Grab a Stack of Rock / LeBrain Train

C’mon C’mon, the Legendary Andy Curran is on the LeBrain Train!

The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike and Superdekes

Episode 59 – The Earl of the 8th Note – Andy Curran

His name is on so many albums in our collections, from Coney Hatch to Soho 69 to Caramel and beyond, to writing with Kim Mitchell and helping to put together Rush and Max Webster box sets.  His bass is literally made of the floor of the El Mocambo club, and now Coney Hatch have their first official live album recorded in that same club.

We come at Andy from two perspectives.  Deke has questions he has been burning to ask for 40 years.  Mike is the new fan whose first Coney Hatch purchase was pre-ordering the live album in late 2020.  That groundbreaking concert was live streamed during the Covid pandemic and then prepared for the imminent CD and vinyl release of Live at the El Mocambo.

Please give a huge welcome for Andy Curran on the LeBrain Train!

7:00 PM E.S.T.
Facebook:  MikeLeBrain  YouTube:  Mike LeBrain

 

Easter Memories: Quiet Riot, GI Joe, Alice Cooper, Def Leppard & More!

Just a short show tonight, for those stuck at home this Easter weekend with nothing much else to do! Music, toys, happy memories. Lots of audio/visual aids. Great comments and audience participation.

Quiet Riot, Black Sabbath, David Lee Roth, Def Leppard, Aerosmith, and rare Japanese imports.

Bonus: Couldn’t resist playing some music so we closed with the show with Uncle Meat singing “Fairies Wear Boots” back in 1991 with Heavy Cutting. Thank you for watching!

 

NEXT WEEK:  ANDY CURRAN!

Max the Axe – Rocks the LeBrain Train on a Thursday Night

We promised you tunes, and we brought the tunes!  With a special interview with the guy himself, kinda a big deal, Max the Axe!  It was not an uptite Thursday night at all.  This loosey-goosey interview covers Max’s discography and history as an independent musician for over three decades.  Find out about his origins, see rare photographs, and watch the band play live!  We even get to look at the cover art and title of the new EP.  (Added bonus:  running commentary by drummer Dr. Dave.)

Straight outta lockdown, Max the Axe jammed together again for the first time in about a year.  The lockdown session was filmed and tonight we played for you three tracks:

  1. “River Grand”
  2. “Pygmy Blowdart” (NEW SONG)
  3. “Scales of Justice”

For a band who hadn’t practised in a year, filmed on a crummy cell phone that apparently only does vertical video, these were some fine tracks.  Enjoy the show!  Rock on, Max the Axe!

 

LATER TODAY

Don’t forget – the Easter special streams April 2 at 7:00 PM E.S.T.   It’s pure nostalgia as we pull from a grab bag of great memories.  Don’t miss it!

 

*Two more unaired songs were played during the session – “Uptite Friday Night” and the new “Oktoberfest Cheer”.

LeBrain Train Easter Weekend Schedule

The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episodes 57 and 58 – Max the Axe & Easter Special weekend!

 

Happy Easter everyone — a weekend I have traditionally looked forward to ever since I was a kid.  Spring is in the air!  The last two Easters have been pretty weird, but I’m glad to spend some time with you during this global crisis.  It’s only getting worse currently here in Ontario as the third wave threatens to undo all our progress.  So, this weekend I’ll be doing two shorter shows instead of one long one.  Here’s the plan:

Thursday April 1 – Max the Axe “Straight Outta Lockdown” session – 7:00 PM E.S.T.

For the first time in almost a year, Max the Axe reunited for a rehearsal.  It was rough and ragged but lead vocalist Uncle Meat has given me the thumbs-up to play some songs from this session, including the brand new “Pygmy Blowdart”.  Special guest:  the one, the only Max himself!

Friday April 2 – Good Friday – Easter Memories – 7:00 PM E.S.T.

Similar to the “Christmas Memories” show from last year.  I had a lot of good Easters.  Join me on Good Friday for some happy memories, musical and otherwise.  Such as:

  • Easter ’85 – Condition Critical in Ottawa
  • Easter ’86 – Quiet Riot air guitar weekend, Turbo, Crossbows & Catapults on the kitchen floor
  • Easter ’87 – Digging trenches in the back yard for GI Joe.
  • Easter ’88 – Skyscraper in Ottawa
  • Easter ’91 – Welcome to My Nightmare?
  • Easter ’92 – Pandora’s study regime
  • Easter ’16 – Record Store shopping in Ottawa

Hope to see you this weekend on the LeBrain Train.  NEXT WEEK:  Andy Curran!

Lists Bloody Lists: Marco the Contrarian boards the LeBrain Train with some Black Sabbath lists!

Thank you Marco from The Contrarians for your appearance Friday night!  The subject was Black Sabbath songs.  Three Nigel Tufnel Top Ten lists from three die-hard fans.  Do the math — that’s like a million tons of metal right there.

Marco is one of the most knowledgeable guests we’ve had on the show.  We couldn’t let him off without asking him some questions about Marco.  The first part of the show features a new segment that we call “Lightning Round – Getting to Know You”.  We’d like your feedback on this part of the show.  We had a lot of fun with it and so did the live viewers.  What did you think of this new feature?  Let us know in the comments.

Finally, we did a Contrarians style discussion on my favourite Black Sabbath record Born Again.  This was very enjoyable and I hope we did the Contrarians justice with our version of the format.

Finally Finally:  Marco mentioned a film project he is working on about a Canadian metal band called Mystique that is very close to his heart.  Check out their Youtube channel by clicking here.  This subject really grabbed the imagination of the live viewers who started looking up their stuff on Discogs!  ($377!)  You’ll also hear about a band called Slam Glory that I liked a lot back in the 90s.

All this and more on the LeBrain Train.  Thanks for watching!

For the statisticians:  Of the 33 songs on our lists, only five overlapped.  They were:

  • Cornucopia (Meat and Marco)
  • Sign of the Southern Cross (Mike and Meat)
  • Hand of Doom (Meat and Marco)
  • Disturbing The Priest (Marco and Mike)
  • Children Of the Sea (Mike and Meat)

Crossover! Contrarian Marco joins the LeBrain Train for some Black Sabbath shenanigans

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano…and Meat!

Episode 56 – Contrarian Marco talks Black Sabbath

In a crossover event sure to melt the structure of reality, we have Marco from The Contrarians here with us tonight!  Their excellent YouTube show, featuring Martin Popoff, is the place you want to be for some real in-depth heavy metal album discussions.  It’s all about people like us who pick odd-duck albums as their favourites.  Which is something I’ll be doing tonight as well!

Without spoiling all the fun, here’s what we have in store.  Uncle Meat and I will be asking Marco some questions so we can get to know him a little better.  Then the three of us will break out the lists!  It’s the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten Black Sabbath songs.  As if that isn’t enough epic-ness, we will also be discussing contrarian-style my favourite Sabbath record:  Born Again.

Additionally:  I will be announcing the winners of our CD draw from last week’s One Year Anniversary show!  This will happen in the pre-show segment before 7:00 PM.

Announcements:  Next week is already Easter.  I’m considering doing two shorter shows that weekend:  One, featuring a Max the Axe live rehearsal with four songs.  These “Straight Outta Lockdown” sessions include a new tune.  The second show I am considering would be Easter memories.  Guests are on a volunteer basis if you’re interested.

Following that:

April 9:  Please welcome the legendary Andy Curran of Coney Hatch to the show!  With co-host Superdekes.

May 7:  It’s Paul Laine, Canadians singer extraordinaire, formerly of Danger Danger and currently with The Defiants!  With co-host John T. Snow!

Are you excited?  Because I sure am!  Thanks to Deke and John for booking these awesome guests.

Brent Jensen and the Raiders of the Lost Mahogany Tape Case

Thank you Brent Jensen for appearing on the show a second time!  Although the conversation veered wildly from Cinderella to Raven and back again, we orbited around Brent’s mahogany box of cassettes.  Maybe you had one like it.  But was your stuffed alphabetically from Accept to W.A.S.P.?  Take a look inside Brent’s tape collection and listen to the amazing stories that unfold.

The chat with Brent commences at 0:23:00 of the stream.

As my One Year Anniversary Show, we are doing a CD giveaway too.  Next week we’ll draw a winner from a hat.  See bottom for the trivia question and submission form!

The trivia question was: What is the tagline on Brent’s No Sleep ‘Til Sudbury podcast? Watch the episode for some pretty obvious clues and submit your answer in the form below.  Really, really, really obvious clues.  Really obvious.

 

A winner will be drawn next week!

NEXT WEEK

Marco the Contrarian joins Uncle Meat and I for the Blackest of Sabbaths, only on a Friday!

Brent’s Back! Leftover People Brent Jensen

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episode 55 – The Return of Brent Jensen

** One Year Anniversary Episode **

 

Brent Jensen is one of my favourite people.  His No Sleep ‘Til Sudbury podcast is essential listening.  I’m currently working my way through the book No Sleep’Til Sudbury, a story I really identify with.  Though Brent is a couple years ahead of me, I really see myself in his story of discovering hard rock and heavy metal in the early 80s.  Seeing bands for the first time, the contrived origins and evolution of Motley Crue, cassettes, video tapes…it is a great read.  One that has me stroking my beard in deep thought, as I am forced to consider heavy metal history from a different angle.

Derek Williamson will be back as your co-host for what we hope will be another excellent free-form conversation about the subject we all love:  music that makes our skin vibrate.

In addition:  this will be my one year anniversary show!  Ontario went into a state of emergency on March 17, 2020.  I went live that Friday.  And here we are a year later!  To celebrate, I’ll be doing a CD giveaway (details at bottom), and showing clips from the very first show a year ago.

Not only that:  Brent is celebrating four years and 200 episodes of No Sleep ‘Til Sudbury, the podcast!  He just opened a new Patreon membership too, so we will be talking about that and plenty more.  This is an episode you don’t want to miss.  You want to catch it live!

7:00 PM E.S.T.
Facebook:  MikeLeBrain  YouTube:  Mike LeBrain

 

CD GIVEAWAY CONTEST 

We will be asking a skill-testing question about Brent Jensen on the show.  Submit your answers in the form below.  We will be giving away two sealed CDs:  The Cars’ debut (remastered), and a signed copy of Jim Crean’s excellent Insatiable.  I will be doing a random draw from a hat next week!

LeBrain on Start to Continue 3/17/21

Wednesday night – March 17 2021 – I will be guesting on Start To Continue with their regulars including Kevin (Buried On Mars)! Tune it at the link below, 8:00 PM E.S.T. It’s their Vinyl Collection Live Chat 44, but I’ll be showing off CDs. New arrivals here at LeBrain HQ including discs from Japan, Germany, and just around the corner.

Tune in Wednesday at 8:00 PM for some musical treasure.

The Very Beast Artwork of Iron Maiden on the LeBrain Train!

Great show tonight with your co-hosts  Harrison the Mad Metal Man, Aaron from KeepsMeAlive, and Superdekes!  We talked the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten Iron Maiden Covers/Artwork (that’s a mouthful) and it was awesome.  We took a close look at:  albums, singles, T-shirts, Reaction figures, MacFarlane figures, and the Neca Powerslave Eddie.  If you like Iron Maiden, you automatically love their artwork.  Ergo, you need to watch this show!

First we unboxed some brand new Reaction Eddie figures.  Go to 0:16:50 of the stream.

Then we wished Steve Harris a Happy Birthday, and commenced with the lists!  Go to 0:24:00 of the stream.

After the conclusion of the Maiden lists, we had a freeform chat covering Queensryche’s Operation: Mindcrime, and a newly unearthed Black Sabbath track called “Slapback”.  Go to 2:22:45 of the stream to check that out.

Thanks for watching, and if you just want to know what Maiden art we picked, check out Aaron’s hand-written list below!  See ya next week!