When I was growing up there’s like a half a dozen or 10 big giant great bands that are super groups you know. Now it’s like there are thousands of bands. Picking through everything is hard. It’s stressful trying to find all the right music you know. George Lynch
It’s a good time for an artist to get their product out and streaming has moved distribution further away from the labels. And it pissed em off because their power came from controlling the distribution. Then the millions started coming in from streaming and suddenly their powerful again. And all they did was moan and complain.
8 Years Ago (2013)
I was writing about my fandom of Tesseract, who just released the excellent “Altered State”.
And it reminded me of an Australian band called Karnivool.
Tesseract also liked Karnivool as they had a few of the Karnivool songs in the Spotify playlists they created to promote the album.
Trivium was also doing the usual PR interviews about their new upcoming album called “Vengeance Falls”, produced by David Draiman from Disturbed.
And from the interviews, the theme was, “Bigger Melodies, Bigger Hooks, Bigger Riffs.”
And in 2021, I can say that the album proved just that, giving us the concert favorite “Strife” with its Judas Priest “Sentinel” Intro.
And the lyrics from Dave Mustaine seemed prophetic to me during this period.
I was questioning why artists would spend a lot of time putting together 12 tracks just to sell them as a packages for $10. It’s an old business model. In 2021, that business model is 55 plus years old.
I can’t recall a lot of companies doing the exact same thing they did 55 years ago and surviving.
But it looks like the album won’t go away anytime soon.
And I think he’s done that. Every FFDP album has a certification. It’s because of the songs, which Bathory said, a song needs to be there for anything else to be added.
And I think my final douche post was written and I was asking the question if having Portnoy in your band is a good thing or a bad thing due to the many projects.
As James Hetfield once said that he is anti-side projects because it dilutes the quality of the main product.
And in the end it is quality that the people want.
I was trying to be a sociologist with the post, “The Old Rock Star Is Dead, It’s Time To Create A New Rock Star”,
You don’t want to be an artist that becomes who others want them to be. It’s okay to not be liked by everybody.
“I’d been caught between two fires for a long time. One was the inferno that I had built with my success and addictions. The other was the fire that burned for my family”
It’s how Chapter 33 called “out of control like a bushfire” started from the “Working Class Man” book.
“Two Fires” is his fourth studio album released in 1990 and his first United States release for Atlantic Records.
This was the last proper attempt to break Barnes to the U.S market, as previous label partnerships with Elektra and Geffen for the earlier records fell apart due to various reasons.
It was also the first step away from the AOR sounding “Freight Train Heart”. Most of the song writing credits this time are shared by the band and unknown writers instead of Desmond Child, Jonathan Cain and Diane Warren.
“Lay Down Your Guns”
The album gave Barnesy a chance to work with some great players like Brian Setzer from The Stray Cats who plays guitar on this.
A sinister crime noir “Peter Gunn” style riff kicks it off. The song is written by Jimmy Barnes and Rick Nowels.
Nowels was still in his early days of becoming a huge songwriter. His credits now include Adele, Lana Del Rey and many more. Just go to his Wikipedia page.
Lay down your guns and surrender
“Let’s Make It Last All Night”
Very Foreigner sounding, the Chorus is massive as you would expect from a song written by Barnes, Diane Warren and Desmond Child.
It was also a hit in Australia and it’s a staple of his live show.
Let’s make it last all night This could be the last time I make love to you
“Little Darling”
A Barnes composition with Setzer on guitar again bringing some rockabilly to a soul rock tune.
Well I get to your house Like the rest of the band But somehow these things don’t always turn out as planned You called me a cab and yeah I walked out that door
Barnesy talks about this event in his book. he thought he messed up his chance with his future wife.
“Love Is Enough”
It’s got a feel like “Every Breath You Take” in the verses, just more rockier.
“Hardline”
It’s a hard rock track and one of the best on the album.
Well it’s late at night something just ain’t right I can tell by the look in your eye You don’t say two words You got a stare that burns It’s gonna be a long long night
“One of a Kind”
Another rocker with hard rock lyrics.
Tight skirts, like a flirt She don’t stop till it starts to hurt She’s sweet, what a treat Got to get her into my back seat
Mmmm. Flirt with skirt with hurt and sweet with treat and backseat. Overused terms but I would not have it any other way.
“Sister Mercy”
Cause a woman’s got the power To take control of me Well she can wrap me round her finger And make a damn fool of me
The blues songs from the 1930s had lyrics like this. That’s how much staying power the blues medium had.
“When Your Love is Gone”
A great ballad. The sound is dated as it uses a lot of 80s sounding midis.
Well, I missed all the signs, never read between lines
And the Barnesy kids make an appearance in the outro.
“Between Two Fires”
A track written by Barnes and Holly Knight.
As you would expect, it’s anthemic and melodic rock.
The Intro and verses riff remind me of “Rocking In The Free World”. And the Chorus soars.
Caught between two fires Losing control since I first met you
“Fade to Black”
This is a great rock song. Forgotten behind the hits.
When day fades to black I won’t look back, of that I’m certain
When you just want to escape the rat race for the night.
I wanna get of this one way street Don’t want to be among the faceless
“Hold On”
It sounds like a track from “Out Of This World” by Europe. With a bit of Led Zeppelin thrown in.
Like most albums of the time, the labels held the power, so they made artists write and write and write.
Barnes wrote over 30 tracks for the album with a lot of em still unreleased and some as B-sides to the singles.
And the fans rallied behind him once again, sending the album to number 1 on two separate occasions and making it 6x Platinum.
And that elusive break through into the US market still remained elusive.
They are one of the rare bands from the 80’s who keep writing and recording new albums. Although the time spans between albums has become bigger over the last 15 years, it’s not because they are lazy, they are just on the road or in the air, touring and doing what they do.
And a pandemic put a halt to their touring plans in 2020. So when artists have time, they normally write and here we are in 2021, with new music.
They have been teasing this new music for about a fortnight, and a lot of internet sleuths started piecing together all the clues about “Belshazzar’s Feast” from a T-shirt that Bruce Dickinson was wearing in an interview he did on Sky News.
And like all things Maiden, I am sure we will get to know more about Belshazzar’s Feast, because that’s what Maiden does, they get people like me into researching and learning.
It’s written by Adrian Smith and Bruce Dickinson, with production by Kevin Shirley.
The country blues rock in the intro has me interested. It’s a new style into the Iron Maiden family.
The verse riff reminds me of “Stormbringer” from Deep Purple played with a bluesy swagger. Vocally Dickinson is still a powerhouse.
How good are those guitar harmonies after the first chorus?
The lead that comes at the 4.27 mark, I am pretty sure it’s Adrian Smith as it sounds like his style, is excellent.
I keep re-listening to this song just to keep hearing the lead break.
In the early 80s, Frank Hannon and Brian Wheat took a band name from a Y&T album and started playing UFO, Scorpions and Def Leppard covers. Jeff Keith, Troy Luccketta and Tommy Skeoch joined after and the band became known as City Kidd.
A three month residency at a U.S Army base would give them the opportunity to write songs and then play them live. Most of the songs written for the debut and some of the songs for “The Great Radio Controversy” were written during this period.
Jack Russell from “Great White” became a fan and he got Tom Zutaut to check em out, who then promised em a recording contract, but they had to wait until the end of 85, as he was moving from Elektra to Geffen.
They got a Q Prime deal but couldn’t get a producer to work with them. Rick Rubin, Max Norman and Bruce Fairbairn rejected them. Zutaut brought in Steve Thompson and Michael Barbiero but their background was dance music and they did some time mixing rock albums. Hardly an ideal choice and they also tried to get out of the gig.
Mid 86, City Kidd changed their name to Tesla and “Mechanical Resonance” was released on November 24, 1986, by Geffen Records.
It’s on Spotify, but they took off “The Great Radio Controversy”. Why they removed it, I guess we’ll never know.
“EZ Come EZ Go”
The funky groove to kick it off hides the rocker the song really is.
The verses are very Def Leppard like (first two albums Lep), in the sense of dynamics (soft and loud), the pulse like bass/bass drum and vocal melodies. But the Chorus rocks hard, like AC/DC and Aerosmith hard.
Then the lead breaks show a guitar hero aspect to the band.
In essence, if this was the first song you heard and it didn’t move ya, then you need to check yourself for a pulse.
There comes a time when you’ve got to let things go as fast as they come Wait and see what tomorrow may bring you, get it all while you can
I know it sounds clichéd today, but to a kid growing up, it was eye opening.
Like a new creed, a new truth.
“Cumin’ Atcha Live”
Written by Hannon, Keith and Wheat. If feels like a band jamming in the style of Van Halen. Even one of the riffs you hear in the first 30 seconds comes from a Van Halen song. The whole solo section feels like an improv jam.
My favourite part is between the 3.18 to 3.53 mark in the leads.
“Gettin’ Better”
Written by Hannon and Keith. One of my favourites.
As soon as I heard the arpeggio intro I was racking my brain as to what song it reminds me of. The D to A to Bm chord progression reminds me of “Goodbye To Romance”. Tesla would use this chord progression again in the “Love Song” intro. Mark Tremonti was a fan, so it was no surprise to hear it in “One Last Breath”.
And when the distorted chords kick in, again I am reminded about something familiar. Maybe “Highway To Hell”.
I’m a hard workin’ man, doin’ all that I can, tryin’ to make ends meet Just a-makin’ my way through the jungle today, it’s gettin’ the best of me
But it’s only gettin’ better, and a change is gonna come my way
My Dad worked two jobs to survive in Australia. My mum never worked as she was tasked with raising the family and keeping the house running. And I’m thinking did it get better for him. He believes so, but my Mum doesn’t. And for me, both my wife and I are working jobs so we can survive in this country and go on some holidays. We don’t know anything different.
“2 Late 4 Love”
Written by the band again, the embryo to “Hang Tough” is right here in the Intro.
I can’t believe this fucked up world in which we’re livin’ in Still I do the best that I can Always got me on the lookout for a getaway Runnin’ hard, I’m a rock ‘n’ roll man
Work to live and don’t live to work. The world will always disappoint you, so just do your best to get bye.
“Rock Me to the Top”
It’s a Keith and Skeoch composition. One of my favourites. It just rocks and rolls its way through my brain. A totally different style.
Rock me, rock me (rock), rock me to the top, to the top, baby
How can you not sing-along to it?
“We’re No Good Together”
Written by Hannon, Keith and Luccketta and I’m a fan of its slow bluesy feel. Very Bad Company’sih and Led Zeppelin’ish. Aerosmith wrote a similar track on “Pump” called “What It Takes”.
And it picks up for the lead break and outro, like “Free Bird”, only shorter.
“Modern Day Cowboy”
It kicks off side 2. A Hannon, Keith and Skeoch composition.
When the verse arpeggios kick in, it’s like the “Kashmir” riff, as each note moves up chromatically.
Also check out the lead breaks on this.
Foreign lands With their terrorist demands Only cause the good to hurt
Like so many others we have grown up with terror in our lives. Some experience it closely and it’s on the news when it happens and the innocent are always the ones to suffer.
The U.S.A., the U.S.S.R. with their six-guns to the side I see the message written on the wall. Too much anger deep inside
This was a thing once upon a time. Communism versus democracy. It looks like the scars never really went away because it’s still a thing. And people thought that once the Berlin Wall fell down, democracy would rule. But the older ones from Eastern Europe like my grandfather, they knew that a new dictatorship, probably worse than the one before, was just a few years away from resurfacing.
Bang bang, I shoot ’em up Bang bang, blow you away It’s a showdown in the no man’s land for the cowboy of the modern day
It’s a showdown!
“Changes”
Another band composition. One of my favorite Tesla songs ever, as it moves from an emotive piano intro into a vibrato style riff.
Changes, time’s makin’ changes in my life Rearrangin’, can’t seem to stop the hands of time I remember, I was so young, I was much too young to see Now I’m older, growing older, and I see things differently
A commitment to self-development and self-learning makes me question a lot of things that I once held as truth. But it all takes time. As time moves forwards, so do the changes. We don’t have three channels anymore. We don’t have dial up internet.
“Little Suzi”
A Ph.D. cover, written by Jim Diamond and Tony Hymas.
The “Albatross” intro was written by Hannon. The original version of the song had synths and was electronic, but Tesla made it an acoustic country rock style cut. In other words they made it awesome.
“Love Me”
It’s day and I’m feelin’ high, what’s the chances for you and I
What kind of high was Jeff Keith on?
Written by Hannon, Keith and Wheat, I can hear UFO and Bad Company in this. I reckon CC DeVille was also listening closely as I can hear “Nothing But A Good Time” in this.
Also check out the lead break, just for the soul and blues rock licks.
“Cover Queen”
A Hannon and Keith composition.
The “Blackout” from Scorpions inspired intro gets me interested. The verses swagger like Aerosmith. And in the last minute of the song it’s pure EVH style jamming.
“Before My Eyes”
It’s a darker cut, almost Dio like, written by Hannon, Keith, Luccketta and Skeoch composition.
If you like Van Halen and Aerosmith, there is enough here to keep you interested. If you like 70’s British acts like Bad Company, Led Zeppelin, Free, UFO, Thin Lizzy and Deep Purple, there is enough here to keep you interested.
If you like the Sunset Strip sounds of Motley Crue, RATT, WASP, Quiet Riot and Ratt, there is enough to keep you interested. If you like acts like Y&T, Triumph, Sammy Hagar and Montrose, those sounds are also here. And if you like the sounds of European acts like Def Leppard, Iron Maiden, Scorpions and Judas Priest, then they are also present.
It’s not on Spotify but YouTube has various videos of the album and it is the last Dokken album I purchased.
By the time “Broken Bones” came out, I was a streamer. But I’ve always had that album, along with “Return To The East” and “The Lost Tapes” in my “saved for later” shopping cart, waiting until the price is right.
This album is also the last to feature bassist Barry Sparks and drummer Mick Brown.
Like previous records, Don Dokken had to organize various labels for a worldwide release. Rhino for the North America market, Frontiers for Europe and King for Japan.
Production is handled by Don Dokken and Tim David-Kelly.
Standing On The Outside
A riff from “It’s Not Love” kicks off the album and I’m tapping my foot along with it.
The verses are better than the Chorus.
And the lead break from Levin is excellent.
Give Me A Reason
It starts off with clean tone arpeggios that remind me of “Walk Away”. But that was hiding the rocker to come.
Musically the song is excellent, while the melodies are stuck in the lower bass/baritone range and sound a bit monotonous.
Heart To Stone
A feel from “Into The Fire” kicks it off before it moves into a “Stop Fighting Love” vibe. It’s basically Dokken sounding like Dokken.
Jon Levin doesn’t get the respect he deserves He’s the longest serving guitarist in the band and he’s become a great co-writer with Don. Plus he respects the past.
How I Miss Your Smile
A simple repeating two chord arpeggio Intro kicks off the song and Don’s heartbreak lyrics take over.
It’s a run of the mill power ballad, but the lead break from Levin makes it worthy. He’s emotive and bluesy.
Oasis
A classic metal riff kicks off the song, straight from the grooves of the “Tooth And Nail” album.
The guitar solo reminds me of “Alone Again” and I like it.
But it suffers from a lack of dynamics vocally.
Point Of No Return
My favorite track.
The Intro reminds me of “Seven Nation Army” but once the song picks up it’s got a “Paris Is Burning” vibe.
Mick Brown and Barry Sparks lay down an energetic tempo.
Jon Levin has done a great job continuing the Dokken guitar brand in the 2000’s and he continues to shine on this track, showing his Lynch and Schenker/Jab influences.
Don Dokken is gravelly in his vocals and I like it as it works for this song.
The Chorus is anthemic and check out the lead break. It’s guitar hero worthy.
I Remember
Another ballad which could have come from Klaus Meine.
Judgement Day
Another favourite.
Levin is inspired by old Dokken.
It feels like “Cry Of The Gypsy” merged with “Lost Behind A Wall” and I like it.
And Don’s lower range singing works perfectly on this while Levin shines all over this track.
It Means
This is good and I like it when artists merge their old way with new influences from modern rock artists.
Release Me
Musically it’s modern rock, like a bit of Tool and a bit of Chevelle.
But it’s the lead break from Levin that captures my attention.
This Fire
An energetic rocker and the riffs are excellent.
Sunset Superstar
The bonus track on the Japanese edition. A speed metal cut like “Tooth And Nail”. It should have been on the album and Don’s gravelly vocals work.
If you like the 80s version of Dokken, you will like this. It’s the best album of the Jon Levin era.
This October, Machine “Fucking” Head will make 30 years!
In the early 90s, Robb Flynn decided to quit the band he was in, to start Machine “Fucking” Head, so he could call the shots and not have to answer to anyone.
Throughout the years he’s had different versions of the band with “The Blackening” line up being the most favored and then the “Burn My Eyes” line up.
Over the last three years, Robb’s motto is simple. If he has a song, or two, he’s going to get it recorded and released. And he’s still calling the shots.
Jared MacEachern on bass is still there, a dedicated right hand man.
In 2019, “Do Or Die” was released.
In February 2020, “Circle The Drain” came out.
In June 2020, the “Civil Unrest” single, featuring the tracks “Bulletproof” and the Jesse Leach collaboration “Stop The Bleeding” came out.
In November 2020, the stand alone “My Hands Are Empty” was released, a collaboration between Robb Flynn and Logan Mader from the “Burn My Eyes” version of the band.
And on 11 June 2021, the 3-Song digital single, “Arrows In Words From The Sky” dropped.
In total 8 songs have been released. They could represent an album that came out today, but we all got to spend time with these songs when they came out and make em special at that particular point in time.
On his blog, Robb said that, “these three songs represent Machine Head better than anything I could ever try to explain here.
The way these songs grew and took shape over time, tells us our future is more exciting than even we would like to admit.
Being able to corral all the chaos, pain, confusion, and yes, hope, into music has never made me feel more alive. These songs will hopefully do the same for you, after all, that’s who they were written for.”
Arrows In Words From The Sky
As soon as the droning open string tones and natural harmonics kick in, I was hooked.
It sounds sad and when the vocal melody comes in, it’s mournful. But all of this is the calm before the storm.
Centuries of pain, under a paper sword Arrows in words from the sky
When the distorted section with the vocal melody “breaking down (I am reborn)” kicks in, it’s desk breaking stuff. It hits a raw nerve and unleashes a lot of emotions.
Listen to the lead break.
It’s guitar hero stuff from Robb Flynn. His lead work is so underrated.
I was writing about streaming services and how all of those little streams add up.
Remember when Taylor Swift and Neil Young removed their music from Spotify. The narrative was very strong about poor artists vs big bad faceless tech giving the masses inferior sound quality and not paying enough. Then their music returned to Spotify and there was crickets.
In the end streaming is king. The sales charts had to amend their formula to include streaming and suddenly an artist can controlling the whole Top 10. And artists from the past have now returned to the Charts.
The old certification awards now include streaming in their formula and guess what, artists are getting platinum awards on streams alone. That’s right, no sales. Just listens. What a brilliant concept.
“Good artists copy, great artists steal” is the saying. We can paraphrase it to “Good artists try to sound original by hiding their influences”, while “great artists let their influences show”. It’s how the language of music is learned. We imitate our influences.
If you don’t believe me, what is the first thing a person does when they are learning an instrument?
They start by learning songs created by other artists.
Inspiration is not theft. Theft is taking something and the person who has it, does not have it to use anymore,
A new release called “Evolution” from an Australian band called “Burnside” had my attention.
I just checked Spotify and they released an EP called “Rise Pt.1” in 2016, which I haven’t heard yet and a post on Twitter from 2018 had them writing new music, which still hasn’t seen a release.
The lyrics from Brent Smith (Shinedown) had me inspired so I wrote about em. At the time was doing these kind of appreciation series called “What Do Ya Mean I Don’t Write Good Lyrics?”
The title was inspired by the verses from “Peace Sells” from Megadeth.
Well in the case of TesseracT and The Night Flight Orchestra, they kept writing and releasing frequently and for TNFO it certainly helped that the band members had other successful projects.
“13” from Black Sabbath was out. The problem that I have with it, is that it tries too hard to recreate the first four Black Sabbath albums.
Which isn’t a bad thing if that’s how you defined your career. Like AC/DC.
But Sabbath was more progressive minded and pushed boundaries. For an act that was considered “extreme” in the 70s, they played it really “safe”.
However, one thing I do like is that they have stayed away from the Verse – Chorus – Verse – Chorus – Bridge – Solo – Chorus structure.
Which led me to write a post called “Risk Management”. The message of the post was basically this;
If you are not on the bleeding edge of society, you are just part of the fabric of society. You want to be a rock star, you cant do it working a nine to five job. You cant do it if you are beholden to your employer. You cant do it if you are beholden to the family.
The only way you can do it is if you throw all thoughts of risk management out the window.
Prime Circle from South Africa had my attention as I had just heard the 2012 album, “Evidence” and I felt the need to write about them.
And they are still pretty active, releasing studio and live albums.
Check em out as their brand of modern rock is anthemic and infectious.
There are a lot of stories of how the recording industry has been transformed since Napster and most of those stories centered around the losses of income to the record labels. They blamed the technology as its never the fault of the record labels.
Then came iTunes and the purchase of mp3’s became legal, putting money into the labels balance sheets. But the labels still complained.
Then YouTube appeared, then streaming came on the scene in Pandora, Grooveshark, Deezer and Spotify and the conversation shifted to the pennies paid per listen. The labels blamed the technology for the low payments because it’s never the labels fault.
In the end if you are signed to a label, creating music which is being listened too and are not getting paid, your issue is with your employer, the record label.
If you read this blog, you will know of my appreciation for The Night Flight Orchestra.
It all started in 2012 with the excellent debut. “Internal Affairs” and it continued in 2015, with “Skyline Whispers” and in 2017, we have “Amber Galactic”, which you can read my review here.
Artist Don Brautigam passed away and I wrote about him here and here.
If you’ve seen the Metallica “Master Of Puppets” or the Motley Crue “Dr Feelgood” covers, then you’ve seen his work.
The album cover is a forgotten art form, but man, it’s an important one. Once upon a time, the look of an album cover would be the deciding vote if a person outlaid their money.
It carried the brand of the band.
It was the first thing that spoke to the music buyer. And as time has gone on, the artists who created some of the iconic covers are never mentioned.
8 Years Ago (2013)
I was listening to Vaudeville. They merge the styles from Muse, Deftones and Radiohead with Hard Rock. It sounds beautiful and original. And if you want an entry point into the band, check out the song “Restless Souls”.
Will you stand up And fight against their wrath Or will you run Until there’s nothing left
Their first album “Dismantle The Sky” came out in 2009. The next album “Vendetta” came out in 2012, and this is the album with “Restless Souls”. In March 2013, they released an EP called “House of The Rising Sun”.
And after I wrote this post they released “Masquerade Part 1” in 2014 and “Masquerade Part 2” in 2015.
Which I didn’t know about. So I have some listening to do.
Daft Punk entered the charts this week in 2013 at Number 1, moving 339,000 copies of their “Random Access Memories”.
And streaming/digital was king as 65% of Daft Punk’s sales came from digital sources. And I was thinking, why couldn’t metal and rock artists get these kind of numbers.
It first began in August 2006, when Hawthorne Heights filed a lawsuit against Victory Records, accusing the label of creative accounting practices, unpaid royalties and for damaging the band’s reputation and relationship with their fans.
In 2011, A Day To Remember also filed a suit against Victory Records for unpaid royalties.
And in 2013, Streetlight Manifesto is telling their fans to not purchase the album from any physical and online retailers and to only purchase merchandise from the band’s website because of their dispute with Victory.
After this post, in 2017, another band called “Darkest Hour” said that they never received a penny from their Victory contract.
And to slap the artists in the face even more, it sold for more than $30 million in 2019 and the artists didn’t get a cent from the sale.
TesseracT is one band that really got my attention and you can read my review of their excellent “Altered State” album here.
Dream Theater announced a “Live At Luna Park” DVD/CD release in February 2013 for a May 2013 release. May was almost at its end and no news had been forthcoming.
Well the release finally came out in November/December of that year.
And people were getting arrested and locked away for copyright offenses. Their jail terms for non violent crimes were longer than violent crimes.
And Police Departments were not doing any investigation of their own. They simple took the evidence of the movie studios and record labels as being true and correct.
This is where I draw the line This is where the old me dies Light a match, let it burn, kiss it goodbye Give it up, what I was, this is where I draw the line
I always like to write posts that highlight how certain songs are inspired by other songs. You can read my post called “The Kashmir Effect”.
And I started a new series called “Classic Album Closing Songs”, thinking it will be a monthly post. And I’ve only done one.
Which actually covered a few albums.
Like “Diary Of A Madman” (1981), “Hallowed Be Thy Name” (1982), “Who We Are” (2011), “S.M.F” (1984), “Shogun” (2008), “Aerials” (2001) and “The Count Of Tuscany” (2009)
And “What About Now” disappeared from the charts and the sales.
Bon Jovi (the band) spent over 5 months recording and writing this album, a few more months promoting it, only to have it do a run of 10 weeks before it disappeared.
From Bon Jovi I went to Megadeth and the lyrics of Dave Mustaine.
And my iPod shuffle was on fire with its selection so I wrote about “Chainsaw Charlie (Murders In The New Morgue)”, “California Morning”, “Crazy Train”, “Caught In The Middle”, “Caustic Are The Ties That Bind” and “Cardiff”.
The thing with blogs and posts is that you try and write something different and creative. Like this post, titled “Dollars And Cents”. At the time I was reading a book on innovations and Charles Goodyear inspired me.
Everyone today knows “Charles Goodyear” as the inventor of vulcanised rubber. But what they don’t know is that he spent his whole life on struggle street, in and out of prison because of his money problems and six of his twelve children died because he couldn’t support them.
And when he perfected his vulcanised rubber, he couldn’t take out a patent because another scientist called Thomas Hancock took out a patent eight weeks earlier. You see, Hancock had gotten a hold of a sample of Goodyear’s final product and reverse engineered it.
Goodyear tried the courts, however the judge couldn’t understand how Hancock could have reverse engineered the invention and awarded all rights and royalties to Hancock.
It wasn’t until his journals were read by others that the following was found: “Life should not be estimated exclusively by the standard of dollars and cents.”
The Goodyear name would be recognised many years later. His achievements are world-changing but he never got paid for it while he was alive.
And the post combined F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ken Kesey, Dream Theater, Metallica and others.
These days, every town has thousands of bands who are recording themselves and releasing their music. And there are artists who have “made it” who are also releasing music. And they all want to be paid for it. Because their hard work and time spent is worth something. It’s all dollars and cents until you have that iconic hit. Only then you will be paid. When the music listening public decides it’s worthy.
Once upon a time my Release Radar playlist was pretty spot. Check out my love for The Night Flight Orchestra, Rise Against, Hell Or Highwater, Adrenaline Mob and Harem Scarem.
And when I was thinking about innovations, I thought about the cassette.
The Cassette tape allowed me to make demo after demo, mix tape after mix tape and it allowed me to copy a lot of albums from people who either had the original album or had a copy of the album from someone else who either had the original or had a copy.
For me it is was a game changer.
The record labels screamed loud and hard to their politician friends to pass new laws and stop this new sharing culture. Remember their headline, “Home taping is killing music.” A more accurate and truthful headline would be, “Home Taping is Spreading Music to the Masses” or “Home Taping Is Spreading Music And This Leads To Increased Sales Later On”.
In the Year 2000, the mainstream was ruled by Nu-Metal bands and progressive music was really at opposite ends of the spectrum.
On one side, you had the Dream Theater style of progressive music. This involved a lot of time changes, with the focus on high-octane technical musical workouts and each song exhibited a smorgasbord of riffs.
On the other side of the progressive music spectrum, you had the Tool style of progressive music. This involved time changes, but the focus was on groove and atmospherics, with each song building on a unique riff or bass line or drum pattern. Tool always stood by their brand and never wavered from it.
In between you had Porcupine Tree, merging Tool like aggression with Pink Floyd like atmospherics and on the extreme end you had Meshuggah with their focus on groovy, technical polyrhythms.
The missing link is Fates Warning. Fates Warning released an album called “Disconnected” which merged the Tool and Porcupine Tree progressive elements with the Dream Theater progressive elements and put them through the Fates Warning blender. It’s a fusion of all the best progressive elements at the time into a cohesive piece of work that can be listened to over and over again from start to finish.
Making something technical sound simple to the ear is progressive music to me.
Metallica did it with each album up to “…And Justice For All”.
Rush did it with each album until they reset their career with “Signals”.
Dream Theater nailed it with “Images And Words”.
Fates Warning nailed it with “Disconnected”.
And back in 2013, I was writing that if an artist wants to make money from streaming music, then they should stay independent and don’t sign to a label.
Or if they sign to make sure they own their copyrights. Streaming pays pretty good, provided people are listening. And the more people who embrace streaming, the greater the pool of money to divide.
Remember when AC/DC refused to have their music on iTunes and even streaming services? Now they’re on all of them.
And remember that each release is competing with the history of music
8 Years Ago (2013)
I was watching Eurovision and I came across Eythor Ingi from Iceland. He sang a ballad called “I Am Alive”. The song is average, however his voice, his look and his name stuck in my head.
So I went to YouTube. He was in a Deep Purple cover band and he covers “Child In Time”. If you want to separate the vocalists from the wannabe’s, “Child In Time” is the song.
I just rechecked on him and he’s still doing music in his native language. I would like to hear an English speaking album as well.
And did anyone hear the new (at the time) Five Finger Death Punch song, “Lift Me Up” and how similar the vocal line in the verse is to “The Ultimate Sin” from Ozzy. A perfect example of taking something from the past to make something new.
We are overloaded with people creating something. The Internet has removed the entry barriers to promote creative works have diminished greatly. Artists are writing books, comics or creating art via paintings or photography.
And they create because they want to create. And at the time System Of A Down had three quarters of the band ready to do another album. But vocalist Serj Tankian was not interested.
“Kingmaker” from Megadeth was just released. The first thing that grabbed my attention was the “Children of The Grave” influence in the verses.
Finally, the Richie Sambora saga was ongoing and some serious scalping was happening in Australia, as tickets to the first Jovi shows in Australia were still available to be purchased but the shows are marketed as sold out and second shows are up for sale.
The Recording Industry is a section of the “music industry.”
But the Recording Industry likes to sell and market itself as the Music Industry.
The Music Industry is everything.
There is the recording industry who are involved in getting artists to recording and releasing music. The release can be via vinyl, CD’s and mp3’s and streaming.
But there is also licensing, touring (and people involved with touring like drivers, road crew), merchandise, publishing, musical instruments (sellers, manufacturers and buyers), music hardware, music software, video production and many more.
And a lot of movement was happening within governments around internet privacy. So I was asking the question, where is the outrage from artists.
There is a lot of press about outraged artists due to streaming and piracy but when it came to their internet privacy being sold to a corporation, there was nothing. Not even a word.
Governments deny that climate change exists and people scream in protest. Governments take away more of our privacy and there is silence.
Circa 2011, the MPAA stated that piracy losses amounted to $58 billion.
How did they quantify the amount?
They didn’t, but they used it over and over again when they spoke to politicians about getting new laws written up.
I remember seeing that Transformers 1 (T1) and (T2) where the most pirated movies over Bit Torrent. T1 made $710M and T2 made $840M. T3 wasn’t on any torrent list and it made $1.3 Billion.
Maybe because the people that downloaded a torrent of T1 and T2 became fans and paid to watch T3. Maybe those little kids that downloaded T1 and T2 became fans and are now old enough to go to the cinema on their own and watch it.
One thing is certain, piracy is designed by the lobby groups so that they can get stupid legislation passed that puts them back in control of the distribution.
destroyerofharmony 