Hello, all, when we last met, we were talking about a weird record store stalker. Today, we’re going to be talking about record store groupies.
Now, I dunno about other guys. I didn’t have too many groupies. (Spoogecakes does not count as a groupie, as she was not a customer, just a psycho employee.) Some of the girls did. I remember Ashleigh had a couple admirers that we fondly referred to as “the Trekkies”. Me, on the other hand…I had Tall One and Short One.
Problem: If memory serves, Tall One was about 15, and Short One was about 16. I was about 30.
But the really weird thing is that Tall One and Short One had both simultaneously shitty, and awesome musical taste. It was like…Schrödinger’s taste. In the same transaction, they would purchase both Steve Vai, and the Moffats. They later graduated on to Kiss.
Second weird thing. That was a decade ago, and bizarrely through Facebook we re-contacted. Tall One even came to my pre-wedding garage sale and bought some of my crap! A lot of my crap, actually.
Everybody used to give me a hard time about Tall One and Short One, because they used to come in all the time, but I couldn’t be mean to them. Well, I was mean a couple times, I had to tell them to get lost I was busy. But then other times, they would come in with a huge box of Crispy Creme donuts. That time, I remember I ate four in a row.
“You ate four in a row?” Short One later said. “Do you know that each donut is like eating two Big Macs?”
“Uhhh…no?” I said.
“Congratulations, you ate eight Big Macs. Those were for everybody! Did you share?”
“Uhhh…a couple.”
So there you go. I’m sure other record store guys have better groupie stories. But did they get Cripsy Creme? Exactly!
When I first started at the store, my first day, my new boss gave me the orientation. We were both young, early 20’s. It went very well. I was excited. I’ll never forget one thing he said:
I think you’ll find that it’s hard work, but rewarding and fun work. You get to listen to music while you work, the discount is really good, and you’ll meet so many girls here. Trust me, this is the best place to meet them.
That proved not to be the case.
Flash forward: June 2004.
In the 10 years since, I had not once — not even once! — dated a girl through work. Granted I’m kind of an idiot when it comes to girls. Never did know how to talk to them without sounding like the biggest idiot in the world. Also I somehow pick up a stutter when talking to them.
Anyway, year after year, I stuttered my way through a decade of probably talking like an idiot in front of hundreds of female customers.
One sunny afternoon in June, I was working the late shift. It was a really nice day, a “windows open” kind of day.
I was working with this guy Matt. Around 6 or so, I had to step out to pick up some boxes from another location. Rush, “Summertime Blues” was on the radio, the first time I ever heard it. When I returned to the store about 45 minutes later, I said, “Matt! Holy shit man, I just heard the new Rush from their covers album. It’s amazing man!”
Ignoring me, he said,”Did you see those two blonde girls in the store before you left?”
I said, “Yeah, the two hot ones?”
Matt responded, “Well one was hot, the other looked like the Angry Walrus. That one left you a note.”
He handed me a piece of yellow paper with a kitten on it. It just said “Paula” and then a phone number.
“Seriously?” I asked him.
“Seriously. I wouldn’t make something like this up, man.”
Good enough for me. The one he referred to as “the so-so one” looked good to me! The glorious prophecy of my boss has come true!
I called the number on the paper and we agreed to go out for coffee. I asked her about the note she left, I told her that’s never happened to me before. She told me she was there with her friend, she noticed me there, but I left before she could hand me the note personally. So she asked Matt if he could give me her note.
We went out four or five times, but it clearly wasn’t happening. And that’s where it gets weird.
When she sent me the “Let’s just be friends,” email, she added a double whammy for me. She told me that the story about seeing me in the store and leaving the note was actually a frabrication.
See, she’d see my profile on some site somewhere, and I must have said that I worked in a record store in the tri-city area. Rather than get an account and send me a message like a normal person would, she tried something different.
“Well,” she began, “in your profile you said you worked in a CD store. You said you were from the KW-Cambridge area. There was a picture of you there, so I figured I could just checking stores until I found you.” Pardon? “I’m sorry I lied about just walking in and seeing you there. Anyway, you’re cool and I’m cool but it’s just not happening, so…”
So…that was mildly creepy and I didn’t feel so bad about it not working out after that!
“When The Lights Go Down”, Canada’s Triumph hits the stage. This album, recorded before their descent into mediocrity, is one of the first double live albums I ever got and is still one of my favourites. The band are tight, there’s a hot guitar solo and just about every hit the band ever had. The band are both singing and playing great, and as icing on the cake, they threw in two new studio tracks (one decent, the other bland).
The decent: “Mind Games” — Gil sings, but does not play drums due to his “annual arm injury”. Gary McCracken, ex-Max Webster, on drums! Can’t get much better than that. This is a great song with a fantastic double-tracked guitar hook.
The bland: “Empty Inside” — pure filler with Rik on vocals. No drummer, as this is a drum machine. Slow, slow, slow. Terrible song, terrible way to end an otherwise fine album. Hints of what was to come.
Live highlights for me included “Never Surrender”, an explosive “Fight The Good Fight”, and the double-whammy of “Spellbound” and “Follow Your Heart” (both singles from Thunder Seven). I think “Hold On” is a bit sappy, although here it is stripped down to a purely acoustic arrangement.
There’s a bonus track on the vinyl, not included on any CD edition of the album. Therefore, buy the CD at your own discretion. It’s “Allied Forces” – a wicked version, too. Gil’s drum solo, “Druh Mer Selbo” (Get it?) is on the CD, but not listed — it’s tacked onto “A World of Fantasy”. On the LP it was a separate track. The annoying thing is that there is enough room on a CD for “Allied Forces”, it still comes in under 80 minutes. I made a CD myself with the entire track list and it fit just fine.
This live album was culled from various shows ’81-’84, so you get a great cross section of key tracks and performances. Yet it is very even sounding, and you can’t really tell that the sources are years apart. It is well mixed and mastered, and it is the Triumph album I play the most.
4/5 stars.
Side 1 LP 1
“When the Lights Go Down” (Gil Moore, Michael Levine, Rik Emmett) – 6:00
“Never Surrender” (Rik Emmett, Michael Levine, Gil Moore) – 6:43
“Allied Forces” (Gil Moore, Michael Levine, Rik Emmett) – 5:07
“Hold On” (Rik Emmett) – 4:21
Side 2 LP 1
“Magic Power” (Rik Emmett, Michael Levine, Gil Moore) – 6:12
“Rock & Roll Machine” (Gil Moore) – 10:20
“Lay it on the Line” (Rik Emmett) – 5:03
Side 1 LP 2
“A World of Fantasy” (Rik Emmett, Michael Levine, Gil Moore, Tam Patrick) – 4:18
“Druh Mer Selbo” (Gil Moore) – 4:12
“Midsummer’s Daydream” (Rik Emmett) – 2:42
“Spellbound” (Gil Moore, Michael Levine, Rik Emmett) – 3:56
“Follow Your Heart” (Gil Moore, Michael Levine, Rik Emmett) – 3:37
Side 2 LP 2
“Fight the Good Fight” (Rik Emmett, Michael Levine, Gil Moore) – 7:36
“Mind Games” (Gil Moore, Michael Levine, Rik Emmett) – 4:49
“Empty Inside” (Rik Emmett, Michael Levine, Gil Moore) – 4:04
Sometimes, things just came into the store that no matter the cost, you had to get it. You’ve all seen Pawnstars, right? It could get that way. 99% of transactions were pretty ordinary, but sometimes you’d get a pretty wild score, and you couldn’t back down.
You’d see imports, singles, bootlegs, promos, special editions, bonus tracks, bonus discs, and sometimes damn near complete collections of several artists. Tom tells the legend of a guy who came in selling a near complete Zappa collection.
There was one guy that I just loved. We’ll call him C. He was addicted to hard rock, heavy metal, and Euro metal. He was a collector and he had numerous Japanese imports. And frequently, he sold us those Japanese imports, of just about anything decent. A few that weren’t so decent, but very very few. I don’t know where he got the stuff, and I didn’t ask. None of my business!
Thanks to C, I have a pretty close to complete collection of Japanese Harem Scarem imports, Bruce Dickinson, and Journey. Whoop de do for a lot of you, but these things are mucho expensivo to buy! Why?
In Japan, it is actually cheaper to buy a CD imported from America then their own (superior) domestic product. So the Japanese counteract this by putting bonus tracks on their domestic product. Much of time, these are songs specifically exclusive to Japan.
A really good example of a song written and recorded specifically for the Japanese market would be “Tokyo is Burning” from W.A.S.P.‘s K.F.D. album. Another would be “Himalaya” by Glenn Tipton. (Ignore that the Himalaya mountains are not in Japan, please, I’m guessing Glenn didn’t know that when he wrote it.)
There are collectors in every city and every town who pay premius prices to get these discs imported here from Japan. Average prices can run from $35 to $50 for a single disc, much more if you’re talking about multi-disc sets. The most I ever paid for a single Japanese disc (new) was $80 (Come Hell Or High Water by Deep Purple), and the least I paid (new) was the “Woman From Tokyo” single by the same band.
So back to the point, these discs were worth coin. And C might actually bring in 4 or 5 at a time. I recall he brought in 4 Harem Scarem imports at one time, each with bonus tracks.
Now, C wasn’t stupid. He knew that if he didn’t get what he wanted for the discs, he could try downtown where there were more collectors and afficianos, and fewer hockey moms. However, he also knew it would be much easier to come to me personally, because I knew what I was doing when it came to imports.
And frequently, since I was usually seeing stuff I wanted for my own collection, I’d be willing to up the ante when needed. Since I frequented Amazon, I knew exactly what these things were worth.
One of the coolest things he ever brought in was a Helloween Japanese box set, 4 discs. I’m shooting myself in the foot for not picking it up back then. I’ll never see it again, I’m sure.
Often, the Japanese imports were packaged with extra goodies: stickers, extra booklets, patches, posters. To find a used Japanese import with these goodies still intact was very rare. That ups the value as well. And for the ultimate collector, Japanese discs come with something called an obi-strip. They are a piece of paper with Japanese writing on it, that goes over the jewel case of the CD. This is what they look like: click to embiggen
Because the obi strip is actually outside the jewel case, it’s hard to keep, and most people end up throwing them away. Add a couple bucks to the end value of a CD if the obi strip is intact. See how this goes?
Unfortunatley, C usually threw out to obi strips, so most of my Japanese imports lack them. You can easily store the obi strip by putting your CD in a sandwich bag as you can see with my Bon Jovi single.
One of the drawbacks of dealing with C is that he became used to a certain level of money when he came in. And, nobody else liked C. They all hated him. I heard it had something to do with him chewing gum when he talked. Never mind the cool-ass shit he brought into the store that nobody else in town could get! So, negotiations could get heavy. He knew what his stuff was worth, and if I could have owned it all, I would have!
Another situation where negotiations could get fierce were with large sales. The largest I ever saw was an estate sale. I can’t remember how many discs we looked at. I’m thinking the number is close to 3000, all in one shot. I think they were in these big gray convention containers that could hold about 400 each. And there were 7 containers, plus a few boxes. And in this case, it was good, good shit. Sometimes, you’d buy a handful of crappy stuff just to get a mountain of good stuff. Because the seller often wanted them all gone and not to deal with them anymore. Clear slate.
When going through these big estate sales, you’d often have a pile of awesome jazz titles alone that probably numbered in the hundreds. Blues, same deal. Of course you’d also get boxes of crap, but sometimes you’d take it just to get to the blues and jazz titles.
Inevitably, there were times when you just could not justify asking as much as the customer wanted. I remember, very unhappily, having to turn down this Rolling Stones CBS years box set, which came with a bonus EP. The box even had this neat paper tongue. I just couldn’t give the guy what he wanted and still make any money off the thing.
Another one that sucked to turn down was the CultCollection 1984-1990 box set. This sucker is hard to find. I just couldn’t give the guy what he wanted. I wanted it for myself as it was, so I was willing to go even higher than the call of duty allowed. Alas, it was not to be. Thankfully, most of those tracks have been released on the Rare Cult boxed set(s), which I have…thanks to C!
Other great box sets I got from C: Black Sabbath‘s The Black Box. Bon Jovi’s 100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can’t Be Wrong. Metalogy, by Judas Priest, complete with limited edition DVD. A complete Motley CrueMusic to Crash Your Car To box set with the poster and stuff still inside.
Sometimes you’d see stuff that, if you don’t grab it, you’ll never see it again. One of my treasures is an Aussie import of Faith No More‘s Angel Dust with a 4 song bonus disc called Free Concert in the Park. Snagged it. Never seen again. On the Faith No More front, I also picked up a split live bootleg album with King’s X called Kings of the Absurd. I have the first Tea Party album, which actually came in more than once. I paid at least $50 for it. Possibly $100, I don’t remember anymore. There was at least one album that we could sell for $100, which was Standing in the Dark by Platinum Blonde. And people would pay it. I was offered a $100 reward once to find the album, as in, whatever the CD cost if I found it, plus a $100 finder’s fee. I never did find it, but I later picked up Alien Shores at a cool hole in the wall in Stratford, and gave it to Peter.
Nowadays, just about everything I want is available from my sofa, even if it’s located in Japan. eBay and Amazon have changed everything about finding rare music. Just a few weeks ago I snagged the Japanese disc of You Wanted the Best, You Got the Best!! by Kiss. Been hunting for that since 1996. Never seen it for sale anywhere, and the one I got was mint. Got it for $40. Incredibly, a month or so ago, I found one of the last two Maiden singles that I still needed. I got “Hallowed Be Thy Name (Live)” for $35. This single, thought at the time to be Dickinson’s swan song with the band, features a cover of Eddie impaling Bruce through the chest!
My advice to aspiring collectors out there: Pick your #1 favourite band, and start on Wikipedia. Explore the discography, and see what you’re missing. Check eBay and see what the pricing is like. Then hunt until you find one at the right price. Good luck!
I can’t help it. When a good song comes on, it’s an unconscious reaction: I start strumming the chords in air guitar…beating the air drums…slappin’ da bass! (Nobody plays air keyboards.)
Everybody around me was embarrassed to the nines. But you can’t stop the rock!
I jumped on counters. I even once jumped down on the floor and did the Angus Young spinny spinny thing. When there were no customers. Sometimes I had to jump right off the counter as a guy was coming in.
“Yeah…heh…just playing some air guitar…”
The first time I was ever caught playing air guitar at work, it was actually at my first job at the grocery store. I was working in the parcel pickup area, and it was March break, about 11 in the morning, and it was dead down there. So they get you to sweep up the area, clean it up real good. And we had a tape deck down there. Well, I started playing air-broom-guitar when one of the assistant managers walked in. He just smiled. Probably thought I was half out of my mind.
My air guitar at weddings is now legendary. It is now tradition that I get down on the dance floor and do the Angus Young spinny-spinny during “You Shook Me All Night Long”. Last time, I did it in a kilt. Don’t worry, I didn’t wear the kilt “traditionally”.
Air guitar is an expression of one’s connection to the rock. If the rock connects, then the air guitars come out. Next thing you know, you’re doing Van Halen on the countertops, pretending it’s the “Hot For Teacher” video. It happens!
Time to wrap up my four-part Eddie Jackson interview from 2001!
This has been the complete, unedited text of our 1-hour conversation. This has never been seen by anybody before. In case you missed the three previous parts:
EDDIE JACKSON INTERVIEW, OCT 30 2001 (Unedited – Part 4)
Q – [NOTE: We had just finished talking about the recording of the Promised Land album.] Now the next album, Here In The Now Frontier, was different. In the liner notes to the new live album, it’s pretty much just skipped over completely. And only one track appears. Were you disappointed in that album at all?
E – No. That’s interesting that you bring that up, because we were working on a couple of the other songs, but I don’t know why there was only one song recorded for the Live Evolution. That’s just interesting you bring that up because I kind of noticed that. I go, “God, there’s only one song from that album, I wonder how that happened?”
Q – I guess it’s the same problem you talked about before, where you can’t fit in everything you ever played.
E – Again, I think we were really focusing on a lot of the older stuff. Throughout our touring, these last few years and whatnot, we kept hearing a lot of “Hey, are you guys playing anything off The Warning or anything off Rage For Order, or anything off the EP?” So right then, that kinda sparked the idea of, “Hey, let’s go back. Let’s really give ‘em something that they’re gonna really enjoy. Who knows if we’ll ever get this opportunity again? Why not just give ‘em a variety, a potpouri of Queensryche material from the beginning to the present, you know.
Q – Listening to the live album, and trying to pick out influences, I think I hear a bit of Steve Harris and Geezer Butler. Were those guys influences on you or am I just hearing things?
E – Since the beginning?
Q – Just bits here and there.
E – I’m sure, especially from the earlier days, there were some major influences from Geezer Butler, Steve Harris, a little bit of Geddy Lee. If there’s times that it sounds like that then you’re probably right. At that given moment, I’m sure I was influenced. We were all influenced by what was out at that time. Especially with the EP, and The Warning. When you’re listening, like I was saying before, you’re relearning the songs. And then when you start hearing the instruments, you go, “Wow, doesn’t that sound like that one band back then?” I don’t you’re really aware of it up until a few years later when you listen back you know!
Q – Is there anybody out there right now who just frightens you on the bass?
E – Oh heck, there’s tons of them! I take more of a simplistic approach, but that’s just my style. I love funk, I really like a really hard driving sound. I tend to focus more on the sonic end of it than the performance end. I’m really into experimenting with sound. As you can tell, actually on the Mindcrime album, I’ve had guys come up to me, and they go, “Hey, how did you get your bass to sound like a truck?” I go, “What? Where’d that come from?” you know? So obviously there’s a little bit of fretless in Promised Land, and Real World, there’s some fretless on there. So heck, you know, some 5 string here, some whatever, here or there. I’ll experiment with anything. I think I really love approaching the sonic end of it, trying to come with a really cool sound, something that’s very distinctive.
There’s a lot of bands out there with a lot of talented bass players that I’m just listening to this thing and go, “How the hell did he get that sound? That is so cool! What is he running? Some sort of an effect? I wonder what he’s using!” You’re just reaching and guessing, it’s a lot of fun though, hearing a lot of these bass players. I tell you, you learn a lot just from listening and I was really a big, big Grand Funk and especially Alice Cooper fan. I mean, [Dennis] Dunaway [Alice Cooper] back then, that guy was an amazing bass player. And then, what’s his name? Sure? Sher? From Grand Funk? Heck, I forgot his name…Mel Schacher. Yeah, he was an amazing bass player. I kind of enjoyed a lot of their bass work back then. You don’t really hear it in my style, I just liked hearing it. The performance, you know.
Q – I know when you put on the Promised Land video game, there’s some definite funk influences there. Funky backgrounds and colours too! Do see yourself for that aforementioned solo project doing some funk, big horn sections and stuff?
E – Oh yeah yeah! That was just a little piece I wrote for that Promised Land CD-ROM game. Yeah, that was kinda fun. And if you noticed, I’m using a different coloured tie on each musician. Each instrument that I’m playing. I dunno, that’s not a big deal but it was to me. You know I go hey, I wanna put a different tie, I wonder if anybody will catch it. But yeah, that was a lot of fun. I tell ya, you’re almost kinda acting your parts out, especially when I was the secretary at the front desk there. It was kinda weird, putting all that makeup, and dressed in drag.
Q – I guess it’s a chance to lighten up because Queensryche are not the kind of band that is really known for joking around.
E – Yeah, I mean, some levity here and there, it doesn’t hurt.
Q – Running out of time here, I’d better start wrapping up! I wanted to ask you if there’s any questions out there that you’ve been waiting to get, but nobody’s asked it yet.
E – Oh geez! That is a great question! Oh geez! You got me on the spot here! This is cool!
Ummm…oh geez. That’s good. I don’t know, you got me here! I just don’t know what to think here! I mean, what question? Oh geez…how about uh…this might be little cliché, or a little simplistic, but how about “How is my son doing?”
Q – And how is he doing?
E – He’s doing wonderful.
Q – How old is he?
E – He’s eight months. Other than that, I can’t think of anything else. Do you have anything you want to ask?
Q – I don’t know…now I’m on the spot here! How about…what can I say…do you remember playing Toronto in ‘95 at Molson Amphitheater?
E – Yeah.
Q – I was there at that show, I thought it was a great show.
E – That was with AC/DC.
Q – Type O Negative.
E – Type O Negative, you’re right! The Molson Amphitheater or Labbatt’s? Yeah, that was back in, yeah with Type O Negative.
Q – Was that the last night of the tour?
E – Yep.
Q – I seem to remember you guys messing around, like a big roadie with a wig playing the part of the nurse during that one song…can’t remember the song.
E – Yeah yeah, well that was our crew, kind of putting in the finishing touches of the last show of the tour. And with the brawl, the bar brawl, yeah, normally that really didn’t happen except for that night. It was the last show of the tour and they wanted to screw with ya.
Q – One of those examples of Queensryche’s sense of humour.
E – Yeah, you know, and I’m sure it throws the audience for a loop, because they just like, “Is this part of their show?” You can just look at their incredulous looks you know. I can just imagine what’s crossing their minds, like, “Wait a sec, what’s that guy with that wig doing onstage?” Oh, get this! We had that same production through that whole tour, with the bar scene, and the lounge band. We were in Dallas, and every night there’s guests that can win seats to sit in, on stage, during the Promised Land song, and that’s when the bar comes out, and we’re the lounge band. The winners would go up onstage with us and stuff. And there were these two girls, and they had to have been peelers! During that song, they started to like, make out! It almost took away my whole emphasis of performing. I’m just looking at this, and looking at Michael, and next thing you know they’re on the floor just like, rubbing each other body to body and I go “Oh my God! Here I am and I’ve got some cousins and aunts and nieces here!” And I go “Oh my God, what the hell are they going to say after the show!” It was just nuts! That was very entertaining that night! They were just…yeah, they were going for it! I’m surprised we didn’t get arrested.
When I talked to Eddie Jackson back in 2001, for the release of Live Evolution, he gave me so much material that 80% of this has never been seen before!
I had so much material that I had to break it up into four parts! In case you missed them:
Part III is below. Stay tuned for the fourth and final part!
EDDIE JACKSON INTERVIEW, OCT 30 2001 (Unedited – Part 3)
Picking up where we left off: Discussing unused song ideas.
Q – Who remembers these ideas when it comes down to jamming for a new album? Is it something that you’d dig up on old tapes, or you just say, “Remember this old bit?” and you play it?
E – Stuff like that just happens. What we normally try to do is just create something fresh. But it’s always fun to go back and take a listen to something that you’ve worked with in the past, on the last release or the release before. Because there’s always some ideas there that you can possibly use.
Q – There’s certainly enough stuff out there to collect with the Japanese bonus tracks and stuff.
E – Yeah, I mean, Promised Land had “Chasing Blue Skies”. That was on the Promised Land CD that was released in Japan. [note: it was actually Hear In The Now Frontier that had that song] And it also had “Someone Else?” but with the full band version.
Q – And some of those made it on to the Greatest Hits.
E – I think so.
Q – What about solo projects? Have you ever pondered that?
E – Oh yeah, oh yeah. I mean, Geoff ‘s [Tate, vocals] working on a little solo project for himself. Scotty [Rockenfield, drums] and Kelly put together something. Michael’s kinda working on that. I’ve always wanted to do something like that, kind of like step away from Queensryche for the day and then do something on my own. I’m always coming up with ideas and I eventually would like to put something together like that.
Q – Do you have any ideas for a direction? Obviously it would have to be different from Queensryche.
E – Yeah, you know, my listening taste of music is so eclectic. It’s like from Abba to Zappa. I love pop rock, I love hard rock, I love jazz. I think one of the last albums that I actually bought was the Rob Zombie Hellbilly Deluxe. That was one of the last albums, I mean it grew on me like fungus! It’s just got some angst and attitude. Stylistically that would be a fun little approach. You never know, it’s always up in the air when that time comes. You could always think about, “Alright, this is a direction I’d like to approach,” but when that day comes, you could always have a different idea.
Q – One thing you notice when you listen to the new live album, is from about Empire onwards, there are a lot of strong grooves happening, especially on Q2K. A lot of the older stuff is faster, more riff-oriented. Which of the two do you prefer to play live?
E – When it comes to the era?
Q – Just which style of songs do you prefer, the faster or the groovier?
E – Oh jeez I’ll play anything! I’m serious! I mean I love a lot of the groove. Yeah, I mean, heck, I’ll play just about anything, just about any type of a groove, you know. I mean that’s what makes it interesting. You got a band like AC/DC. They are one of the few bands that can get away with writing 3 chord progression songs with the same 4/4 beat and still create something that’s very good! But they’re one of the few bands that can get away with that. I dunno what it is about them. Sure, there’s other bands that might have released one album, and then a next one and it’s kind of similar, might have a lot of the same grooves and stuff…sometimes it doesn’t work for them. I’m always into the idea of creating something different. But you can only go so far because everything’s pretty much been done, I feel. I think you have to continue to be creative with what you have to work with. You know, you’re obviously gonna hear a song that’s gonna sound like somebody else. There’s something about that song, you know, “God, that chorus sounds just like band that was out in the 80’s,” or “that intro sounds just like this band that just came out last year,” you know. What can you do? You try to be creative. It’s really difficult to be original anymore. Especially now. I dunno, there’s a lot of musicians out there that are very talented, and there’s a lot of bands that have been very successful doing what they’re doing. You just have to credit them with their talents and whatnot. It’s tough to be extremely original nowadays.
Q – You notice a lot of bands today resorting to electronic sounds to make something new. Moby, or whoever. Do you ever see Queensryche experimenting with something like that?
E – Like more instrumental?
Q – Yeah, I guess on Rage For Order you guys experimented a lot with electronic sounds.
E – Oh yeah, I mean we actually created some of those sounds ourselves! Yeah, you know at the very end of “Walk In The Shadows”? That big ambient reverberated sound? At the very end, “Walk in the shadows…walk with me! POW!” That’s a door slamming in a parking garage!
Q – It’s always something you don’t expect!
E – Exactly! Nobody else knows that unless you’ve been told about it. That’s why that album to me is the most memorable one. We ended up putting something together, like I was explaining to you in regards to coming up with our own sound. Our own little ideas. I don’t know what triggered us into doing that, but I think we were just trying to pull out all the stops when it came to producing the album. For the production side.
Q – I find that album, even though sonically they’re nothing alike, to be akin to Promised Land just for sonic experimentation.
E – Oh yeah! From banging on top of these big garbage cans… What else did we do?
Q – There’s some really neat electronic vocal effects on Geoff’s voice on “Damaged”. “The broken parts, of my machinery…” And then it sounds like an electronic overload or something.
E – And believe it or not, those were effects that I don’t think we could ever do again. Seriously, because…”Well, that was cool, did you record it?” He goes, “Yeah.” “Well let’s try it again!” And we could not recreate that! It was weird! So again it was like one of those one-offs. That’s why the tape is always rolling because you never know what you can come up with, and you can use.
Q – The band was experimenting a bit with different instruments…sax, cello, and piano, on that album. Do you play any different instruments?
E – I’ll tinker around with a little bit of keyboard, a little guitar here. I’ll tell you what I really love the most, it’s really kinda rivaling playing bass. It’s singing.
Q – Oh really? Well you’ve always sung backups live.
E – Yeah, I love singing! And I’ve noticed since Chris has left, I’ve had to cover a lot of his parts, and I’m telling you they’re up there sometimes. But still, it’s something that you don’t really think about. Through all these tours that we’ve been performing on, I’ve never realized how much he actually sang. Because you’re so busy playing your bass and singing your parts. But you’re aware that he’s singing his parts too, but since I’ve covered his vocal parts…gee whiz! I’m like, holy cow, I’ve gotta sit down and remember all this! But yeah, it’s pretty interesting you know, but I just can’t believe how much he actually sang.
Q – I notice the Q2K material…it’s funny that you say you’re singing more, but I think the live versions have stronger harmonies. Do you hear that as well?
E – I think maybe a lot of that could be for the fact that the harmonies are riding a bit hotter than on the album. The harmonies are probably still there on the album, but they might have been recorded a little hotter on the live mix.
Q – I just thought they stuck out a bit and I thought, “Hmm, well somebody’s singing more!”
E – Yeah, well, that’s Kelly and I. And for the fact that I love singing, I have no complaints with what was thrown at me with regard to all the backing vocals and whatnot. I mean heck, I’ll sing anything.
Q – Do you see yourself singing lead on a Queensryche song? I think Chris sang a lead on Hear In The Now.
E – You know, I don’t know. That’s never crossed my mind, but again you just never know! With Queensryche, heck, you just never know, we’re always branching off into some sort of new territory whether it’s sonically speaking, producing, writing or whatever. I guess at times you could say it’s a conscious effort, but there’s times where you know, you’re aware, and you just try to create something for that moment. At least for myself, I don’t normally like to look back and listen to what we’ve done in the past. Because then you start getting influenced by it, you know? And there’s gonna be ideas that might sound like something in the past. There’s nothing wrong with that, but…
Q – But when an interviewer asks you, “Hey do you remember that electronic part in Damaged” and you haven’t heard the album in 5 or 6 years…!
E – Believe it or not, you’ll be surprised, especially when you hear a lot of these songs that we had recording for this Live Evolution, it’s amazing how much more you remember. When you play “London”, or “Screaming In Digital”, or “Suite: Sister Mary”. All of a sudden you just start reminiscing, and you just start thinking back at the time when it was recorded. I mean we were in Philadelphia, Rage For Order we were up in Canada…
Q – Where were you in Canada?
E – Up in Mushroom Studios, was it? Up in Vancouver? We’ve recorded in many studios. We recorded in that one, was it in Montreal?
Q – Yeah I read about that, in the dead of winter.
E – Yeah, O:MC. Operation:Mindcrime.
Q – I think the most interesting location you’ve recorded in was the cottage for Promised Land.
E – Oh geez, talk about tranquility and isolated! It was this small little island up north up by the San Juan Islands. Yeah, you’re right. We got away from everybody. Fortunately it was only like a 3, 4 hour drive, but still, just within those 3 or 4 hours you go from a live environment to a very tranquil and quiet environment. There were times at night when we would take a break, we were recording until 12, or 3 in the morning, however long it took us to record whichever song. But we’d be taking a break outside and you can hear the whales! It was pretty wild. There was a couple of little wildcats out there. We definitely didn’t leave any food outside!
Q – I think it’s safe to say that the environment must have impacted on the sound of that album. It sounds like it was recorded in a cottage, in the woods.
E – Do you think the influence was there? Do you think there was a lot of influence?
Q – I think so.
E – Well, there was this doctor, and I can’t remember his name, but he owned this cabin. It was actually sort of a…not a bed and breakfast, but like a summer retreat sort of thing. He would hire the cabin out for people that would wanna head out to San Juans and stay there for the weekend, or for the week, or for the two weeks, or month, whatever. So what we did is we just basically told him, “Listen, we’re a band…” And that right there obviously…”Wait a sec! Before you even continue!” That kinda scared him a bit. But no no, we’re not type kind of a band. We respect our environment we don’t start thrashing things for no apparent reason. But if the shitter stopped working in the middle of the night, then you’re going to hear from us! We kind of worked out a deal, and we were there for a few months, and we ended up just hiring out…we moved in to both units. So it was a massive cabin, it was pretty cool. We were just living and breathing that album there.
RUSH – Beyond the Lighted Stage (blu ray, directed by Sam Dunn)
OK, as a Rush fan, I am biased. I loved Beyond The Lighted Stage. For those who are not Rush fans, I am sure you will enjoy Kim Mitchell’s description of Geddy’s voice. (“Like a cat stuck in the door with a blowtorch up its ass!”)
This blu-ray looks absolutely amazing in beautiful 1080p. Consisting mostly of interview footage, Sam Dunn and co. have created another fantastic, glowing, appreciative documentary. Gathering up such fans as Mitchell, Billy Corgan (who is a SERIOUS fan), Trent Reznor, Les Claypool, Jack Black, and Sebastian Bach, Rush is finally given the movie treatment that they deserve. Dunn covers the early years, the 80’s, Neil’s tragedies, and beyond. Outside of Neil’s books, I have never heard him speak about his personal tragedies before. This was especially enlightening.
Amazingly, somebody in the Lifeson clan had a camera rolling at the dinner table one night when a 16-year-old Alex told his father that he wanted to quit school and do music full time. It is hard to believe such footage exists, but here it is. Such footage is very special, but only one of many such moments in Beyond The Lighted Stage.
Bonus features are fantastic. A hilariously tipsy dinner at a hunting lodge gives you that fly-on-the-wall feeling. A revealing bit with Geddy and manager Ray Danniels sheds light on the day that Geddy was fired very early in the band’s career. Live footage of “Working Man” with Rutsey on drums is a blu-ray first. Samples of other Rush DVDs give you some more music to sink your teeth into. A little bit more detail on Hemispheres, Presto, and Roll The Bones are also available as bonus features. This is just a portion of the generous bonus features included.
Certainly, since they still have not been inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Rush have not achieved the ultimate in mainstream appreciation. This movie goes a long way into making up for it. Best of all, it maintains the feeling that Rush fans are in a secret underground club — those who “get it”. This is “our” band, not “theirs”. Now you can get the whole story, the way the Rush fans see the band.
I have to give Geoff Tate credit for a good answer to a tough question. Regarding “knife incident” and the rumoured Queensryche split, Geoff said, “I’m thinking, I’m not gonna really dispel too many of the rumors because it’s hardly ever that Queensrÿche gets any publicity, so this is great. All 43 people on the Internet are talking about it.”
That’s a great answer. He also says the band plan to tour in 2013.
With all this drama (hopefully) behind them, I’ll take you to Part 2 of my October 2001 chat with bassist Eddie Jackson. This is the unedited transcript, never before seen anywhere by anybody.
EDDIE JACKSON INTERVIEW, OCT 30 2001 (Unedited) Part 2
Q – Now the album packaging [Live Evolution] is pretty cool here, but what the heck does that say under your picture?
E – My credits? It’s backwards! All the letters, the words are backwards! They’re spelled backwards! The words are spelled in reverse. So let’s say you come up with the word “happy”. I start with the letter Y first, and then a P and then a P and then an A and then an H. You know, heck, gotta be a little goofy every once in a while! What I original wanted to do was to have it printed out so if you put it up to a mirror, then you would be able to read it correctly. But I didn’t think about that until after.
Q – Next album right?
E – You’re like the second or third person who asked me about that. [One guy said] “What is that, Spanish?” No, it’s not! I think you’d know if it was Spanish or not. You know, heck, just going a little goofy. Some creativity there.
Q – Are you “cyber-savvy” at all? Are you into the internet and stuff like that?
E – A little bit, you know.
Q – Do you see the internet as a way to reach new fans?
E – Oh, absolutely!
Q – Are you doing that? Are you noticing that?
E – I think so. Especially with our fan club. A lot of that is, instead of sending mailers out, we just send ‘em e-mailers. Not only is that a cost effective approach, but it’s a lot more efficient, I think you can do a lot more than just a letter or a flier. I think it’s done wonders. Obviously it’s been the wave of the future for a few years and I think it’s a great tool.
Q – You’ve got bands like Marillion who pre-sold their album online before even a note was recorded It’s just amazing how the dedicated fans will seek you out.
E – Oh absolutely, yeah yeah! Well again, we’ve been very fortunate to have this type of fan base. They’ve allowed us to evolve and grow as a band. And they’ve evolved and grown as individuals as listeners, as fans. What more can you ask for? [They’ve] given us the freedom to create and I think that’s great, and also by being able to communicate with them through our music and also through cyberspace. It’s great!
Q – Let’s go back to LIVEcrime for a minute. You’ve got more than one new release coming out, LIVEcrime is being reissued on DVD and album.
E – I don’t know if it’s on DVD though.
Q – OK, I’ll have to check. [Note: It is coming this month]
E – I was only told it was going to be the live CD, but you may be right.
Q – Now, the live CD is going to have some bonus tracks on it. Are these the same versions as on Live Evolution or are they with the original lineup?
E – Those are with the original lineup. Those two songs, “Road To Madness” and “Lady Wore Black”, those were recorded at the time LIVEcrime was recorded.
Q – From the same gig?
E – From the same gig. I mean, we recorded the whole show! But we were mainly focusing on LIVEcrime. Yeah, I mean, there were a few other songs through that whole set that we performed. Yeah, we recorded the whole show, but we just figured, OK. A lot of that was pretty much EMI’s idea. And so it was kinda interesting to hear about EMI releasing this. And here we are, just doing the groundwork on Live Evolution, and we’re just thinking, “Wait a second!” You know, are they going to conflict with one another? But I don’t think it has, I think it’s great because for the collector and for the hardcore fan out there, even though most of that LIVEcrime is the same as that released before, with the exception of those two extra tracks, that’s what makes it interesting. But yeah, that was pretty much our very first live recording. With the exception of The Warning tour. You know, that had the live video.
Q – Which is also pretty much impossible to find. If you ever talk to EMI about getting something reissued…
E – Yeah, good luck finding that one! But then again, that was only released on video, that was never released as a live audio. And then Live Evolution was our very first full length live recording from start to finish, and a lot of people ask us, “Why’d it take you so long?” But I don’t know! As you’re evolving through your career, and recording and touring and all that, I guess for me it doesn’t really cross your mind because you’re so busy and you’re so tied up at that moment doing what you’re doing. Whether it’s recording or touring that it never really crossed my mind. There are times when you release a new album, by giving it an extra [live] track or two which Japan loves…they love that type of thing, when you can add a bonus track or two. That’s always fun but I don’t know why it’s taken us so long to release something like that. Look at the Greatest Hits, [it] was released last year! A lot of people said, “Why’d it take you so long?” Well, why are you complaining? (laughs) Stop bitching about it, there you go, it’s right there! (laughs).
Q – Well here’s another release you can ponder. You guys did a video game, Promised Land a few years ago. There’s an exclusive track on that called “8 Miles High”. And it’s never been released anywhere else as far as I know on CD.
E – Have you heard it?
Q – Yeah. I couldn’t beat the game though, I had to, uhh…cheat.
E – Well I’ve got the cheat sheet for that thing.
Q – But it’s a great track and it would be nice to get it released, like you guys have collected a few B-sides and live things and remixes that you can release on a rarities album. Is that ever gonna be in the cards?
E – You know, anything is possible, but again, I don’t know if we’ve taken it that serious, to do something like that. Maybe perhaps the majority of the reason if, how satisfied are we with the results of that particular song? There was reason why it wasn’t added to the new album, or whichever album was released. Perhaps stylistically it didn’t coincide with what we were doing. Sonically, maybe it didn’t work. I dunno, that’s an interesting point, I mean, would we ever put something like that together? Anything’s possible. I think it would be fun. We have quite a few songs in the vaults. We’ve archived quite a bit of ideas, there’s even songs that we have from The Warning days. From Operation:Mindcrime days. Just a couple of songs that are floating around doing nothing. You never know, there’s actually been a couple of songs…let’s see, what was it. Which album was it? Promised Land I believe? There were two songs that we had used ideas from a song that was written back in…Rage For Order? Or Operation:Mindcrime? But we kinda took theintro or the middle piece of those songs and just kind of created a whole new song with it.
Towards the end of the record store days, I was prone to growing an awesome beard. I also wear glasses and enjoy wearing baseball hats. Because of this, and an obsessive love of movies, I was told that I kinda-sorta-in-a-weird way resembled Steven Speilberg.
But not quite enough, so instead my nickname became Señor Spielbergo.
I grew back the Señor Spielbergo beard this year! It’s much more grey. I tricked my wife into letting me grow it back. I told her it was my “playoff beard”.
But, the Rangers were eliminated, so I have to shave it. She told me so. So this is your last look (in 2012) at the Señor Spielbergo/playoff beard! It was an awesome beard. Easily the best since the record store days!
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