Grab a Stack of Rock / LeBrain Train

Best of 2020 Part 2: Sunday Screening – Top Live Streams

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!

11. December 18 – The Best Bands You Don’t Know – 83 views

10. June 11 – Live Albums – 85 views

9. October 24 – Steph Honde – 89 views

8. (TIE) December 4 – T-Bone – 100 views

7. (TIE) November 27 – One Hit Wonders – 100 views

6. (TIE) November 20 – Brent Jensen – 100 views

5. September 4 – Storm Force – 102 views

4. October 9 – A Tribute to Eddie Van Halen – 106 views

3. October 16 – New Release Friday – 110 views

2. December 11 – Iron Maiden Deep Cuts – 128 views

1. November 6 – Frank Loffredo – 167 views

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:

 

Thanks for watching in 2020 and making all this possible!

Boxing Day Live Stream featuring LeBrain’s Mom – “Christmas Memories”

We’re locked down, but not knocked down as this week’s live show proved!  From 1977 to 1991, stories of Christmases past were unfurled for fun discussion.  From the Star Wars years, through GI Joe, Transformers, and Atari, to cassettes, CDs and VHS, the greatest years of our lives were presented.  Then, special guest LeBrain’s Mom joined the latter half of this episode for her first on-screen appearance…bearing wine!

I had a great night and I hope you did too.  Lots of visual aids this time.  Thanks for watching!

Boxing Day Live Stream — “Christmas Memories” — Hang out Dec. 26 if you’re locked down!

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episode 43

Nobody “wanted” lockdown to happen in Ontario, but here we are.  You don’t have to be alone on Boxing Day, no matter where you are.  This Saturday December 26, join the LeBrain Train for a special holiday episode called “Christmas Memories”.  Special memories such as:

  • Waking my dad up with Lego
  • Getting Luke’s X-Wing
  • Finding a Millennium Falcon under the tree
  • Waiting for a train from Stratford in a blizzard
  • Killing time…
  • The Atari years
  • The year I woke everybody up at 1 AM playing GI Joe
  • The dawn of the Rock N’ Roll era:  cassettes, cassettes, cassettes!
  • Boxing Day with WWF’s Demolition
  • 1989:  The first CD player
  • 1990:  Led Zeppelin
  • …and on and on!

There might be guests — or I might just open it up for anyone to join the show.  You’ll just have to tune in and see.

It’s OK if you’re upset or just not in the mood.  Who is these days?  We have been here for each other since the start and the hope is to spread some positive feelings this week.

I’ll be on break for the next couple days.  Have a drink or two, and we’ll see you Saturday December 26.  Let’s get into the sweet nectar of nostalgia!

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

 

All The Bands You Never Heard Of…epic 3 hour LeBrain Train

Awesome show this week! The 42nd LeBrain Train was another three hour long epic.  The theme was “Best Bands You Probably Never Heard Of”.  We never settled on a proper wording for it, or a proper system for keeping score.  The goal was to introduce you to plenty of artists we think you’d think.  And we hope you do!  For the first time ever, there was no crossover with the six lists!

Lists by:

Added bonus:  At the mid-way point (1:30:00 exactly) a very-caffeinated-me decided to go on an F-bomb laden rant about people who post The Mandalorian spoilers openly on social media without warnings.  Please enjoy my rant!

The final score:

  • Mike:  11 points
  • Sarah:  14 points
  • Harrison:  17 points
  • Rob:  19 points
  • John:  23 points
  • Aaron:  88 points

Huge thanks to everyone for hanging out so long!  Thanks for watching and see you next week.

Learn All About Bands You (Hopefully) Don’t Know on this week’s LeBrain Train

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episode 42

This week’s episode is brought to you by the brain behind 2 Loud 2 Old Music — John himself.  The man is like a music encyclopedia so it’s only fitting that he came up with this particular Nigel Tufnel Top Ten list.  What are your Favourite Artists that Nobody Else Has Heard Of?  Tonight’s panel will answer that question 11 times each, and hopefully give you a ton of stuff to listen to over the Christmas holidays.

Tonight’s panel:

There will also be a couple guest lists for us to run down.  That means you could be getting up to 66 bands to listen to!  (Depending on list crossover.)  Are you excited?  I am!

 

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

SCHEDULING NOTICE

There will be a show next week, but it will not be on Friday!  Friday is Christmas after all.  I plan to go live on Boxing Day , Saturday December 26, and talk about Christmas Nostalgia.  From getting my first X-Wing fighter to the year I got Zeppelin, I can’t wait to tell you some stories.

For the following week, I am tentatively planning to go live on New Year’s Eve, Thursday December 31.  I dunno what time yet…it’s not like I have anything else going on…but it’ll just be a New Year’s party.  Mrs. LeBrain is planning to join me and we hope you can too!

 

Iron Maiden Deep Cuts Gonna Get Ya No Matter How Far

Picking a favourite episode among the 41 (!) shows we’ve done is a bit like picking a favourite child.  Impossible to do!  But I took a real shine to this week’s instalment:  the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten Iron Maiden Deep Cuts.

Each of us had our own personal criteria to determine if a song was a “deep cut”.  For example, I chose no songs from Live After Death, or any leading tracks from an album.  Harrison the Mad Metal Man decided that he would include no single A-sides, and no songs that were played live…ever.

As an added bonus to this episode, we brought back Geoff from 1001albumsin10years.  The Graph Alchemist himself had to be involved, to track all these crucial Iron Maiden songs.  In particular I wanted to see what albums were dominant.  Geoff then went above and beyond the call of duty by bringing us a four-way Venn diagram showing all the songs that the panel had in common.  Ever seen a four-way oval Venn before?  You will!

The panel tonight consisted of:

  • LeBrain (Yours truly)
  • Harrison the Mad Metal Man
  • Aaron from KeepsMeAlive (in absentium)
  • Uncle Meat

These four lists were all graphed and included in the episode’s statistics.

We also had three “bonus lists” that we ran right at the top of the show.  These bonus lists were submitted by:

  • Reader KK
  • The Mighty Holen
  • Michael the Box Set Wizard

Finally this episode also marked the debut of the brand new LeBrain Train theme song by T-Bone.  So good that I played it three times.  Everybody loves the song and video — let me know what you think too.

Best show ever?  Definitely top five.

Shoot, do I have to do a Nigel Tufnel Top Ten LeBrain Trains now?*

Click to enlarge the graphs:

 

 

* Foreshadowing.

 

 

 

Iron Maiden Deep Cuts with Harrison on the LeBrain Train Tonight!

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episode 41

It had to happen eventually:  the return of Harrison the Mad Metal Man, and our first Iron Maiden list show!  It’s the Iron Maiden Deep Cuts this time, a subject sure to generate tons of discussion.  Of course, B-sides are fair game, as are Blaze Bayley cuts!

No spoilers but I can tell you that Harrison is being very stringent about what certifies as a “deep cut”.  However, this is a “no disqualifications” episode, so nobody will be getting killed by Eddie tonight.

Iron Maiden’s gonna get ya no matter how far.

The Nigel Tufnel Top Ten lists (concept by Uncle Meat) are always a pleasurable diversion, especially when we keep track of the stats!  To that end, Geoff from 1001albumsin10years will be back tonight to bring us more graphs!  We also hope that the Meat Man himself will be joining the fun with his hard-laboured list.

We have not had Harrison on the show since May, when we counted down the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten Judas Priest albums.*  Because of the time difference between Canada and Australia, Harrison and I did the last show in the morning here.  He also had an awesome moustache.  This time we’re doing it at the usual 7:00 PM E.S.T.  (He can be the one to get up early this time.)  Will the moustache remain?

 

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

 

Nigel Tufnel Top Ten Judas Priest albums

 

 

* The last time Harrison was on also happened to the first show broadcast from the cottage.  A very special show for me because of both location and guest.

 

 

 

VIDEO: LeBrain Train theme song by T-Bone!

Thank you to T-BONE for this awesome new theme song and video for the LeBrain Train!

This is a wonderful surprise, and complete with lyrics. All we need to do is get it in the right file format and this will be the intro clip to the LeBrain Train each week! Thank you T-Bone for going above and beyond the call of duty!!  (He must really have enjoyed being on the show.)

Scraping the Skies of Thunder Bay with Tee Bone

Thank you Tee Bone for an awesome Friday night on the LeBrain Train! Tee Bone, an original member of Thunder Bay’s own Current River, has plenty of great stories which we only scratched the surface of in this almost three-hour chat!

Topics discussed and their locations in the stream:

  • T-Bone Tales – scattered throughout.
  • Shaun of the Dead challenge – 0:33:20.  The zombie apocalypse has come and you are unarmed.  All you have to save yourself from the horde is your record collection.  Choose five records from your collection to throw at the zombies to save yourself.  Harder than it sounds!  This segment includes a highly disputed meltdown over Tenacious D’s debut.
  • Beer de-canning from Sleeping Giant brewery’s 2020 advent calendar – 0:35:00
  • A special Def Leppard box set unwrapping and story from someone involved with the making of it – 1:27:25
  • An hour-long track by track discussion of David Lee Roth’s Skyscraper LP – 1:50:00

Truly, some of the most fun I’ve had on a Friday night.  Good stories, good times, good beverages.  Good friends.  Spend your Friday nights with us, or catch us on Youtube after the fact.  Give the videos a share if you think your friends would like watching too.  It’s all about community and thanks for being a part of it.  Special appreciation to Harrison the Mad Metal Man for hilarious commentary.  I shall dub thee:  Hilarrison.

Chewing the Fat with T-Bone on the LeBrain Train

The LeBrain Train:  2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano

Episode 40

This special 40th episode of the LeBrain Train is brought to you by T-Bone!  That’s right folks — after months of isolation in the wilds of Lake Superior, finally we have the one and only T-Bone from Thunder Bay joining us this week.  Deke and I will be talking rock with a true original.  On the docket this week:

  • An advent beer calendar “de-canning”
  • An in-depth discussion on David Lee Roth’s Skyscraper LP
  • A mental musical exercise based on Shaun of the Dead

…and lots more

T-Bone has contributed to list shows in the past but this is his first real live experience on the LeBrain Train.  T-Bone’s past submissions to the show were all Nigel Tufnel Top Ten lists and you can check out his rock pedigree in the following shows:

We hope you enjoy tonight’s rock as we chew the fat with T-Bone.

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