The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike and the Meat Man
Episode 85 – Cinco De List-O: Top 5 Horror Films
Topic courtesy of the Meat Man! It’s Halloween so perfect timing for another movie list: horror movies! And any time we’re talking movies, we better have Rob Daniels and Erik Woods on board!
It’s a really simple subject so we don’t need a lot of explanation here. To read up on my history with horror films, check out Record Store Tales #496: The Horror. It may spoil a couple of my picks so be forewarned!
November 5 7:00 PM E.S.T.: We are joined by the awesome Dan Fila, drummer of Sven Gali and Varga! Freeze, don’t move, this show is gonna be Under the Influence! Co-hosted by John “2loud2old” Snow.
I also have an appearance on Tim’s Vinyl Confessions coming up, and will be be on 107.5 Dave Rocks, with Jessie David and my pick for The Essential Alice Cooper, on October 31!
Always nice to repost a seasonal classic. Enjoy this Halloween tale.
RECORD STORE TALES Part 241: Halloween, KISS style!
Our annual inventory count fell on October 31. For five years straight, I never got to dress up, hand out candy, or do anything fun on Halloween because I was too busy counting discs and CD towers! However in the early days, this wasn’t the case. Halloween 1996 was actually a pretty good one.
Like most malls, ours had a few Halloween contests. T-Rev entered the store in the Pumpkin Carving category. He and I came up with the plan to do a Kiss pumpkin. T-Rev, the store owner’s brother, and myself gathered in my mom’s workshop in the basement. My mom had plenty of paint, and I was good at drawing the Kiss makeup designs. T-Rev had the idea to make the pumpkin Gene Simmons, and figured out how to make a pumpkin tongue stick out. I must say he did an amazing job.
The first step was to spray paint the pumpkin white. One of the guys did the cutting. Then, I drew the Demon design with a black magic marker. We thought the nose needed to be more three-dimensional, so I cut it out a bit. Together, we began colouring in Gene’s makeup. We needed something to define the eyes of Gene, and T-Rev thought of using pumpkin seeds. We added a wig, and voila!
T-Rev propped Gene up on the magazine stand outside the store. Immediately we started getting compliments, and the response was pretty unanimous: We had done the best job in the entire mall.
Unfortunately, the judges didn’t base their ratings on who had done the best job. They were only marking the results, whether the store employees did the pumpkins themselves or not! A store that hired a professional carver won first place. We came in second. There was no prize for second. T-Rev and I considered that to be cheating. Cheatie-cheatertons.
The contest was over, and not too soon: the pumpkin had begun to rot, as pumpkins do. That didn’t stop a customer from coming in on November 1st and offering him $10 for it. T-Rev accepted his gracious offer, even though the thing would be turning horrific in a day or two. A fool and his money, right T-Rev?
By 1997, the store had moved out of the mall. This was our last pumpkin carving contest, but at least we had the satisfaction of winning the popular vote. As far as I’m concerned, we went out on top. My personal consolation prize was later on, Halloween 2006. By this time I had moved on to United Rentals. They took Halloween very, very seriously at United Rentals! I dressed up as Paul Stanley, and this time, I finally won first prize!
JETHRO TULL – The Very Best of Jethro Tull(2001 Chrysalis)
Every fan had their first Jethro Tull purchase. Mine was 20 years ago, with their newly released Very Best of Jethro Tull. Why not? I was working at the Record Store when a used-but-mint copy dropped in my lap for only $8 (staff discount). It was only right of me to ensure it got a good home.
Unlike some “hits” compilations, this one didn’t strike with clusters of songs I wanted to focus on in the future. Other compilations can do that. For example I decided to hone in on the Brian Robertson Motorhead album immediately after hearing a double best-of. With The Very Best of Jethro Tull, I liked it all equally. I just wanted to get them all, with no particular priority. It all sounded great to me.
The album is non-chronological and contains some edit versions. “Thick As A Brick” is cut down from 44 minutes to just three — makes sense. They chose the first three minutes, which are ojectively the best known. Other edits are the single versions of “Too Old To Rock ‘n’ Roll: Too Young to Die” and “Minstrel in the Gallery”, while “Heavy Horses” gets a new edit bringing it from nine minutes to a more single-like three. The songs span the 1968 debut This Was to 1995’s Roots to Branches. Several albums are not represented at all, such as Benefit, A Passion Play, A, Stormwatch, Under Wraps, Rock Island, Catfish Rising, and J-Tull.com. Justifiable? That’s up to personal taste. Several non-album singles are included instead, such as the well known “Living In the Past” and the wicked string-laden “Sweet Dream”.
The album has an excellent flow, only interrupted with the synth-y “Steel Monkey” from 1987’s Grammy-winning Crest of a Knave. Preceded by the savage “Locomotive Breath” and followed by the tender picking of “Thick as a Brick”, it doesn’t fit in except as a speedbump. If I may be so bold, I believe “Steel Monkey” was included simply because it would be odd not to include something off that controversial Grammy winner.
While I enjoyed all the songs, the one that stood out particularly strong was “Bourée”. I never heard Bach swing like that before! The diversity of this CD, spanning all styles of rock from progressive to blues to folksy. Yes, the flute can rock and Ian Anderson is the Eddie Van Halen of the instrument.
Another true treasure from the VHS Archives. When the Pepsi Power Hour ran this guitar-centric special in early 1988, my best friend Bob and I watched it religiously. We drank up, though didn’t fully understand, every word from Rik Emmett. The former Triumph guitarist was (and is) one of our favourites. His knowledge is encyclopedic. Laurie quizzes Rik on a number of the top rated electric guitar players of the time.
Rik demonstrates his favourite passages, and discusses with host Laurie Brown the following axemen in order:
Tony Iommi
Jimmy Page
Joe Satriani
Steve Vai
Kirk Hammett
Jimi Hendrix
Angus Young
Eddie Van Halen
Yngwie J. Malmsteen
and, of course, Rik Emmett
Other topics to stay tuned for in this wide-ranging discussion:
Lefties (like Rik)
The 1988 Zeppelin reunion (Atlantic 40th Anniversary)
Gerry McGhee and Stevie Skreebs of Brighton Rock dropped by the Power Hour with Michael Williams in early ’89 to showcase their new music video, “Hangin’ High N’ Dry”. World premiere! The brand new album Take A Deep Breath was in stores and the band were on tour. The affable group were questioned about such topics as:
Playing football with Steve Harris
Recording Take A Deep Breath with Jack Richardson
Lightening up or getting the sound they wanted?
Brighton Rock double live?
Why Stevie scratched the big VH logo on the hood of his first car25
Cool “Outlaw” T-shirt giveaway
The Boston Bruins
“Live” vs “studio” videos
The unreleased X-rated version of “Hangin’ High N’ Dry”
August 1991: MuchMusic’s Angela Dorhmann visited Lee Aaron at Sounds Interchange for the Power Hour, to debut Lee’s new video “Sex With Love”. Much also speaks with director Don Allan about the clip.
Topics discussed with the charismatic Lee Aaron that day:
Brent Jensen and Alex Huard have been, for several weeks now, discussing classic rock albums from the perspective of the veteran and the newcomer. It has been a fascinating series to follow and listen to albums with. This week they tackled an unprecedented three: Van Halen’s Fair Warning, Diver Down, and 1984. Have a look!
I felt like writing again, I hope you don’t mind. My emails are not the esteemed A Life in Letters by Isaac Asimov, but it’s more about the process of the writing for me.
I’ve been listening to Van Halen in the car a lot. Long story short: I’ve been having issues with my music hard drive in the car, with it repeating tracks. I discovered I could fix it by formatting the drive and starting over. Certain Van Halen albums used to give me issues in the car, with the repeating songs. It’s been a pleasure to rock to King Edward this week. It’s hard to believe but he died over a year ago now.
I remember coming home from work the day he died and I was just in a foul mood. Not only was I grieving Edward Van Halen, but I felt stupid for grieving someone I never met and never hoped to meet. It was a torrent of shitty feelings, plus I hadn’t eaten properly. It was a Tuesday and I had to do laundry or something, and I snapped at Jen. I felt like an asshole afterwards. I also remember telling you this story, and you were the one who said it was OK to be grieving. Until that moment I didn’t really consider that maybe you don’t have to be a psycho to be upset about Van Halen’s death.
Music aside — which was usually warm, fun with instrumental and occasional lyrical depth — Van Halen meant a lot to me. I must have been 13 years old when I was sitting on the porch with my best friend Bob, hearing 1984 on the tape deck for the first time. My dad came home from work, heard the noise and asked what we were listening to, as dads often did. “Van Halen!?” he said. “Sounds like some kind of tropical disease!”
My dad was always good with one liners! When we watched music videos on Much, he would mock the singers shrieking their best operatic screams. “What’s wrong with that man? Should he go to the hospital? He sounds like he’s in pain!”
Good memories, all. I’m very attached to those childhood memories. I’m trying to commit them all to writing before they’re gone. Often, lost memories can be triggered by an old photograph. But there are many things I wish I had video of! If only there was a tape or photograph of that first time I heard Van Halen. But film was a precious commodity until the last 15 years or so. You didn’t just take pictures of you and your friends listening to music on the front porch.
I remember some of the tapes, and conversations. Iron Maiden’s Maiden Japan was popular in our porch listening sessions. George would come over from next door, and Bob would come over with his tapes. My house was right in the middle! I wonder how much of my happiest childhood memories are due to geographic concerns. If my house wasn’t right there in the middle of everybody, maybe I never would have been there that day to hear Van Halen or Iron Maiden.
Sometimes I worry that I spend too much time living in the past and trying to recapture those moments. But then I think about what you would say to that. “Why are you worried about something that brings you happiness?” I think you might ask. And you’d be right. So bring on the Van Halen. Bring on the Iron Maiden. Let’s party like it’s 1985. Might as well go for a soda — nobody hurts, nobody dies.
RECORD STORE TALES #949: My Music at Work (2006-2007)
None of my jobs since quitting the Record Store have been musical in nature. Dealing in steel pipe and accounts payable were boring by comparison, but everywhere I go, I bring music with me.
For a brief while I was working at Novocol Pharmaceuticals. They make the stuff that freezes your teeth so the dentist can do his work. It was pretty wild; I had a lab coat and a cubicle. One day I heard music drifting in. I got out of my chair and wandered around. I realized that the music was coming from the phone.
Many offices have phones that can play a radio station piped in. A little mono speaker, but better than nothing. It was the first music I had in the workplace since quitting the store. CHYM FM became my nemesis as time went on, but for the moment, I was glad to have music again. James Blunt, Rod Stewart, and a lot of “Bad Day” by Daniel Powter. Remember Daniel Powter?
I was at Novocol for a few weeks, and then I had an opportunity at United Rentals where I spent over a year of some of the best work days I ever had. United was a very special place and I’m glad I got to experience it. I made many friends there, and once again, they had the phone radios set to CHYM.
At United, we had a big back room with 8-10 computers for us to enter invoices. When we started the room was full. And I made myself known as the music guy when Rod Stewart came on the radio, as I spoke up to sing his praises. It was the first good song all day. Probably “Downtown Train”. That station only played one or two songs per artist, unless that artist was Beyonce.
“Right on, Rod Stewart!” I announced to the room. “Great song!”
The immediate response from one of the younger girls in the room was “Who’s Rod Stewart?”
I feigned shock. “Who’s Rod Stewart!? The guy with the spikey hair! You know ‘Reason to Believe’, ‘Have I Told You Lately’, ‘Rhythm of my Heart’, ‘Tonight’s the Night’…no?”
No. They did not.
I put up with CHYM for a long time, but one day somebody changed the radio station to Dave FM, the local rock station. All of a sudden, Bon Jovi and Quiet Riot at work were a mainstay. Even Judas Priest. “You’ve Got Another Thing Comin'”. Hearing that at work, a band that I was not allowed to play back in the Record Store days, it was awesome. Just awesome. Here I was in an Accounts Payable office, listening to music I liked better than what I was allowed to play at the store.
The boss poked his nose in the door. “Hey, is that Quiet Riot? I used to love Quiet Riot!” I was the only one in the room who knew what he was talking about. He was a good boss; he helped me get my current job.
“Lick It Up” would thump from that little mono speaker. It was still better than whatever I was allowed to listen to when I worked in an actual music store. The only times I played Kiss there were the occasions no bosses were around, and I was confident I wouldn’t get caught. If I was working at an out-of-town store like Oakville, I would play forbidden bands like Kiss and Iron Maiden. I knew nobody would be popping in for a surprise visit.
Not everybody was happy with the music at United. One lady, a couple years older than me, liked CHYM.
United closed their Kitchener office in 2007 and moved operations to the US. Employees were being shed slowly, and in the latter days there were only three of us left in the back room. There was an older lady, a younger one, and me. Two of us loved the music that Dave FM played, one of us claimed it caused headaches. No matter how low the volume was.
“How can you listen to this? It’s just noise,” she would complain.
She wasn’t even that much older than me. Four years tops. But after having Rhianna and Kelly Clarkson forced upon us for a year, my sympathy was not high. I offered to bring in some CDs from home that I thought everyone would like. I chose The Cars. Turns out I was the only Cars fan. We stuck to the radio and Dave FM.
Because the office was closing, we were all looking for new jobs. We were trying to be supportive of each other, but I noticed that the one older lady that didn’t like rock music was starting to become a little difficult to bear. She’d always been like a motherly figure, helping others. This seemed to change as we got closer and closer to the end. She was getting this attitude of superiority and it wasn’t helping my self esteem. I had 10 years of retail management, which she told me wasn’t enough for the kind of jobs I was looking for. I’d have to set my sights lower and work my way up, according to her. A little encouragement would have been better medicine, but talking to her made me feel like I was going to be stuck forever. In a few weeks she’d be gone, thankfully, to a new job as a receptionist. Good riddance. The vacuum enabled me to step up into a leadership role at the end of United. And then the call came through – I was needed. Urgently. And now I’m here!
To my chagrin, my new work had CHYM FM on the speaker phones too. But as in the past, CHYM didn’t last and before too long, Dave was back. History repeats!
mikeladano.com 