart to a falling star
When news filtered through of his tragedy all the walls went up
Around a world she declines
As the tears from her eyes fall
No one understands, and no one will
All she has lost

Here We Are Juggernaut is heavy.  It’s a perfect pick me up after The Afterman.  In real life, it is Claudio referring to his wife Chondra as his secret weapon and together they are unstoppable.  In the Amory Wars story, it refers to the characters Coheed and Cambria, the growing attraction they are felling for each other, the discovery of Wilhelm Ryan’s plan to siphon the universe’s energy for his own use and the plight of Dr. Leonard Hohenberger, the creator of Coheed and Cambria.  Here We Are Juggernaut is the battle cry.  It is from The Year of The Black Rainbow album.  

 

We were stupid, we got caught
But nothing matters anymore
So what? Here we are, juggernaut,
So let’s hang us a hangman, we’ll bury our burdens in blood

Dark Side of Me is about allowing people into your world, the good and the bad.  As mentioned by Claudio in the deluxe edition book, “True intimacy lies in the dark side, in making peace with the fact that it lives somewhere, so that you share it with the person and they can be there to help you overcome it.”  

In relation to the story, this is after Meri had died in a crash caused by Sirius after she told him she couldn’t be with him and that she was carrying the baby of Officer Colten.  The song is on The Afterman; Descension album.

“You had a million chances to play the hero for her, but you made your choice and hers too.  You left that woman in the dark and came back like you could just turn the light on?  If you loved her, you would’ve stayed up there Sirius, you would have let her go.” Colten said to Sirius.

I gave my everything
For all the wrong things
In this cold reality I made
This selfish war machine

Oh, this has become hell
How can I share this life
With someone else?
I promise you
There is no weight that can bury us
Beneath the ghosts of all my guilt

Here in the dark side of me

In Keeping Secrets of Silent Earth: 3 is the closer of the first set.  Its epic and the crowd sang it all the way through.  Man Your Battle Stations is the war cry as the Rebel army prepares for war.

In the seventh turning hour
Will the victims shadow fall?
Should the irony grow hungry?
With the victory and all they sought for
We were one among the fence
One among the fence

The encore begins.  Key Entity Extraction I: Domino the Destitute was written before the final Michael Todd (ex bassist in Coheed) episode.  In relation to the story line, Domino is a form of energy in the Keywork, angry and bitter, forever stuck in the afterlife.   

The story of Domino, a boxer with talent that gave in to all of the temptations of fame, like drugs and fell in with the local mafia boss.  After losing a fight against the current champion, Domino is offered a chance to redeem himself to the mafia boss by committing a robbery.  He convinces his brother, to help him.  It all goes wrong, his brother gets killed and Domino unable to live with himself, commits suicide.  The song is on The Afterman; Ascension album.

Welcome Home is closer, with its Led Zeppelin Kashmir groove.  It’s as epic as Kashmir.  A song dealing with loss that turns to anger.  The Writer is the character in this, he is the reaper, about to kill a woman that he loves as she pleads for her life.  The song is on the Good Apollo, I’m Burning Star IV, Volume One: From Fear Through The Eyes Of Madness album.  

One last kiss for you
One more wish to you
Please make up your mind girl…
Before I hope you die

Overall, Coheed put on a show.  They easily could have played another 5 to 6 numbers, and in my view they should have, as they don’t tour Australia often.  I remember Dream Theater put on a three-hour extravaganza the first time they toured here.  

Also a big thumbs up to Josh Eppard on drums (Welcome Home) and Zach Cooper on bass.  You guys killed it.  

Till next time.  

One last thing, parking cost $29.  Nice hit on the wallet.  Thanks Sydney CBD for ripping people off again.  At least the Beef Yeeros at Brighton Le Sands made up for it.     

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

Stargazer – Kingdom Come – Classic Song waiting to be discovered

It’s the keyboard synth intro.  It grabs you from the outset and by the time the whole band kicks in with the guitar line playing the same keyboard intro, you are hooked.

Lenny Wolf was the Eighties Robert Plant.  He did Robert Plant better than Robert Plant.  Regardless of how critics and fans saw Kingdom Come, one thing is undeniable, they wrote songs that are catchy as hell.

Stargazer is not a charting song.  It was never designed to be.  It is a classic rock song.  It is written by singer Lenny Wolf, guitarists Danny Stag / Rick Steier and bassist Johnny B Frank.   The song was produced by Keith Olsen fresh from Whitesnake’s smash 1987 album and Ozzy’s No Rest For The Wicked.  It has an epic feel to it, however it is only 5 minutes long.

Sitting in the dark
Staring at the sky
Within all of heavens eyes
Wondering where and why
Who made all of this come alive
Who knows what will come in time

The ultimate question, the why are we are, and what is our purpose in life.

Ooh, just to know what’s the reason for making us
Is what I would like to know
Ooh, just to know where we go when the earth is cold
We may never know

If only we had a crystal ball that could tell us the answers.  If only we had a crystal ball to look into the future.

All the mystery dreams and fantasy
We touched on our way to see
Living day by day trying to getaway
Dream on to another space

We always wanted to be somewhere else.  We are like the small town boy or girl from Don’t Stop Believing.  Trying to catch the last train out of our current lives and into a better life.  Of course life is nothing like that.

Ooh, just to know that you are not the only one
Who is searching on
Ooh, just to know that beyond there is something more
For the rich and poor

Live, work, die.  Three words that sound familiar to everybody.  When said together like that, it is the easiest summation of every single persons’ life.  We just want to know if there is some afterlife, something after death that makes this life worth it.

Check it out.. YouTube

Within three months of the In Your Face album coming out, the band had called it a day.  What an implosion?  At least they left us with two classic albums, with the classic line up.

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Music, My Stories

Storm Thorgerson – Off to the Bright Side of The Afterlife

The album cover was an important part of each album release.  A lot of the times we purchased albums based on how the cover looked.  Iron Maiden immediately comes to mind.  Most of the times people are unaware who the artists are that create these iconic images.  In this case, Storm Thorgerson is a name that people either know or don’t know.

I guarantee if you mention to anyone the name Storm Thorgerson they would look at you like you are speaking a different language.

However if you mentioned Pink Floyd – The Dark Side Of The Moon, then you get a reaction.  You can say that he is best known for creating the prism-spreading color spectrum on the front of Pink Floyd‘s ‘The Dark Side of the Moon’ album.  (All images are sourced from Wikipedia, so that I can showcase my favourite album covers by Storm).

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Pink Floyd – A Momentary Lapse Of Reason was the first Pink Floyd album I purchased in the late eighties.  From this album I started to go back and explore the others.

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Storm passed away, on Thursday 18th April after a long illness with cancer and the after effects of a stroke in 2003. He was in his 69 years old.

If you have Dream Theater’s – A Change of Season EP, Falling Into Infinity album or Once In A Livetime album, then the cover art was all designed by Storm.  Dream Theater is one of my favourite bands at the moment.

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File:Dream Theater - Falling into Infinity Album Cover.jpg

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Megadeth’s – Rude Awakening DVD cover, was designed by Storm.  This cover is a dead set classic.

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Europe – Secret Society – again very creative, the secret society is faceless people pulling you in all directions.

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Thornley – Come Again – this is one of his best covers, the trap door exit into another world or an alternate reality.

Peter Gabriel – I love the ghostly face in the car with the raindrops. The light and dark shades capture the moment.

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Black Sabbath – Technical Ecstasy – this one was a rare one from Storm, as most of his album covers involved photographs and manipulation of photographs.  This one is more or less a drawing.

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Muse – Absolution – the shadows of the people falling down from the sky, while the person looks up.  Brilliant. Or are the people finding absolution and are being taken up the sky.  Again it makes you think.

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Led Zeppelin – Presence – I always took this photo as showing a side of the wealthy/powerful and the black presence in the middle of the table.  I am sure others have a different take on it.  It has been known the Jimmy Page dabbled in black magic, and could this be the presence that the album cover refers too. It makes you think.

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The Mars Volta – Frances The Mute – we are all faceless people bypassing each other, just to get ahead.

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Biffy Clyro – Only Revolutions – i love the contrast of the Red and the Blue.  Very war like.

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There are a lot of other covers out there, so delve deep and remember the man who is iconic to pop culture.  He worked with the best and he is the best.  Rest in Peace and thanks for the memories.  

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music, My Stories

Motley Crue – 1994 – Poison Apples, Hammered, Till Death Do Us Part – John Corabi Era – Part 2

Continuing on from Gerri Miller’s Metal Edge interview with Nikki Sixx.  The below excerpts in italics are taken from Metal Edge circa 1994.  The lyrics and comments are added by me.

“POISON APPLES”
A rocker with a punky vibe, this song was originally called “Hangin’ by a Thread.” Nikki wrote it last year in “Hawaii on vacation, when Bob [Rock’s band Rockhead] was out with Bon Jovi. I recorded the riff on a ghetto blaster and played it for the band, and they said this is really cool.  It got thrown into the Motley stew and turned into a bastardized version of the original. But nothing about it kicked ass.” Meanwhile Nikki was working on a possibility for his solo song with the title of ‘Poison Apples.  

Subject wise “The first part is my story what that time of my life was about. The second part is more about the band, and takes aim at the “tabloid sleaze” press preoccupation with Tommy Lee and Heather Locklear’s now-defunct marriage.  Lines like “Sex smack rock roll mainline overdose/Man we lived it night and day” refer to past excesses, and homage is paid to one of Nikki’s favorite bands, Mott the Hoople.  “Ian Hunter’s one of my favorite lyricists and Overend Watts is the reason I play,” he says. “Tommy Lee played honky-tonk piano on it.”

Don’t you love that knowledge.  How the song starts of as one thing and it ends up going through a metamorphosis into something else.    

Tabloid sleaze just maggots on their knees
Diggin’ in the dirt for slag
Moonshine, strychnine, speedball, shootin’ lines
Anything to push their rags

Nothing has changed these days.  If you want to be misquoted or if you want to have words taken out of context, do an interview for the mainstream.  If you want your fans to know what you mean, connect with them.  Let them be the interviewers.

Pretty little poison apples, see the scars tattooed on our face.
It’s your disgrace.
Pretty pretty poison apples, mama said,
“Now don’t you walk this way, just find some faith.”

The lyrics on Motley Crue are world-class.  I like how Nikki refers to the band as pretty little poison apples.  He is merging the Garden of Eden with LA and the dreams of a young kid trying to make it.

“HAMMERED”
Cool, heavy, with grooves galore, this song is “about a sleazy piece of shit person in anyone’s life.”  Some might infer that it’s about Vince Neil but when asked about it, Nikki insists that it isn’t.  I don’t know where I was coming from when I wrote it.  It’s a song about a dirt bag.  We all know plenty of them.  Written very quickly at rehearsal, its characterized by Nikki as having a Deep Purple vibe.

To be honest, when i first heard this song, I took it as a dig to Vince Neil.  According to Nikki, Vince quit because he wasn’t into music anymore and he wanted to devote his time to car racing.  According to Vince, he got fired, because he didn’t like the direction the new music was heading/  Apparently it was all keyboard driven.

Regardless of what story you believe, one thing is clear, Vince Neil delivered a superior hard rock album with Exposed, which came out 1993, a whole year before Motley Crue.  In my mind, this made Nikki’s words mean shit.

Act like Jesus crucified again
These four walls are closing in
Who and what do you think you are
A rich mother fucker in a fancy car?
Concrete jackal suckin’ on the past
Goldcard junkie kissing money’s ass

You can tell that Nikki is directing the words to a person who is suing him.  Vince Neil sued Motley Crue in 1992 after his firing, for 25% of the Crue’s future profits and $5 million in damages for being fired.  In addition, Exposed was selling close to the million mark.  As we know once, Motley Crue came out with their 1994 album, they only moved 500,000 units.

Hey, Mr. big time Hollywood,
Tell your story walkin’ if you think you could
Your money’s runnin’ low from your cocaine whores
Nothin’ but a rat scratchin’ at my door
Hey, now I’ve said all I’m gonna say
Time will judge, see who fades away

There was an incident where Vince and port star Savannah went to Hawaii.  After 4 days of partying on pills and cocaine, Savannah overdosed.  As much as Nikki denies it, this song is having a dig at Vince.  Time did judge, and it was Nikki that needed to get Vince back into the fold.

TILL DEATH DO US PART
This soulful heavy rocker is “about pride and standing up for what you believe in, standing up for yourself till you die.  It reminds me of ‘Danger’ off the second album,” says Nikki.  “It’s mid tempo but not really a ballad. It’s very emotional.”

Autobiographical lines include “I’ve walked my walk, talked my talk, lived and died in my songs. Temptation cuts so deep/Its fires still burn so strong/You know I’ve lived a few mistakes and I stand by them … Sometimes my words may cut too deep and I step on a toe or two/Half dead and barely half alive but I live by the truth.”

Nikki notes, “A lot of people tend to look at us from the outside in,” drawing wrong conclusions because of what they read.  But “I don’t really care, to be honest with you. The only thing that’s important is family and friends.”

Till Death Do Us Part is the best song written by Motley Crue.  They should have re-recorded this as a B side or a bonus track with Vince.  Of course Vince wouldn’t sing it, he has made that clear in previous interviews.  The album was meant to be called Till Death Do Us Part.  The guys even tattoed the name on their bodies.

Poison Apples – YouTube

Hammered – YouTube

Till Death Do Us Part – YouTube

 

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music, My Stories

Next 100 Years, I Could Make A Living Out of Lovin’ You and Ain’t No Cure For Love – Classic Songs Waiting To Be Discovered

Crush.  Does anyone know that It’s My Life came from this album.  You can say this was Bon Jovi’s renaissance.  After delivering a terrible album in These Days and a worse solo album in Destination Anywhere, Jon Bon Jovi needed to go back to Rock N Roll.  Luke Ebbin was on board to produce the album.  It was to be his first major production credit and what a good job he did with it.  It’s My Life was a monster.  So whatever came after it, wasn’t going to matter.  Call it the curse of the Number 1 effect.  Crush was a great album.  However, it was the B-sides that came with the CD-singles that were the standouts.

Next 100 Years was written by Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora.  It has that Beatles Hey Jude ending and then from about 4.25 it just goes into overdrive.  It’s got that Seventies vibe, that abandonment.  Hell the song even goes up to 6.19 which strays very far from the pop formula that Bon Jovi is renowned for.  Sambora wails on the guitar.  This is the year 2000, Nu Metal is ruling the scene and guitar solos are non-existent.  Trying telling that to Richie.  He must have missed the memo.  If there is one thing I can say about Richie, he stayed true to himself as an artist.  He didn’t follow the grunge trend or the industrial electronic trend Jon followed on Destination Anywhere.   He just remained the same.  His second solo album, Undiscovered Soul was a real standout in 1998.  I even watched him perform, 5 minutes from my house, at the Shellharbour Workers Club.  Now that was an unexpected surprise.

I’ll believe 
When you don’t believe in anything

That is life.  When I don’t believe someone else i know believes in something better and vice versa.  The Yin and the Yang.

I Could Make A Living Out Of Lovin’ You was written by Jon Bon Jovi, Richie Sambora and Billy Falcon.   If you like AC/DC, if you like rock n roll, this is the song for you.    It’s the a quality AC/DC song not written by the Young Brothers.  This song was on the Australian deluxe version as a bonus track.  To me, it is one of the best rock songs Bon Jovi has written.  It’s got that Bon Scott tongue in cheek attitude in the lyrics.  It is the guys having fun.  Yes FUN.  That is what it is supposed to be about.  Having FUN.  

If there’s something that needs fixing 
I’m the man to see 
Look me up, I’m listed 
Just check under “B” 
If you’re ever on the spot 
Well, I’m good with my hands 
24-7 I’m your handyman 

Until the work is finished 
Well, I don’t get paid 
I don’t mind getting dirty 
That’s my middle name 
I’m in the service business 
So I understand 
Call me 24-7, I’m your handyman

Aint No Cure For Love is the best ZZ Top song not written by ZZ Top.  How this song has not ended up as a Bon Jovi classic is a tragedy.  It’s the guys having fun again.  It’s written by Richie Supa, Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora.  Supa is known for his contributions to Aerosmith, plus Sambora used him for a lot of the Undiscovered Soul songs.   This is Classic Rock revisited in the YEAR 2000.  It deserves more attention.  It show a different side of Bon Jovi.

Cupid was a blind man
He must have missed his mark
Shot an arrow in the air and hit me in the heart

I went to see Saint Valentine
Said whats come over me?
Daddy must have missed the chapter about the birds and bees

You can be the King of diamonds
You can cash in all your gold
You could hire Johnnie Cochran
It’s too late to save your soul

NEXT 100 YEARS – YouTube

I COULD MAKE A LIVING OUT OF LOVIN’ YOU – YouTube

AIN’T NO CURE FOR LOVE – YouTube

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Copyright, Music, My Stories

Danny Stag – Guitar World – September 1989

The interview below (in italics) appeared in the September 1989 issue of Guitar World.  It was written by Brad Tolinski.

Kingdom Come lead guitarist Danny Stag speaks with the humility of a man who knows he’s been blessed. ‘”It was a mind blower” he says, describing last summers’ Monsters Of Rock tour.   “Our U.S. debut was in front of 40,000 people.  Some bands only get to do that a couple of times in their whole careers, and many never get that chance at all.  We did a whole tour to those numbers.” 

We got short changed in Australia.  We never got these mega bills of super star bands.  I remember buying Circus, Metal Edge and Hit Parader and reading about the Monsters of Rock tour.  It had Kingdom Come opening, followed by Metallica, then Dokken, then Scorpions and the mighty Van Halen headlining.  Kingdom Come formed in 1987, taking musicians from various other rock groups that were paying their dues on the club circuit.  By 1988 they had gone multi-platinum with their debut and are playing to 40,000 people. It was this kind of ride to the top, that a lot of kids expected to happen to them once they formed bands.   When it didn’t happen within one to two years, they would call it quits.  

On the tour with Stag were some of rock s most lauded guitarists, including the legendary Edward Van Halen. When asked whether he found such fast company intimidating, Stag launches into an illuminating examination of his roots.  “I realized that I was the only a blues based player,” he says. “Rather than competing, I was playing in my own ball game. My tastes run more towards Howlin’ Wolf, Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon and Jimi Hendrix.  People don’t usually think of Hendrix as a blues traditionalist, but I feel he was one of the masters, maybe the ultimate.” 

As an aspiring guitarist, this is what I wanted to read.  Who influenced the people that are influencing me?  Muddy Waters, Howlin Wolf, Willie Dixon.  Back in 1989, I had never heard of those players.  There is that name again Jimi Hendrix.  His name just kept on popping up in interviews from the Eighties.   

Although one wouldn’t immediately detect the Mississippi Delta in the arena rock anthems of Kingdom Come, interludes like the funky acoustic intro to “Highway 6,” off their latest, In Your Face, suggest a refreshing depth and sense of history.  Stag is pleasantly forthright and even passionate about his music and his influences. However, he makes only brief mention of the band Kingdom Come is most often compared to Led Zeppelin.  How valid does Stag see those comparisons to be?

“I must admit, I used to scratch my head in disbelief when people compared me to Page.  He was an influence, but not a big one.  I really liked Zeppelin’s first two albums, but I didn’t care that much for what followed.  I think younger people are missing the Hendrix part of my playing because they aren’t as familiar with him as they are with Page.” 

“This Led Zeppelin/Kingdom Come comparison has been blown way out of proportion. Some of it comes from the way Lenny (Wolf, Kingdom Come’s vocalist) sings, but if you listen to Lenny and Robert Plant back-to-back you’ll find they don’t sound anything a like.  Plant’s voice has completely different tonal qualities.  Maybe we come out sounding like Zeppelin when everything is mixed with our drummer, who plays a monster back beat.  It’s hard to escape the fact that Zeppelin created certain hard-rock conventions that every band uses.” 

“But you could accuse Hendrix of ripping off Muddy Waters,” says Stag with increasing irritation. “Voodoo Chile is a lot like Water’s (I’m Your) Hoochie Coochie Man.  The Beatles were influenced by Buddy Holly and the Everly Brothers.  The difference is, the Beatles and Hendrix did variations on the music they loved and their influences were more like tributes. Paying respect to your musical forefathers is part of a long tradition.   Ex-Zepsters Page, Plant and John Paul Jones, who’ve been openly hostile to bands like Kingdom Come and Whitesnake, should perhaps re-examine the condition of their glass houses.  It’s fairly common knowledge that Led Zeppelin brazenly borrowed, almost note-for-note, several Chess-label classics.”

“Whole Lotta Love, one of their biggest hits, was proven in a court of law to have been taken directly—without permission or subsequent knowledge—from a Willie Dixon tune.  After I read an interview with Page where he accused me of stealing from him, I wanted to do a solo album and call it Houses of The Bitter.  I’d record Whole Lotta Love, I Can’t Quit You and You Shook Me and write in huge letters who really wrote those tunes.  To be influenced like we’ve been is one thing, but to steal songs without acknowledgement is another.”

“I don’t know.  Maybe some of the bad blood started when a journalist misquoted me.  This guy told Page that I claimed to never having heard Led Zeppelin.  That’s obviously absurd and Jimmy would have a right to feel ticked off.”

Back in September 1989, this was a shock to read.  Led Zeppelin borrowing songs from other artists and passing it off as their own.  These days, I am older and wiser, but back then I was green.  They even stole the intro riff to Stairway To Heaven and failed to acknowledge it.  I have said it many times, musicians are the sum of their influences.  No music is created in a vacuum.  Kingdom Come is very similar to the hard rock version of Led Zeppelin and they hit pay dirt with that similarity.  The audience wanted Led Zeppelin to be around.  Since Led Zep was not around, other bands stepped up like Whitesnake and Kingdom Come to fill the void.  The audience lapped it up, sending these bands to the top of the charts.   

Stag sounds defensive but he doesn’t need to be.  His manic, hormonally charged soloing, aggressive pick attack and tightly would vibrato remain distinctive whether filtered through a single coil Strat pick up, a fat sounding Les Paul or a plain old acoustic Martin. 

“I never work out solos,” says Stag.  “I just wait til I’m inspired.  Then I have the engineers crank the music real loud in the control room and I go for it.  I just shut my eyes and improvise.  It’s like a short burst of emotion.  When you want to comment on something, you use the words available to you in your vocabulary.  Soloing is like that with me.  I’m commenting on what’s happening musically by reaching into my built up musical vocabulary of licks and scales and use whatever is relevant.  I don’t worry about how it’s going to work, it’s just a feel thing.”  

I used to read the comments from guitarists who said they never worked their solos out with a grain of salt.  My idol Randy Rhoads worked his solo’s out and he created masterpieces, Vito Bratta the same.  Solos are meant to add to the song.  This is what guitarists forgot towards the late eighties.  In saying that, Stag’s leads where good on the ear.  By having a musical vocabulary, he had that knowledge to work out the solos on the fly. 

To translate that feeling in the studio, Stag uses a 1962 Stratocaster with a bridge-position humbucker, in tandem with a 50-watt Marshall head. All of Stag’s Stage effects are by T.C. Electronics.  “My system is pretty simple. The 2290 has five effects loops, and they’re completely programmable.  Most of the time I just use a little delay panned so that two of my cabinets are dry and two are wet. I keep the dry cabinets so I never lose punch.  I have some parametric eq’s, but I only use them on one song and a couple of solos.  They help emphasize my single-coil sound.”

How minimal the set up?  That is what Rock N Roll is all about.  Plug the guitar into the amp, turn it up and bash away.  These days, the guitar rigs are a plethora of schematics. 

Now that Kingdom Come has comfortably settled into star status, what does the future hold for Stag?  
“I’d like to experiment more with sound, like the weird stuff Hendrix was doing on Axis: Bold As Love. I don’t really think you lose your identity when you change tone or pickups; it’s what ‘s under the fingers. You could tell it was Hendrix whether he was playing clean or whether his sound was balls-to-the wall.  Having sound is everything, but having a sound is not.  Kingdom Come is close to taking its place alongside the great bands.  We’re like a Deep Purple, a Rainbow or a Led Zeppelin. We might not be as original as those guys were in their time, but we have that kind of musicianship. We’ve got the depth.”

The interview appeared in the September 1989 Guitar World issue.  It was obviously done around April / May 1989 when the In Your Face album was released.  Kingdom Come called it quits in August 1989.  So by the time the magazine hit the newsstands, Kingdom Come was no more.  They left us with two magical albums.  In Your Face is a very under rated album and it deserves more attention than what it got.  However that is for another day.     

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Music

Vito Bratta – Eddie Trunk Interview – 17 February 2007

VITO BRATTA – so the record company’s saying we need another Pride.  I say, Ok, so what exactly does that mean?  The label goes we need the hit singles… I go listen the songs we gave you, on “Pride” weren’t hit singles written purposely to be to be hit singles. They were just songs that became hit singles and they were just songs we wrote.  Now you’ve got somebody telling you now you have to purposely write a hit single.  Now how do you do that?  How do you purposely write a hit single, I mean there are people out there that do that…

Vito was a songwriter who created songs that he wanted to create.  That is why the music sounded magical.  I always hated it, when a band’s creativity was stifled or chained just so that the labels can chase dollars, and by doing that the labels end up losing because the band becomes lost.  If a band becomes lost, the audience will know.  In the seventies, the bands did what they wanted.  The labels were scared to say anything to the artists.  Then the artists got rich, joined with Wall Street bankers and everything changed.

VITO BRATTA – “Big Game” was a setback for the Label.  It didn’t sell as many.   We were doing a headlining tour of Europe by ourselves for the Big Game album and they (the Label) said wouldn’t it be great if we played at Wembley with Motley Crue and Skid Row? 

Skid Row went on and they were just killing the place.  And Motley Crue had a great show and here we are sandwiched in between.

We realized, that night, on stage at Wembley that these songs from the Big Game album aren’t translating well in the live show because when you’ve got tens of thousands of angry British rockers out in the audience and if you don’t have a certain type of music; it just wasn’t working.  So we all looked at each other on stage and said we need to throw in some of our better stuff in here.  I was like what better stuff.  We need to write more for who we are because these songs are not translating.  

Then we went back to the States and we told the record label, no more tours on this album.  We are going to do the album that we want to do.  And they said well considering how the last album went, they said “go ahead”.  They gave us unlimited funds.  Mane Attraction was a half a million dollar record.  They just said go and do everything that you want.  Now the problem was that by the time it came out, that whole scene was over with.  

A half a million dollar record, and once it came out, it was over in 4 months.  These days you can record an album for 10,000.  Then again why would you.  Just record your best songs and release more frequently.  White Lion where missing for 18 months from the music business.  It was the worst decision ever made.

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Music, My Stories

C.C. DeVille – Guitar World September 1989 – Part 1

The below article (which I have re-typed in italics) was written by Brad Tolinski and it appeared in the Guitar World issue of September 1989.  

When Poison colleague Bret Michaels was asked to suggest an appropriate alternative career for the flamboyant C.C. DeVille, he immediately replied: “C.C. is obnoxious, so he’d be a great game show host.”

C.C. DeVille, I remember was the winner of the Worst Guitarist Polls in the Guitar mags back in the late eighties and early nineties.  When guitar playing got exposure via Shrapnell Records,  a new audience niche was born.  I called that niche, the Guitarist Elite.  This new niche hated guitarists like Mick Mars, C.C. DeVille, Scotti Hill, and many others from successful hard rock bands, as they where too sloppy and too safe (always referring to the Pentatonic scale).  The funny thing here is that this same elite revered Ace Frehley, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck and other players that also had strong roots with the Pentatonic scale.

GW – Who are your favorite guitar players?
Jimmy Page.  Not because he’s trendy at the moment, but because when I was eighteen I thought he sucked.  I had to mature as a player to really appreciate him.  Youth never understands nuance or phrasing.  I initially hated all the great guitarists. The local players would say, “Dude, listen to this.”  They’d play some Page or Hendrix, but I wasn’t able to comprehend it.  I wanted to hear speed.  When you’re young you approach things from a different perspective.  There’s peer pressure to always burn and your emotional thing isn’t very developed.

I will admit that when i was starting off, I couldn’t get into Hendrix and Page.  Growing up in the Eighties, I loved the hard rock / glam scene.  At that time it was all about Warren DeMartini, Randy Rhoads, George Lynch, Eddie Van Halen, Mick Mars, Yngwie Malmsteen, John Sykes and David Mustaine (I actually like Megadeth first before i liked Metallica, and that was courtesy of Mega).   I didn’t get into Page and Hendrix until 1993.  That was when the Labels abandoned the eighties scene in favour of grunge.  I took that as a cue to delve deeper into the Seventies.

My next major influence would have to be Jeff Beck.  “Because We Ended As Lovers” off Blow By Blow is the pinnacle of confidence on a guitar.  It’s a brilliant example of the guitar as an emotional medium.

To be honest, C.C. is spot on here.  Jeff Beck’s Blow By Blow album was another album that I explored in the nineties.  I remember reading a lot of interviews from Slash, where he talks the world of Jeff Beck.  Then he appears on Blaze Of Glory from Jon Bon Jovi.  Then he was set to appear with Guns N Roses on the song Locomotive, but didn’t because of a cymbal crash sending him partially deaf for a while.   I was interested and i wasn’t disappointed.  Try telling a current Metalcore guitarist that can sweep over eight strings and play a million tapped notes a minute to go and give Jeff Beck a listen.

Jimi Hendrix was amazing because he destroyed all conventional knowledge of what it meant to play guitar.  We all tend to play it safe.  If someone says a song is in A, we immediately jump to a familiar scale in that key.  Hendrix didn’t think that way, he just followed his own vision.  My favorite cut by him is Little Wing.

Again, my nineties “Seventies Boot Camp” began with Jimmy Page.  Hendrix was next.  Clapton was third.  Beck was fourth.  Tommy Bolin was fifth.  Paul Kossoff was sixth.  I was already aware of Richie Blackmore, Tony Iommi and Ace Frehley.  They where the big three for me originally.  Now it involves so many other great guitarists/songwriters like Steve Lukather from Toto, Ted Nugent, Neal Schon, Carlos Santana, Larry Carlton, Al DiMeola, John McLaughlin and so many other’s.

I first heard Little Wing when Skid Row covered it.  Then I heard Stevie Ray Vaughan’s version.  I liked the little differences between each.  Nothing can compare to Hendrix’s version.  Even the vocal line is sorrowful.  You can feel the sadness and the hope all rolled into one.

If guitar playing has turned into an athletic event, then Eddie Van Halen is the Olympic champion – he lit the flame.  Speed is a great thing to have when you need it and something I’m always trying hard to develop, but Edward is the master at using it properly.  You’d have to be a fool to deny his influence  on every rock player in this decade.  Eddie saved Rock N Roll.  In 1979 music was starting to head towards synthesizers and skinny ties, and Van Halen came out and made it very chic to play guitar.  He’s still the greatest.  You hear kids saying he’s not good anymore, but they can’t appreciate what a good songwriter he’s turned into.

This is true.  Rock N Roll was always in the scene, buried with the coming of disco and ignored with the movement into new wave.  Van Halen made it cool again to be a rock band.  They had the stiff middle finger raised and we all wanted to be part of that attitude.  They paved the way for the eighties destruction that was too come.

Another major influence was a guy named Lee Pickens who played with a band called Bloodrock in the early Seventies.  He was way ahead of his time.  It was lucky for me that my brother bought their record or I would  have never known about him.  My favorite track was something called Cheater.  One of the greatest solos of all time.

This is what we want as fans.  Musicians telling us their influences.  Cheater was on the second Bloodrock album.  From the 5.10 mark, Lee lets it burn.  Its melodic and its brilliant.  The cowboy style yeahs, just add to the climax.  Its the like the end of the world.  Apocalypse will happen when the song is over.  Check it out.  Just click on Cheater.

As I get older I understand that the guitar is not about showing off, it’s a conduit for emotion.  I’m a stylist, not a size of your penis type player.  Playing guitar is about music, it’s not a contest.

The Nineties made me re-evaluate what it is to be a guitar player.  When i started playing in the mid 80’s my main focus was rhythm.  Then when i picked up the Randy Rhoads Tribute album, my focus initially was on the wonderful RR riffs.  Then i started to delve into the leads.  The Nineties was a time with no bass player.  Due to that I had to adapt the way i write riffs so that i always had a bass note running, so that when we jammed a song, it sounded complete.  So the solo breaks ended up turning into riff driven breakdowns.

 

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Classic Songs to Be Discovered, Music

Black Hearted Woman – Blue Murder

John Sykes could have followed the Whitesnake formula he established on the 1987 album with Blue Murder.  John Kalodner even pressured him to come up with Whitesnake style songs.  In the end Black Hearted Woman and Out of Love were delivered to appease Geffen Records.  Blue Murder was guitarist/vocalists John Sykes, bassist Tony Franklin (from the Firm) and drummer Carmine Appice (King Kobra, Jeff Beck).   

The album was produced by Bob Rock who would go on to greater glory with Motley Crue’s Dr Feelgood and Metallica’s Black album.  It was mixed by another Canadian in the super experienced Mike Fraser.  The album even has the following comments: WARNING!! THIS ALBUM HAS BEEN “FRAZZED”.

When I first heard the album, i was blown away.  This was an artist being creative and pushing his own boundaries.  There where no commercial pop singles to push on this album.

Black Hearted Woman has that Children of The Night/Aint Gonna Break My Heart Again vibe from the Whitesnake album.   The riffs are very similar.  It was written by the band.  It is perfect and sleazy.  The small lead break before the bridge is reminiscent to what Sykes did in the Cold Sweat solo break by Thin Lizzy.  He is referencing his past.  His influences.

Even the lyrics are classic Coverdale style lyrics.

When she walked in the room
I was drawn like a fool almost hypnotised
You made my heart beat, baby, like never before
Underneath her disguise I saw trouble and lies
But I walked right in
She said tonight I’m gonna make you push it
And that’s the score

The sad thing about all of this is that David Coverdale threatened to delay the follow-up to Whitesnake’s 1987 album if Geffen Records put cash behind Blue Murder.  It didn’t matter if John Kalodner was a big fan of John Sykes and that he organised his signing to Geffen Records.  Whitesnake was where the money was at the time, so David Geffen complied with Coverdale’s request.  The label failed to promote it and the album more or less disappeared.  

To be honest, David Coverdale hasn’t really released anything as good as the 1987 album and John Sykes hasn’t either.  The Blue Murder albums combined could rival the 1987 album.  Basically the two of them together, that was the magic.  Add Aynsley Dunbar on drums and Neil Murray on bass.  Rock Metal History.     

Hear Black Hearted Woman on vimeo.

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A to Z of Making It, Music

Persistence Part 2

There is a recent Dear Guitar Hero article with Tommy Thayer in the Guitar World, May 2013 issue.  The interview was conducted by Brad Angle.

QUESTION: Is it true that you did manual labor tasks at Gene Simmons and Paul Stanley’s houses before becoming a member of Kiss? (Tony Ratoni)

ANSWER: Those are kind of urban myths.  Sure, I started working for those guys part time in the late Eighties, an my credo was that I’d do whatever needed to be done.  And a lot of times when you’re in those situations you do all kinds of things.  I think, somehow, through all the speculation on the internet, people started saying that i did all these strange jobs.  But nothing was strange.  I was just a go-getter that would do whatever task was at hand, which is normal if you wanna get somewhere in your life.  I’m proof that persistence works.  

So all you wannabe artists, are you prepared to persevere.  If you want to be rich, take up banking or get involved technology.  Hell, tech heads are the new rock stars.  They are the cool ones, the ones that people want to hang with as they are rolling in the cash.  If you want to be somebody in music, you need to persevere.  Tommy Thayer was a go-getter for Kiss.  Gene Simmons signed his band Black and Blue and produced two mediocre albums.  He even took one of the Black N Blue songs he co-wrote and called it Domino on Revenge with only himself as the writer.  Tommy Thayer then played the tribute circuit in a Kiss cover band.  This is a period now that is spanning from 84 to 2000.  In 2002 he made his debut as the new Spaceman for Kiss.  He didn’t quit.  He kept on making connections.  He kept at it.

There is a comment on the Persistence and the Meaning of making it post, where Robakers mentioned the persistence of Lars Ulrich in getting Metallica off the ground.  This is so true.  Everyone seems to forget that part of Lars.  He was once a kid, that built connections around the NWOBM music that he was interested in.  He surrounded himself with like minded people.  Eventually one of those people started a label.  Then they where doing a compilation album.  The rest is history.

These days, everyone remembers Lars as the guy that sued his own fans when Napster came on the scene.  That is because, Lars wanted to be part of the corporate elite.  Lars wanted to hang with the rich because he thought it was cool and the rich wanted to hang with Lars as they thought it was cool to hang with a rock star.  Instead of Lars being the stiff middle finger hero to his fans against the corporations, he became one of them.

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