I’m not a Christopher Nolan junkie, nor a spy thriller fan, so it’s quite a surprise that I loved Tenet as much as I did. I think I understand 95% of it now, and I’ve only watched it three times, so that’s not bad. Seriously, I think John David Washington is great, as was the whole cast. One normal and one inverted thumb up for a movie I file in my science fiction collection. Great stuff.
Jeopardy’s never made my lists here before but watching Alex Trebek keep on going and going only weeks before his death is awe-inspiring.
American Dad had a better than average season this year. Some of the episodes this year will go down as the series’ best: “Brave N00B World“, “300“, and “First, Do No Farm”. The latter features a new Weird Al Yankovic called “Rabbitage” based on — you guessed it — “Sabotage” by the Beastie Boys. The season also featured pop star The Weeknd in an episode called “A Starboy is Born”.
I’m jumping the gun a little bit on Discovery as the season hasn’t ended yet. However, setting the season over 900 past the days of Kirk and Spock has opened the show up to new possibilities and…discoveries. It has been a great season with some standout episodes that felt more like The Next Generation than anything since. Contemplative episodes with minimal (sometimes zero) violence. Trek is back, and Discovery is currently the superior show, even over Picard, which was pretty good itself.
And finally we have Mandalorian, which despite an unimpressive initial teaser trailer went on to be the show we always hoped it could be. And it was Bill fucking Burr’s Mayfeld that really pushed it late in the season, adding some much needed character development. All this made it so much more delicious when Giancarlo Esposito’s Moff Gideon did all the moustache-twirling villain stuff at the end. Then we get Boba, more vicious and primal, and the stoic but intense Jedi. Bonus points for doing what Qui-Gon Jinn failed to do in Episode I: just crush the fucking droid with the Force already! Thanks, Luke.
2020 was the Year Without a Marvel. Boo.
Well, I didn’t write the song, and this makes ZERO sense out of context, but yeah, that was me screeching out a Beastie Boys parody last night on @AmericanDadTBSpic.twitter.com/duEI6hgH1t
Strictly going by YouTube views alone (not including the two Facebook channels), here are the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten live streams in 2020 by views. Pick one to watch and enjoy!
You want my personal recommendation instead of just going by the numbers? No problem. I have some special favourites that I’d love for you to watch. Any time we had a special guest interview was cool, so watch: Steph Honde, Storm Force, Frank Loffredo and Brent Jensen. Beyond that….
My Nigel Tufnel Top Ten personal favourite (non-interview) live streams in chronological order:
2020 was a learning experience! I think I can speak for everyone there. Before 2020 I never heard the phrase “flatten the curve”. I’ve worn a face mask before, but only in a hospital. Now I have a collection. My theory is that Neil Peart was the glue holding the universe together.
“And when the music stops, there’s only the sound of the rain…”
Neil’s death was the first shitty thing that happened this year. Losing the Professor. It certainly set the tone for a year a loss. A year that stole Eddie Van Halen, my uncle Don, and countless more. We grieve the losses of not just people, but also daily ways of life.
I naively hoped this pandemic would bring us all closer together. Instead it has divided us…some of us. Not all.
Community. My friend Aaron from the KeepsMeAlive is the champion of community, and this year we have seen the community come together like never before. It warms my heart to see the genuine care that you have for everyone. We all started just talking about music. Now it’s something so much deeper, as we are huddled in isolation, but never isolated.
2020 also taught me that there are good people out there that you can count on. They know who they are. I’ve had to lean on a lot of people. A few have had to lean on me. Point being — we’re still standing!
Going out less meant more time to focus on listening and writing. While the lists are still coming (stay tuned!), I can tell you that I both bought and reviewed more new releases in 2020, than any other year. I’m happier with my year-end list than ever before, and I’ve expanded it from a top five to a top ten…a Nigel Tufnel Top Ten, in fact!
This has been a musically rich year. There is usually one band, sometimes a handful, that defines my year. My band of the Year would have to be Loudness, even though they didn’t release anything new. So why “band of the year”? The reasons are entirely personal, as they should be. In early 2020, before Covid, I got really sick with a bad flu. (Or was it Covid, who the fuck knows?) As sometimes happens, music ran through my head when I was sick. That music was “Let It Go” by Loudness which led to some deep dives into their discography. In 2020 I bought and reviewed my first 10 Loudness albums, many from Japan, including a five disc box set. No band defined my 2020 like Loudness did and I’m glad I got into them when I did.
The road forked with Loudness. Not only did I explore their discography, but “Let It Go” then led to a left turn: a deep analysis of the year I first heard that song, 1986. A really key year in my life. I wrote a big “1986 Saga” and felt like I had exorcised some ghosts. Some of the most rewarding writing I’ve ever done in my life.
I didn’t stop there, and I dove into another year: 1991. It turns out people like reading personal history and how music ties into it.
Of course the virus and the lockdown also caused a different fork in the road, this one being the live streaming. That has been its own reward. So rewarding that they’ve earned their own lists this year, and I’ll present some for the best shows of the year in the coming days.
As bad as 2020 has been (undoubtedly the worst year in our collective lives), on a personal level it hasn’t been so bad. People being indoors has driven traffic on the site way up, and this has been our most successful year yet in terms of hits. But this has been earned: the writing and content on the site has improved with it. I’ve learned more about personal health and mental health this year and was somewhat more prepared when lockdown began. I hate to say it because it sounds like boasting, but as much as 2020 sucked, for me personally…I’ve had worse years.
Silver linings.
I feel very fortunate that in 2020, we didn’t lose anyone in my family to Covid. Not to Covid. But I did lose people. Many of us did. And there is a long way to go before this is all over. So please, for me: be safe. Be smart. We have to beat this thing and protect those we love.
We can do this. In the memories of everyone we lost in 2020, please keep yourself and your loved ones safe.
REST IN PEACE
Donald Winter
Clifford Michael Woodhouse
Dorothea Daniels
Tina Schipper
Abigail Lobsinger
Neil Peart
Eddie Van Halen
Leslie West
Martin Birch
Steve Priest
Pete Way
K.T. Oslin
Jeremy Bulloch
David Prowse
Alex Trebek
John Prine
Charley Pride
Lee Kerslake
Gerry McGhee
Tommy Lister, Jr.
Ken Hensley
Jason Slater
Chuck Yeager
Fred Willard
Pat Patterson
Frankie Banali
Bob Kulick
Chadwick Boseman
Ben Bova
Johnny Nash
Spencer Davis
Sir Sean Connery
Kirk Douglas
Vera Lynn
Christopher Tolkien
Terry Jones
Reed Mullin
Freeman Dyson
James Lipton
McCoy Tyner
Max Von Sydow
Johnny Yune
Keith Olsen
Kenny Rogers
Joe Diffie
Bill Withers
Ellis Marsalis
Mort Drucker
Brian Dennehy
Little Richard
Betty Wright
Jerry Stiller
Astrid Kirchherr
Anthony James
Bonnie Pointer
Ian Holm
Joel Schumacher
Carl Reiner
Ennio Morricone
Grant Imahara
Regis Philbin
Peter Green
Wilford Brimley
Ben Cross
Justin Townes Earle
Helen Reddy
Mac Davis
James Randi
André Gagnon
Charlie Daniels
Chad Stuart
REMINDER!
Don’t forget tonight’s live stream “Christmas Memories”! No bad, no ugly — just the good.
GETTING MORE TALE #870: You Can Be My Lemon Wedge, and I’ll Be Your Tequila (Part One of a two-part review of Kim Mitchell’s Greatest Hits)
The leaves turned colours, and were starting to decorate the ground. I had been working at the Record Store for over a year. I was well over my first relationship that went south, and was now seemingly hard at work wrecking the second. Everything started lovey-dovey in the summer. The first two months were bliss. It started to sour in September and October. “People are always on their best behaviour at the start,” she used to say in regards to “new love”. Now that things were going bad, was it my fault? It had to be. What was I doing wrong? It was in this emotional environment that Kim Mitchell released his first solo Greatest Hits CD in 1995.
As things started to go south, I anticipated that I’d need some new Kim music to get me through. This compilation had two new songs, one rare remix, two re-recordings, and some surprising bonus music. Decent value for a hits set. “Ooh, it’s a messy breakup,” sang Kim on the new track called “Rainbow”.
The relationship was hitting the rocks and taking on water, and so the arguments were increasing. Making things more uncomfortable, she was hanging out with my ex from the first bad breakup. A lot. I didn’t have a lot of experience, but that was weird, right? They talked a lot. It was obvious to me that she wasn’t happy with the way things were going and I was in no way prepared to deal with this added twist.
In October we went out on our last movie date: Virtuosity, a terrible Denzel Washington sci-fi thriller featuring Russell Crowe as the killer. I didn’t pick it. I haven’t seen it since.
I was the driver that night. Kim Mitchell’s Greatest Hits was in the tape deck. I purchased the CD (and still own that copy) but I recorded everything to tape so my music was always mobile.
I will tell you one thing I remember: she hated the song “Lemon Wedge”. I wasn’t keen on it either, but it was a very popular tune with old school Max Webster fans. It’s different. T-Rev at the Record Store absolutely loved it; it was one of his jams. “Lemon Wedge” is funky, horn-laden and mental. Not at all like “Patio Lanterns”. I was more indifferent to it. I was puzzled that it was included on Greatest Hits at all, instead of one of the songs from Itch that I thought were better. But I don’t skip songs; I play albums all the way through. We’re heading home from this shitty movie and on comes “Lemon Wedge”.
You can be my lemon wedge, And I’ll be your tequila. I just wanna have a dance, And I just wanna feel ya.
“This song is terrible! Why do you listen to this?” I didn’t think it was worth explaining that I don’t skip tracks. That wouldn’t help.
Then, as if on cue, I made a wrong turn in the car. I have a terrible sense of direction and didn’t know my way around town like she did. She was really mad at me now, so I pulled over into a parking lot on Fairway Road. Then I sat there and just took it. This in turn frustrated her even more.
“You never stand up for yourself!” she complained. “Whatever shit people say, you just go with it! You can’t just keep bending over all the time! You need to grow a backbone and start sticking up for yourself!”
I wanted to, but I was afraid of getting dumped again, so I preferred not to argue. Getting dumped was no fun and I was not eager to do it again. But I got her point.
“Well, I like that Kim Mitchell song,” I lied in a half-assed rebuttal. She was not very impressed with my comeback.
My head was spinning. This was supposed to be a movie date. How did it turn into this lecture about me growing a spine? I can relate to the episode of Big Bang Theory where Penny dumps Leonard. “Just tell me what to do, and I’ll do it,” he said before she walked out. But that isn’t what she wanted.
“I’m pretty sure it’s already over,” said Leonard with the wisdom that I was lacking.*
It really was curtains; all over except for Kim’s singing. There were a few more arguments, but it was toast after Halloween. I can’t remember what our last argument was about, but she was hanging out with my ex again and wasn’t answering her phone. The ex was in fact the final “Lemon Wedge” that pushed us apart for good. And it’s good that it happened for reasons that are obvious to anyone who is not me in 1995.
Instead of trying to win her back like I did with my last doomed relationship, I moved on decidedly. I deleted my electronic contacts so I wouldn’t be tempted to email her. I selected a variety of rock albums that I tailored to my listening needs. She was into a lot of current music – Dance Mix ’95, the new Smashing Pumpkins, Lisa Loeb. I chose to dive deep into classic British hard rock, the stuff she wasn’t into. Deep Purple, Whitesnake, Black Sabbath. Ozzy had a new album out and so did Iron Maiden. There was plenty of music that didn’t remind me of her.
For a variety of reasons, that relationship took some time to get over. She married the next guy, which is exactly what also happened with the previous ex! I was the guy people go out with before the meet the one they were going to marry. So I did a lot of re-evaluation, both personal and musical. I really wanted to like that “Lemon Wedge” song just because she hated it so much, but I couldn’t force it to happen. You either like “Lemon Wedge” or you don’t. I wish I could say it was my favourite song in the world because of this story. Unfortunately not every story can be about your favourite song. Some are just about the music that was playing at the time.
Full CD review tomorrow.
* Ironically, Kaley Cuoco otherwise known as “Penny” was in that awful Denzel movie as a child actor.
It happened again. Insomnia. The battle rages on, win some lose some. I’m so wired on Friday nights. Fridays, being the last night of the work week, are the only night I allow myself to enjoy a couple cups of coffee. That’s part of it, but what really gets me wired is this burst of creative energy that comes with the weekend. That’s been amplified recently with the Friday night live streams. Those who have participated know what it’s like. You get this charge; this burst of adrenaline after a good show. I’m up for four hours after a decent one, let alone a great one.
Eventually I go to bed but my head rattles all night: ideas, worries, creativity. The next day is Saturday. That’s my day to have fun, work on enjoyable projects, and spend time with my wife. I’ve had problems sleeping in on Saturdays since I was a kid! It’s a real thing. I get too excited to get up and at ‘er.
It’s especially unenjoyable when I’m tossing and turning in bed with a song I dislike stuck in my head. Radio often repeats songs I don’t like. The Cornell version of “Patience”, or The Wild. Or even J.J. Wilde. (I know, I know, she’s local, I shouldn’t say bad things. I love her voice, just not her song.) The best thing for me to do in that case is get up and listen to something else. I have to think carefully about what to listen to, because it’s likely going to be the next song that will be stuck in my head for the rest of the night. Something old and familiar that feels like good times will work. It has to be familiar though. If not, my brain will skip like a record when it can’t remember how parts of the song go.
I have a few strategies in my war against insomnia. One is to burn off some energy by going for a late night walk, although in recent days this is…not the best option. Not anymore. Not since Covid. A shelter was opened down the street. We’ve seen an uptick in crime and drug use. A few weeks ago, a car was on fire in the middle of the night. I’m not kidding. This is across the street!
Instead of a walk, I’ll go out on the porch, watch some Youtube, listen to some songs, and eventually go back to bed. I try not to rise before the sun does. If the sun is coming out, then I give myself permission to get up. This does not always work out, but it’s a guideline. I have also tried turning my clock around so I can’t see the face. That keeps me from counting the minutes until it’s a good time to get up.
Maybe I’m not the best one for giving advice, but it’s important to talk about this stuff. I’ve said it multiple times — we are all in this together. Interrupted sleeping patterns is part of living through a pandemic. Maybe you can give me some advice. I’ve tried a few different earphones for sleep but nothing has been comfortable enough to wear longer than an hour. Do you have any sleep earphone recommendations? Leave in the comments. Must be wired — no Bluetooth. Helping each other is the way we’ll beat this pandemic and the war on insomnia!
This might get emotional here, so hold on to your hats and grab some tissues.
I just wanna say thanks.
In March 2020 the world went into lockdown, and we all dealt with it one way or another. Now, at least where I am, lockdown 2.0 is looming. Christmas is coming and seeing my family is a question mark. I’m not able to see my friends. Yet in a bizarre twist I’m feeling so connected to everyone. This pandemic has forced us all to stay home, but instead of moping and watching Simpsons re-runs, together we’ve turned Friday nights into a fun weekly event.
Not that there is anything wrong with Simpsons re-runs!
This first started with just me, talking into a camera and hoping people were watching. They were. And they wanted to play along. Then Uncle Meat came up with the “Nigel Tufnel Top Ten” countdown theme and it was a huge success. And here we are now! I had to invest a little money into this, to take it up to the level I wanted. I bought a new camera, two new microphones, lights, cables (lots of trial and error here), a streaming subscription…several hundred dollars later I’m where I want to be and I wouldn’t have done it without so many awesome humans.
Thank you Eric, my friend of 20-plus years, but soulmate for 40. I love you, you big stinky Meaty Uncle.
Thank you Derek, also know as “Superdekes”. It’s hard to believe we never spoke to each other except by keyboard until this pandemic began. You have become a friend, a collaborator, a creative genius (“Paper Plate T-Bone”) and the facilitator for bringing on some great guests.
Thank you Aaron for being a reliable regular, not to mention 24 years of friendship. Now we can speak regularly about the music we love!
Thank you Kevin for getting me on Streamyard, and for being a reliable co-host for many weeks now! Sorry I’ve been mangling your last name for years now, though you didn’t know it until recently!
Thank you Geoff and Sarah for your recent contributions. I’ll be seeing you both again soon — that’s a promise/threat!
Thanks to Rob Daniels for 35 years of friendship, amazing co-hosting duties, and for bringing your own shows to us every Wednesday and Saturday! You are weathering the storm like a superhero Rob. And of course thanks to Gimli who I suspect could actually be the real star of your show….
Thank you John Snow for helping me out multiple times as co-host, and for very cool backdrops every time!
Thank you Harrison for watching on the opposite side of the world, since the very beginning. We’ll be having you on again real soon for another great list show. No spoilers!
Thank you Holen, wherever and whoever you are! Thank you Saige for the amazing LeBrain Train graphics. Thank you to Tyler(s), plural. Thank you to my family especially my mom for watching week after week even if you do not care about AC/DC or Van Halen. Thanks to Chris, Scott, Len, Seb, Michael LeFevre, Lana, Rosana, and Никола́й Черныше́вский for watching regularly. Huge appreciation to the guys from Storm Force, Steph Honde, and Frank Loffredo for coming on and supporting the show. Taking the time to come on and talk to us means everything to me.
Frank mentioned that he loved the “DIY” method of what we do. That’s it exactly. He gets it. This is a bunch of stir-crazy friends getting together every Friday night to hang out, geek out, drink coffee (some of us anyway) and talk music together. On a personal level, it’s me trying to stay connected, but also trying to give back to the community. I’m not making money on this, it’s happening out of love. And necessity. We need to take care of each other. As a classic introvert, this pandemic has brought out hidden talents. Not just in me; in all of us. One of us (not naming names) got kind of sour on the idea of doing interviews a couple years ago. He had a bad experience. But this Friday night show has allowed us to have some really great interview experiences together and I’m glad to have been a part of that. DIY is right. We have been figuring it out as we go and it keeps getting better week after week.
The worst thing about making thank-you lists is forgetting someone. I hope I didn’t. I appreciate every single person who has watched, contributed, left a comment, and or just hung out and watched. I think we’re just getting started. Just like this pandemic keeps going and growing and evolving…so will we.
There are a handful of Helix albums that I play less frequently today. I tend to gravitate towards “underdog” albums besides the “big four” on Capitol Records. I can usually be found spinning Breaking Loose, It’s a Business Doing Pleasure, B-Sides and other lesser-known classics.
As an ending to this past summer of 2020, I decided to change it up and spin some classic 80s Helix, the stuff I grew up with. I chose Walkin’ The Razor’s Edge and Long Way to Heaven in the car. As per usual, like an old movie, images, thoughts and feelings came flooding back with every song.
Razor’s Edge was my first Helix, and considered the “big one”, with hits like “Rock You”, “Gimme Gimme Good Lovin’” and “(Make Me Do) Anything You Want”. The first memory that came back was how disappointed I was with that Capitol cassette when I got it as a gift as a kid of 13 years old. In Canada at least, Capitol cassettes in the early 1980s were of awful quality. They always seemed to play slow. I undoubtedly heard the album play sluggish and warbly for years.
That wasn’t all. I scanned through the credits and noticed something that I thought was peculiar.
“They didn’t write the only songs on here that I know!” Even as a kid, I noticed!
“Rock You” was a Bob Halligan Jr. composition. The other two songs were covers (Crazy Elephant and A Foot in Cold Water respectively). For the first few listens, I had a hard time getting into Helix’s own originals. I wondered if I even actually liked Helix at all! But then as now, I didn’t just fast-forward to the songs I liked. I played the whole tape front to back every time. I’m not sure when I started doing that — listening to an album in full, and only in full. It came later in childhood. When I played my Styx and John Williams records I tended to just skip around to the tracks I liked. It’s possible that the change to listening to full albums was a combination of the cassette format with my good ol’ OCD.
I was new to “heavy metal” music, and Helix were one of the heaviest bands I’d heard. My young ears were not acclimated yet. Only one Helix original jumped out at me on first listen, and to me it was clearly the hit that wasn’t: “Feel the Fire”. It sounded like a rewrite of “Heavy Metal Love”, which wasn’t on the album. I liked it because I didn’t have “Heavy Metal Love” (didn’t even know what album it was on), so “Feel the Fire” would do instead.
Time went on, and then suddenly another song clicked: the atmospheric and thumping closing track, “You Keep Me Rockin’”. I enjoyed the dusky intro before the song kicked into gear. I can remember listening to this in the family minivan. Because my own Sony Walkman and Sanyo ghetto blaster couldn’t play Capitol tapes properly, I liked to give them a spin in a car tape deck, which usually had the power to play the tapes at the proper speed. I cannot remember exactly where we were parked, but it was definitely on a cottage holiday. It might have been in the parking lot of The Chapel in Underwood Ontario. I would rather wait in the car listening to music while the parental units were in there browsing. “You Keep Me Rockin’” came on and I distinctly remember thinking “I’ve never noticed this cool slow part before, but it’s good.” As if it was the first time, I heard that thunderous riff. I played it a couple times before I relinquished control of the tape deck back to the parents.
Long Way to Heaven came next into my life, probably Christmas of ’86. I remember there was a flyer in the newspaper with cassettes on sale. A&A Records, perhaps? I circled Yngwie Malmsteen’s Trilogy and Long Way to Heaven by Helix. Both tapes suffered from the slow warble that was a Capitol trademark in my collection.
Long Way to Heaven brings back fewer memories. Though the album cover was better, the music is less memorable to me. No cover tunes this time, though there were two Halligan co-writes. I remember thinking the old-fashioned harmonies on “Don’t Touch the Merchandise” were cool, and they sound just as good today. You can really hear the smooth voice of Doctor Doerner in there.
Two of my strongest memories of Long Way to Heaven had to do with the lyrics. “School of Hard Knocks” confused me. Was this about highschool? Was this what I was in for? A school of hard knocks? “It’s a long long education” sang vocalist Brian Vollmer. This caused a bit of a panic for me as I worried about the next year at school! Then there was “Bangin’ Off-A-The Bricks”. While the lyrics were about starting out in a rock and roll band, all I could think was “do these guys really beat their heads on brick walls?” I couldn’t tell but it seemed like it. “We were just getting our kicks,” sang Brian, but I couldn’t understand what was fun about it. Any metaphors went right over my head.
I also wondered what my Catholic school teachers would have thought about lines like “It’s a long long way to heaven, but only three short steps to hell.” But I also didn’t care what they thought.
Those cassettes were hard to listen to, but by 1989 came the answer: Over 60 Minutes With… was the first Helix CD, compiling the best songs from the first three Capitol records. There were even three unreleased songs, and they were great! Finally I had the chance to appreciate deep cuts, by hearing them with the sonics they always deserved. Fan favourites such as “Animal House” and “Young & Wreckless”. New stuff like “Everybody Pays the Price”. Songs I never heard before like “Does A Fool Ever Learn” from No Rest for the Wicked.
I wasn’t able to listen to Helix properly until I had a CD player. That happened, and it’s been true love ever since. I’ve been a Helix supporter for many years now and I’m still proud to wear their shirts!
A spontaneous mini-chapter as I navigate a November weekend.
GETTING MORE TALE #866.5: Right Now, I Am Happy
As of right now, 10:39 AM on a beautiful Saturday morning in early November, I am happy.
It might not last. It might be a moment as fleeting as the breeze. But as I remove my mask in the open air, and breath it deep, I feel good.
We’ve had a hell of a week. A Wednesday kitchen accident left us without a functioning stove and a hell of a mess. We are working hard and cleaning up. Just one more thing, right? But not the end of the world and nobody hurt. Well, not too badly; I’m sporting a cut hand from some broken glass in a kitchen corner. It just makes me look tougher! Hah.
I am learning that it is OK that I can’t do all these home projects on my own. Somebody is coming to haul the old stove away in about an hour. On Monday somebody else will be delivering the new one.
I am enjoying my beloved music collection. This week I have delved back into Judas Priest. I currently have five Judas Priest reviews ready to post, just awaiting final revisions. I intend to finish all the Judas Priest reviews before the end of 2020. It’s going to happen. It feels good to achieve a goal, trivial to others as it may be. I am learning not to judge myself too harshly and to recognize my worth.
Priest were a really important band to me in my younger years. Listening now, even to their more recent music, I still get a huge kick. “Revelations” from Nostradamus might not sound like the Priest I knew back in 1987, but it gets my head a-bangin’. My air guitar is tuned and ready to rock when I hear it. My old bones still creek, but my young heart still pumps molten blood when I have the mighty Priest in my ageing ears.
Well, I’d better split, the junk lady will be here soon to pick up this old stove. If it’s nice and sunny where you are then I recommend you go outside for some nice air. It’s a beautiful day and right now, I am happy.
GETTING MORE TALE #865: “So I would let it slide…slide like mercury”
In mid-’94, my girlfriend of three months dumped me for the other guy. She was my first breakup. The good news is that eventually they got married and are still together today. I tended to do that to people. When they broke up with me, the next guy is the keeper.
I was young, stupid and immature. We all were. I didn’t know how to deal with this rejection. It hurt like nothing ever hurt before. I had a magazine featuring an interview with Henry Rollins. One of his best quotes in there was about getting dumped and the pain it caused. I couldn’t believe that this big tough guy could be hurt the same as me. What Henry didn’t say in this interview was just how to overcome the pain.
I grabbed a beer out of the fridge and decided that this was the moment I was going to try drinking. I sat there and stared at the bottle, beads of condensation rolling down the label. I looked at it a long time, and put it back in the fridge. I couldn’t stand the taste of beer.
The first song that hit me in the days after the dumping was “Love Song” by Tesla. It was a brand new experience for me: my first breakup song. It was like hearing it for the first time. The impact was all new. I hit repeat and sang that song again and again. The next song that I remember having an impact came later. It was a brand new one: “Descending” by the Black Crowes, taken from their latest amorica.
Released November 1 1994, amorica was the third Crowes disc, and the first during my long tenure at the store. It didn’t take off like other new releases had that season. I gave it a lot of store play. I liked it better than Southern Harmony, though that is a minority opinion. When it clearly wasn’t selling as well as expected, the Boss commented, “Because it’s the same. It’s just the same.” He levelled that judgement at a few new releases that year. They were too similar to the preceding albums. Similar or not, amorica was starting to grow on me.
It came two months after the Great Dumping of ’94, but the wounds were still raw. And evolving. A few friends said, “You have to win her back,” and so I tried mightily. Her brother had become a close friend, which really pissed her off. She was even more enraged when she found out that I was trying to get her back all this time, and the fuel on that fire was the fact that a few of our friends were trying to help me without her knowledge. Yep, an ever changing landscape of scars being ripped open. That was my 1994. “Descending” slipped into my life in the middle of that storm.
The song is calming. Whatever Chris Robinson was actually singing about, I applied the lyrics to my own life.
Have mercy baby, I’m descending again. Open your eyes, This time it’s sink or it’s swim.
I tried not to go out of my way to hurt her, but she and her new boyfriend didn’t have the same rules where I was concerned. To me he seemed to really relish pushing their relationship in my face. I offered an olive branch once — I offered to drive him home when he was stranded out of town at her place. But temporary truces were strictly temporary. So I would put on “Descending” again, or one of the other albums that really impacted me during that period. Balls to Picasso by Bruce Dickinson, Promised Land by Queensryche, and Handful of Rain by Savatage.
None of the songs I was seeking solace in really had lyrics relating to my situation, but I interpreted them as such. One lyric from “Descending” that struck me was the line “But I would let it slide, slide like mercury.” I felt like any time they tried to hurt me, I would just let it slide. Slide like mercury. “All silver, and quick baby, poisonous and deadly.”
I loved the way the pedal steel guitar slides crazily on the fretboard at that exact moment in the song, sounding exactly how mercury skitters about.
We didn’t have the internet but we were all on local “BBS’s” — Bulletin Board Systems. You could put a tagline under your name. I usually had a lyric. “I would let it slide, slide like mercury,” was one of my favourites. It was me saying, “You can’t hurt me.” It wasn’t true, but I wanted them to think that. At one point, he changed his tagline to something like “Stop it with the stupid mercury!” They really hated when I went around quoting lyrics. I know because they said so. Of course that meant I had to keep doing it.
A peace was eventually brokered, and everything was put in the past. Everything that is not forgotten is certainly forgiven. The memories don’t bring pain with them, more a startling realisation. I look back and see a stupid kid who really didn’t know any better. I thought life was like a song. If the girl dumps you, you win her back. That’s what the bands always told us. Not the Crowes though. These messages were foggier. It’s in that misty misunderstanding that you can make the songs your own. “Descending” is just another one of “my” songs.
Have mercy baby, I’m descending again, Open your eyes, This time it’s sink or it’s swim.
No sermons on ascending, No verdict on deceit, No selfish memorandum, No confusion for me.
Curses, curses and clues, A feast for fools.
Have mercy baby, And hand me downs, It was just a few years ago, You’d hand me ups and a map, Right out of town.
But I would let it slide, Like mercury, Silver and quick, Poisonous and deadly, So deadly.
It was laundry night, when my phone blew up. Uncle Meat was desperate to get a hold of me. He rang my phone twice and there was a text message to call him immediately. Of course, I was worried about my buddy. If he needed me, I’d be there.
The urgency was apparently musical in nature.
Max the Axe had just finished mixing the three songs that will make up a forthcoming punk EP. He finished that day…a full sweaty day at the studio that ended with “Thirsty and Miserable”, “Pygmy Blowdart” and “Oktoberfest Cheer” on a burned CD-R. The only way for Meat to hear these tracks, songs that he sings on, was convoluted. Max had to physically deliver the CDs to my house, and then I had to rip them to PC and email them to Uncle Meat. That’s how ass-backwards those two guys are with technology.
The bonus in this case is getting an early copy of the still-untitled punk EP, which I assure you, is a killer. But Max was so appreciative of my favour that he randomly gifted me this cool set of Twisted Sister guitar picks. 10 picks mounted on a paper matte, with a cool Twisted Sister picture. Ready for framing. Thank you Max!
What about the EP? “Thirsty and Miserable” is a Black Flag cover with inspiration from Lemmy Kilmister. It’s brilliant is all I can tell you. “Pygmy Blowdart” is an original (Meat stresses that he did not write the lyrics) that sounds like a Josh Homme hit. Finally “Oktoberfest Cheer” is a drunken, sloppy, very messy Kitchener-centric party song that could very well become a local anthem. Oktoberfest actually ended a couple weeks ago, but this song captures the boozy oom-pa-pa of our annual Bavarian celebration. “Don’t crush my smokes, and don’t spill my beer!” I think it’s brilliant in that lager-soaked punk rock tradition. I only heard an early mix, so I hope they take my advice when I say “more accordion”!
Enjoy “Thirsty and Miserable” by Max the Axe featuring lead vocals by Eric “Uncle Meat” Litwiller!
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