RECORD STORE TALES #1018: Surfing the October Colours (Cottage Video)
The last cottage weekend before closing was totally maxed out! And I don’t mean Max the Axe!
Life is too short. It must be lived to the fullest. When you and I first met here at mikeladano.com, I was 10 years younger. Spending four hours on a Saturday pounding words into a keyboard was nothing back then. Today I’d rather be experiencing life. So that’s what we did. From music to food to photography, we enjoyed our last weekend at the cottage before closing, to the max!
The music for the road was top notch. Ghost’s new album Impera received another spin. It’s as good as the day it was released. Then while hanging out in the “G” folder, we rocked out George Lynch’s debut solo album, Sacred Grooves. Better than any of the Lynch Mob albums. It also enabled me to teach Jen a little bit about the mighty Glenn Hughes. His struggles and triumphs.  On the road home, we rocked David Lee Roth’s Eat ‘Em and Smile and Your Filthy Little Mouth. A pretty solid selection of guitar rock.
The fall colours were spectacular. Orange, yellow, deep maroon. As you are all well aware, I am not usually a “fall guy”. This year has been a little different. I have a friend in California who finds all this Canadian weather beautiful and fascinating. For her, I enjoyed documenting the weekend with video tours and personal messages. It totally made this fall weekend a different experience for me. It was like seeing the place through new eyes. And this is now going to be part of my wellness plan for winter. She wants me to continue sending her fun videos and pictures of the Canadian landscape during the snowy months. I checked my phone — do you know how many pictures of snow I had from past winters? Two. TWO. I have photos on my phone going back to 2014, and I only have two with snow in them. With her enthusiasm and encouragement, I’m going to have fun documenting the winter of 2022-2023! I’ve never had this before — a friend in a sunny climate who has requested Canadian snow videos! On the condition that I stay safe and don’t crash my car or break my neck! This gives me a whole new project to do this winter, that I never had before. I feel very positive about going into the cold, dark winter months.
I’m recovering well from my dental surgery and ate two steaks this weekend! They were awesome! As were all the fish and mushrooms I cooked up. No A5 wagyu in stock at the butcher’s shop though. That will have to wait until next year, I suppose.
We did something else different that we haven’t done in recent years. We went into town! I took some video of the big waves, a daring surfer, and some quaint streets. Something new for this video.
Please enjoy this last cottage video before we close — all to the music of Tee Bone Erickson and Max the Axe!
It certainly seems appropriate that my first album post-surgery is Lick It Up!
Tom Petty would have worked as well, since “The Waiting Is the Hardest Part”. That was certainly true. I woke up at 3 AM this morning and I was raring to go. I got a couple more hours’ sleep after that, but was up again well before 6 AM just wanting to get on with the day. Get it over with!
Extraction was scheduled for 8 AM. Dr. McCann’s office in Kitchener Waterloo — nothing but praise. Fantastic people. Wonderful nurses, terrific doctor. I said “I’m probably in the top ten chickens you’ve ever had.” No problem.
I sat down in the chair. They attached all the monitors and accoutrements. I asked if I looked cool.
The IV going in was the hardest part. They said there were a few stages to the drugs, and first they would take the edge off the anxiety. I asked the nurse to just keep talking to me. We talked about my work, she kept asking me interested questions. And that’s the last thing I remember.
I don’t even really remember waking up. I remember being light on my feet with a face stuffed full of gauze. I remember feeling confident to stand, and then to slowly walk. By the time I was in the car, I was talking slowly but back to my old self.
I’ve been sitting here chillaxing at my parents’ house today, tired but not sleepy. My dad made me a nice lunch of orzos. Tonight my mom is making home made mac n’ cheese. We watched Spiderman: No Way Home together. My dad thought the idea of three Spidermen was kind of goofy; he only likes Tobey. My mom seemed to understand most of it. I had fun.
It has been about six hours since I left the dentist and I’m still really frozen.
I have this awesome Optimus Prime set to build. I’ll save it for when I’m back in my own home. I’m a little swollen. I was hoping for more actually!
I really don’t give a shit what people say. “Oh it’s no big deal, I had a tooth out last week.” Well to me it’s a big deal. I’ve had teeth out before too, but never so seriously that they are advising five days of complete rest afterwards. Five days seems serious, right?
I was advised to treat myself to something nice to look forward to after the surgery, so after a lacklustre trip to Toys R Us (which apparently Rob Daniels didn’t know could be shortened to TRU!) I placed an Amazon order. And I ordered this sexy beast of a set.
It’s the first ever fully transformable Lego set, and it’s Optimus Prime himself. This toy has been getting (mostly) rave reviews so I decided this should be my get-well present to keep myself occupied. It has been about 15 years since I last purchased a Lego set. It will be fun to see how much the system has changed since I was into it.
So that was Sunday. Monday was a bit of a shit-show. Jen had three seizures, two of them in bed. I barely slept last night, but I made it through work today and now I’m off until next week. Poor girl really suffered yesterday. I worry about taking care of her during recovery. My parents will be pitching in to help since I won’t be able to do it all by myself.
I’ve been lucky to have plenty of support from friends. They know who they are!
Tomorrow’s the day. I’m scheduled for 8 AM. If I can, I will update you as soon as possible. I would like to record funny videos of swollen cheeks and muffled speech but I guess we shall see what I’m in for.
As a kid, I had heard of Coney Hatch but never particularly paid attention. MuchMusic rarely included their tunes on the Pepsi Power Hour for unknown reasons. I probably heard “Hey Operator” but nothing else by the band. Timing was not in their favour with me. I wasn’t even into heavy rock yet when their first two albums came out. No wonder they passed me by. By the time I dove head-first into rock music on December 26 1984, I had already missed most of their career. Ironically though, Coney Hatch did have a song on the metal album that I heard that day, which was Masters of Metal II and “Hey Operator”.
Fast forward to summer 1990, and a hot “new” singer was making waves on MuchMusic. I didn’t really know who this Andy Curran guy was, but my best friend Bob loved his song “No Tattoos”. Bob was pretty anti-tattoo and felt that the coolest way was to have clean skin. He really identified with Andy’s lyrics. “No tattoos, gotta stay cool, my mama never raised no fool.”
Personally speaking I loved Motley Crue and their tattoo sleeves. I didn’t identify with “No Tattoos” the way Bob did. “I didn’t listen…I was scarred for life. And I couldn’t just stop at one!” That whole “scarred for life” line was one Bob really liked. It was a good song and I liked it, but it didn’t resonate with me like it did with Bob. So again, this Andy Curran guy slipped out of my mind when the single was over.
Suddenly, the Hatch had a new live album up for pre-order. Their first release in ages and ages. I decided it was time to finally take the plunge with Coney Hatch, and I’m glad I did. Live at the El Mocambo is one of my favourite live albums now! And I got in on the ground floor with it, limited signed copy: 19 of 300.
And then we landed an interview with Andy Curran! At this point I had to cram so I bought all the Rock Candy reissues of the Coney Hatch albums, and the self-titled Andy Curran. The “No Tattoos” record, as he calls it. Interview prep is serious business, and I did the best I could in the given amount of time. But I didn’t want to fake it. When I found myself vis-a-vis with Andy Curran, I fessed up. I was new. I was a Coney Hatch rookie who had done his best crash course in a band that I was growing to love.
And Andy was so cool about it. In fact he came back two more times to complete our chat and answer every question we had.
Better late than never — check out Andy and some Coney hatch today.
Although I keep complaining about views being down, therefore ad revenues also being down, I have turned down an advertising opportunity for this site. Normally this would not be anything to write an article about, but something about it didn’t feel right from the start. Sharing my experience with readers might offer some interesting insight.
I have done paid “advertorials” in the past. Most notably, I received an offer from someone representing Guns N’ Roses to post a “review roundup” by a guest author. No problem. We agreed on a price and I was sent a well-written article with links. I posted it and the client was happy. I posted it as a guest editorial, since I didn’t write it. No issue from the Guns camp. Everyone was happy. (I had another advertorial offer from Kiss but I was on hiatus at that time.)
I frequently get offers to run ads for online casinos and other things that have nothing to do with music. I have always turned them down. This site is supposed to be about music, but it’s so schizophrenic topic-wise that I don’t want to make it worse by running articles about online gambling. Easy to say no to those, regardless of the money involved.
This week I received another offer from a search engine optimization company based out of India. The email was from a “Digital Marketing Executive”.
“I just landed on your blog fanpage ‘MikeLeBrain’ and was wondering if you’re accepting guest posts on your blog,” he asked.
I’m not sure what “blog fanpage” he was asking about, but I responded yes, I am accepting music-related guest posts. I let him know my rate in US dollars and he responded in the positive. He said the article will be well written, and according to my “blog theme”. But there were some conditions that we didn’t have with the Kiss or Guns N’ Roses offer. Some that bothered me included:
2) Links should be Dofollow – 1 Client link, 1 internal link, and 2 High authority links.
I don’t know what those terms mean and I didn’t get any clarification.
3) The post must be on the homepage for some time and it should be accessible from the home page (via a relevant category).
As readers know, I post daily. Not every article I post is going to be accessible from the home page forever. Generally people use the search function to find a relevant review. This condition made me uncomfortable.
Now here’s the kicker.
4) Article should not be marked as a sponsored post, paid post, guest post, etc.
That was a dealbreaker. Guns N’ Roses was clearly a guest post. They had no issues with that. If I didn’t write it, it’s automatically a guest post. That’s what guest post means.
I then responded that I had to decline their offer. The guest post issue was the problem. I explained that I had to mark a guest post as such. I’m not going to have someone else write words and then claim that they’re mine. No way. Absolutely no way.
I believe I made the right decision. The executive ignored my declining email, and continued on.
“We will send you all the details before sending the articles like topic, anchor text and client link for approval. After the article is written we will send to you for review. We do not want our post to be marked with any kind of disclosure. You can publish the article under your writer name, or our writer name.”
For the second time, I declined. It did not feel right.
“As I said before, I have passed on this. Not the right fit. Sorry,” I responded.
Here’s what really sticks in my craw:Â “You can publish the article under your writer name.”
No way. Absolutely no way. I’m not putting your words down as if they were mine. No. Way.
Sure, he added “or our writer name” but to not post it as a guest post? Just strange. Nothing about this felt right regardless of the money. I know I made the right decision, even if I’m losing out on money. My integrity is worth more than that.
RECORD STORE TALES #1013: “Joey” – The Joey Tempest Conspiracy, 7 Years Later
I think with the distance of seven years, we can finally put the Joey Tempest Conspiracy Theory to bed. “What conspiracy,” you ask? It all started in March of 2015 when a writer friend of mine, Tommy Morais, contributed an excellent review of the Europe album, War of Kings. He rated it 4/5 stars, and said “I praise Europe for giving us a true great hard rock record in 2015”. You’d think there was nothing controversial about Tommy’s review, but on June 13 of that year…everything changed.
A reader going by the name “Carrieanne” dropped a massive, monolithic comment one morning, explaining that Joey Tempest was no longer in fact Joey Tempest. He had been replaced by a doppleganger. A satanic one at that. According to Carrieanne, “since the middle of 1989, the real Joey Tempest is not in this band, and Joey was truly the only one who has made this group huge with his talents, awesomeness and uniqueness!! And since 26 years, there’s such a horrible imposter and liar in this ‘group’, that’s not the real Joey Tempest!!”
“The real Joey Tempest had to leave the group because of this horrible liar!! It’s so obvious and so clear to see that it’s just someone different (unless you’re blind and deaf, like bunch of ignorants [sic]).” On and on it goes, a massive diatribe praising Joey, attacking the fans who enabled the replacement’s acceptance, and of course, religious weirdness. “You are worshipping the devil!!!” said Carrieanne.  But all is not lost. The real Joey, one day, will come back. There’s a really messianic angle to this whole comment. Carrieanne ties the lyrics to “Danger on the Track” and “The Final Countdown” to a prophecy of this great replacement, like biblical verse.
“Are you on drugs?” asked Jompa Wilmenius, of E-Tainment News. Reader Derek commented, “I can see you made the mistake of spilling meth into your coffee this morning champ.”
You can’t help but see similarities to conspiracy theories today. I’m reminded of Romana Didulo, a woman who claims to be the “Queen of Canada”. Canada already has a monarch and his name is Charles III, but I digress. Tens of thousands of followers legitimately believe Didulo to be the legitimate Queen of Canada, as she tours the country in a beat up RV and feeds her followers tins of sardines. And just like with Queen Romana, acolytes of the weird soon emerged to talk about Joey Tempest. Things got even weirder.
Admittedly, this next part is kind of my fault. With co-writer 1537, we cooked up a parody review of War of Kings, playing up the whole replacement angle. For example, we wrote: “Just look at the songs here! ‘Children of the Night’. The real Joey would never have written a song about ‘children of the night’, ‘California 405’ is the highway that O.J. Simpson was chased down – a definite clue that there was something more going on here than meets the eye!  Why would Europe specifically reference that notorious highway unless they were implying some sort of wrongdoing behind the scenes?”
We guffawed and high-fived and hoped Carrieanne would drop another bizarre comment. That is not exactly what happened.
We laughed some more, as one person clearly did not get the joke. We thought it was pretty obvious. With lines such as “Joey would NEVER let his hair go flat like that, wake up people,” I really did think it was an obvious joke post.
We mocked Doreen a bit, but then shortly after, a new player entered the field. Miranda, claiming to be Joey’s wife, also did not get the joke. “Must post fast since I’m sure the guys in white coats [are] coming for ya,” she said. Miranda claimed to have Joey Tempest’s birth certificate, marriage certificate, childrens’ birth certificates, and a DNA report. (I’m not sure what good a DNA report will do us.)
I followed Miranda to her YouTube channel, where she goes by the name “TheMirandaTempest”. On this page, she has poorly dubbed her vocals onto classic Europe ballads, to create fake “duets” with her “husband” Joey. Joey’s wife, incidentally, was also publicly known to be Lisa Worthington, not somebody named Miranda. So now, we had two different delusions. We had Carrieanne who said Joey Tempest was replaced by a satanic doppleganger in some bizarre conspiracy. Now we also had Miranda, who was posing as Joey’s wife online. And things would get even weirder still.
We know now that there was at least one Facebook page posing as Joey Tempest at that time. Imposters, of the online variety, were of actual concern. You can see why as we go on.
As Miranda’s comment was thoroughly mocked by readers, others came to her defence. Doreen claimed again she knew the real Joey Tempest, but I think the person she knew was probably that fake Joey on Facebook. Once she realized that several commenters were trying to explain the joke to her, she became angry. She did not find it funny. Neither did Joey Tempest, or his wife, she claimed.
Soon, Doreen’s partner Billy Low entered the fray.
“Joakim Larsson [Joey’s real name] and his wife are personal friends of mine. They are also personal friends of my partner. We ask him to do cover versions of songs for us, which he does. We also met him recently. A fake? Plastic surgery? Don’t make me laugh! Are you one of those who is going to write a book about this, hoping to make money? If so, forget that idea. Anyone with even a shred of common sense would know that what you are claiming is pure fabrication. If l wasn’t so furious about this, l can assure you that l would laugh my head off!”
They met him recently. They. Met. Him. Recently. Whooboy. His wife Miranda…”You read what Joey’s wife has said on here,” said Billy Low. The person claiming to be his wife, who is not his wife, because his wife was Lisa Worthington, you mean.
It’s really easy to understand how the Queen of Canada has followers when you see stuff like this. She’s told her followers not to pay their bills, as Canada is illegitimate. She is the Queen, and she says don’t pay your bills. So these Canadians — homeowners! — are having their electricity turned off. This is happening as we speak. And they believe in their Queen even harder.
The very active comments section rolled on, with one comparing the situation to Matthew Trippe who claimed to be Nikki Sixx at one point.
From the comments’ IP addresses, I learned the following. Billy and Doreen didn’t even live on the same continent as Miranda, so I’m not sure how they are close personal friends. Carrieann was in Poland, and had the same IP address as another commenter “Someone X”. It was all so very strange.
Strange, yet in the context of what we see in the world today, pretty tame stuff. Nobody’s losing their house because they think Joey was replaced by a satanic lookalike, or because they pose as Joey’s wife online. As least, we hope they don’t.
Billy Low accused me of making the story up to write a book and make money. While that was certainly untrue, I admittedly did milk the posts for hits as much as I could. They were very popular! One or more of the Joey Tempest posts tended to stay in the top 10 for hits, for a long time. I won’t apologize for that. Entertaining the masses can be a thankless job. I probably earned enough in advertizing dollars from the Joey posts to buy a few coffees. Sue me, Billy!
This autumn presents three challenges. One is familiar, two are new. One is really bothering me.
CHALLENGE THE FIRST:Â Seasonal Mood Disorder
Hello fall, my old friend. I wish you’d fuck off again!
CHALLENGE THE SECOND:Â Kitchen renovation
Loyal readers will recall that our kitchen and bathroom were ripped apart last year after a leak in the building. Now it is finally time to redo the kitchen. Next week, this begins with a consultation and estimate. I’m not looking forward to all the disruption, but we’ve put it off long enough. Any survival tips?
CHALLENGE THE THIRD:Â Dental surgery
I never had my wisdom teeth out until well into my 30’s. I have one left. Now that one is starting to cause problems. It is also impacted against another tooth and neither can be saved. They both have to go. The surgery is scheduled for September 28. They have to knock me out. I’ve never been knocked out in my life. They advised me to take five days of rest afterwards. I’ve never done that before either.
To say this has been freaking me out is an understatement. Fear of the unknown. Oh, sure. I “know” everything will be fine. That’s not how anxiety operates. It ignores what you “know” and focuses on all sorts of “what can go wrong” scenarios. Whatever your brain can dream up. I have a pretty creative brain. I’ve imagined every scenario from a broken jaw to never waking up. You name it, my brain has already come up with it.
I have support and I have strategies. One strategy I have been given is to make fun plans for the five days that I will be out of commission. A Lord of the Rings marathon is one possible plan. I have also planned a series of posts called “Teeth Week”. All songs about or relating to teeth. I’ll visit my parents and go for fall walks.
Much like the kitchen reno, this is long overdue. Short term pain for long term gain on both, we hope. Thinking of the benefits. Toothaches gone would be a plus. A nice kitchen would be a plus. Trying to focus. As a result, I haven’t been focused on writing and may have to put some projects like the Def Leppard series on temporary hold. We’ll see how it goes. I don’t mind telling you I’m scared.
RECORD STORE TALES #1011: The Principle of Moments, 39 Years Apart
A short while ago, the Contrarians did a discussion on Best Albums by Artists Who Left a Band in Their Prime. Uncle Meat participated in this discussion, and selected Robert Plant’s 1983 album The Principle of Moments for his pick. As most readers know, Uncle Meat has done a lot of music discussions but has never had an album to show off like other participants tend to have. He decided to do something different for this special episode, and went looking for a used CD copy to show.
The Meat Man took a walk over to Encore Records, who did have a copy in stock. Meat was pleased, purchased the CD and brought it home with him. Only then did he realize something very unique about this specific CD purchase.
Meat originally bought the album back in 1983 on vinyl, at Sam the Record Man in downtown Kitchener. He actually went in looking for Metal Health by Quiet Riot. Approaching the counter, the legendary Al King was working that day and was opening a box of new arrivals. “New Robert Plant is in,” he said. So Meat bought that too. A lifelong love affair with The Principle of Moments had begun.
Meat realized that he bought The Principle of Moments in 2022 from the same man who sold it to him in 1983: Al King. Today Al works at Encore, still selling great music to the masses, a public service we are grateful for. But what are the chances? 39 years apart, the same man sold the same album to the same guy. Different format, different store. Same album, same two guys. One in a million?
Welcome to this “Behind the Scenes” instalment of Record Store Tales! Just a quick update on music, writing, and other assorted goings-on! The soundtrack for me writing this is the new Marillion album, An Hour Before It’s Dark. Great album.
Things are rolling on, and we are enjoying our summer. Together. Jen and I have not spent this much time together in years. I’m happy to report that we still enjoy each other’s company. I have to tell you, I don’t miss the show. The LeBrain Train – remember the LeBrain Train? Instead of broadcasting to YouTube every Friday night, we’re enjoying the sunset. I’m sorry if that’s hard news, but I don’t miss it. I can’t help how I feel. On the other hand, as many of you know, I tend to get depressed in the fall and winter. I like to have strategies to cope with the depression, and for the last two years, that has been the LeBrain Train. So, I am certain that when winter rolls in, I will need the show back. It won’t be the same — I want to keep things fresh. The Meat Man and I have been discussing ideas. We will be back at some point in time. I know that because I know my depression will eventually return. The show, and you the viewers, help me cope.
Be patient. It’s not time yet. I will know when it feels right. Summer is short in Canada. We only get so many weeks, and before too long the days are short and the temperatures cold. I know some of my pals, like my good buddy Aaron, love the winter. All I can say is there are times I’m envious.
I’ve been posting daily, keeping a steady pace, but don’t be surprised to see “filler posts” pop up now and again. Kind of like this one. For me to sit down and spend two hours listening and writing every single night — it’s just a hard pace to keep up. You’ll know the filler posts when you see them! I was thinking of doing a “Sheik Week” – an entire week of posts dedicated to the tweets of the Iron Sheik.
Views are down, comments are down, but I keep on keepin’ on. Music and writing. It’s what I do. What I have done for most of my life. I’ve been branching out. Fiction is refreshing. The ways the words flow so easily when I write fiction, it’s remarkable! Writing a music article is hard work. Finding out the facts, confirming the details, describing the music…sometimes I feel like I am running out of words. I don’t have that problem with fiction. It’s so refreshing. You have already read The Adventures of Tee Bone Man, we have seven chapters now, and we are building the story into something huge. You’ll see. In my spare time I have also been writing “sexy fiction” that is not for public consumption. I have been inspired and the words flow easily. It keeps things fresh. I enjoy writing fiction. I need to find more ways to incorporate fiction with my musical writings here. I will figure it out!
In the meantime, I will be continuing to report from the lake with fantastic photos, rocking videos, and stories of our musical roadtrips. Jen and I met 17 years ago and I’ve never felt closer.
It has been a great summer. And it ain’t over yet.
RECORD STORE TALES #1008: Backstreet’s Back (in stock)
Little known fact, people: did you know that in the United States, the Backstreet Boys had a second self-titled album, with the same cover art as Backstreet’s Back? It’s true, and I know it’s true because I once had about 200 brand new sealed copies in the trunk of my car.
The 1997 self-titled Backstreet Boys (as opposed to the 1996 self-titled debut) was a compilation. It contained hits from Backstreet Boys and Backstreet’s Back. Some of the tracks were slightly remixed, others not. I acquired this box while dating “JJJulie”, the girl that dumped me while I was on the road opening a new store in Barrie. For the record, I don’t blame her for dumping me. I was miserable working that job. I only blame her for not waiting until I was in the comfort of my own home instead of a strange hotel room.
JJJulie and I dated for two months in 2003. If I recall the story, her mom owned one of those book clearance businesses. The kind of business that buys and sells old overstock from other chains. JJJulie must have got the box of discs from her.  Unable to move the product, she gave it to me. Our store was crammed full of Backstreet Boys. I think I might have given her 10 bucks for the whole box. Then it sat in my trunk for months.
I did find some use for the box of BSB. We were allowed to carry two copies at a time in our bargain bin. We paid $1 to $2 each for bargain bin CDs. I sold two copies to the store for $2 each. I kept track of them. Any time we sold a copy (every few weeks), I would sell another $2 disc from my box to the store, for the bargain bin. That went on for a year or so. I probably moved about 20 copies from my box before I quit. Not a huge profit, but some small change for me. The store would have made double what I did with their markup.
I did all this on the sly. The owner would have said “No more Backstreet Boys!” I had to do some things on my own, even if they helped the store in the long run, simply because the upper management tended to throw one word at me repeatedly: “No”. They wouldn’t have complained at the 200% markup when the discs eventually sold, but they really had pickles up the ass. So, anytime I looked at the sales reports and saw that a copy sold, I went out to my car, grabbed another Backstreet Boys, and sold it to the store for $2.
When I eventually quit the store, I had an almost full box of BSB still left. I didn’t know what else to do with it, so I put it in the dumpster. Backstreet’s back…where they belonged! In the dumpster.
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