The LeBrain Train: 2000 Words or More with Mike Ladano
Episode 44 – Special “Season One” Finale
Got nothing to do tonight? Join the club! Better yet, join the stream! This week’s special episode takes place on Thursday December 31. It will be a drop-in show, meaning folks will drop in and say hello, and read their own Nigel Tufnel Top Ten lists. It will be any topic, from music on down to favourite children’s breakfast cereals. Several guests so far confirmed. I have a list planned myself, and it’s a very special one!
Iron Tom returns with his 2020 list of awesome, a little bit of commentary, and plenty of Youtube videos for you to check out!
ElderOmens
King Buffalo Dead Star
Drive-By TruckersThe New OK
The Atomic BitchwaxScorpio
King Gorm King Gorm
Five Alarm Funk Big Smoke
Let the ‘Wheels on the Bus’ take you on a tight funky ride…
Jerry JosephThe Beautiful Madness
Drive-By TruckersThe Unraveling
Great album for the shit-storm that was the last four years. However, I’m not sure I’ll be partying to some of it four years from now….
Brant Bjork Brant Bjork
The coolest dude on the planet being a one-cool-man-band….
Steve Earle Ghosts of West Virginia
Emphasizing the humanity over politics plays well….
Deep Purple Whoosh!
After the quality of the last few albums, I don’t know why I was surprised by how much I liked this one… Keep going boys….
Testament Titans of Creation
This band has been pretty consistent over the decade and have produced another great thrash album that is as catchy as it is heavy….
Neil Young Homegrown
1974-recorded and 2020-released and enjoyed…I read that Young thinks that the album is ‘the unheard bridge between Harvest and Comes A Time’ and he’s right….
Armored Saint Punch the Sky
A pleasant surprise…no gimmicks just solid consistent heavy metal.
Blue Öyster Cult The Symbol Remains
A little uneven but the highs more than outweigh the lows… The videos may be unintentionally hilarious but the rock fire remains….
Wishbone Ash Coat of Arms
Fans of well crafted rock with tasty twin guitar will enjoy….
AnnihilatorBallistic, Sadistic
A heavy riffy old-school thrashfest that does not let up….
Jason Isbell, Reunions
It doesn’t quite match the strength of his last two, but that’s only because Isbell has set the bar so damn high for himself… This is an excellent album in its own right….
Mr. BungleThe Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny Demo
Ian’s and Lombardo’s presence help Mr. Bungle deliver little on the experimentation, but some great straight-up thrash….
Brimstone Coven The Woes Of A Mortal Earth
Riffy modern occult rock with excellent vocal harmonies….
Lowrider Refractions
Who knew there were deserts in Sweden? These Kyuss-wannabies make a good case that there are….
Wytch Hazel III: Pentecost
Wishbone Ash fans will have lots here to enjoy….
King Weed – Riffs Of The Dead
King Weed The Seven Sins Of Doomsday
Instrumental Stoner from France… Groovy cool shit… And there are two more 2020 releases I haven’t checked out yet….
Diamond Head Lightning to the Nations 2020
A fresh coat of paint on some metal masterpieces and some pretty cool covers….
WobblerDwellers of the Deep
Yes, Crimson and Gentle Giant fans will find much to like here….
Freeways True Bearings
Vintage 70’s guitar rock for 2020 and they are from Brampton….
2020 may have sucked, but the music didn’t. This year I bought and reviewed more new releases than ever before, which I narrowed down to the Nigel Tufnel Top Ten studio albums of 2020 listed below.
I would like to dedicate this list to my good pal Uncle Meat who originated the concept of a “Nigen Tufnel Top Ten” earlier this year. It has become our thing.
BEST ALBUMS OF 2020
11. Now or Never – III
10. Mr. Bungle – The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny Demo
Storm Force’s debut album goes straight to #1 on their very first appearance! No surprise here. I’ve been raving about this disc since February and I owe it to Superdekes for putting these guys on my radar in the first place. This is a well-deserved #1. Age of Fear is an uplifting album with depth. It’s a thoughtful, heart-pounding blast of classic hard rock.
Deep Purple’s Whoosh! and AC/DC’s PWRUP prove two things: old dogs that both learn and don’t learn new tricks can all be champions. (I call this theory “Schrödinger’s Dog”.) Deep Purple’s growth continues while AC/DC managed to tap into the vein of success that always worked for them. Both records deserve their spots in the Top 3.
It was a thrill for me to learn that Dennis DeYoung both read and enjoyed my review of his newest album 26 East Vol 1. It’s a terrific, Styx-like conceptual work that will please the old fans. As will the new albums by Harem Scarem and Stryper, who didn’t stray far from their successful classic hard rock formulas. Kim Mitchell and Sven Gali on the other hand dared to be different. Kim went laid back and acoustic, while Sven Gali went with their heaviest uninhibited inclinations. As for Mr. Bungle, it has been 21 years since their last album California. All four Bungle studio albums are completely different from one another — four different genres. For The Raging Wrath of the Easter Bunny, they teamed up with Scott Ian and Dave Lombardo to re-record their first thrash metal demo tape. And it could be their best album since the self-titled debut in 1991. Not bad for a bunch of songs they wrote in highschool.
Corey “Mother Fuckin'” Taylor makes his debut on any list of mine with his solo album CMFT. It’s a surprising collection of commercial hard rockin’ tunes. Also appearing for the first time is Now Or Never (NoN) with their third album called III, featuring singer Steph Honde. It’s an excellent, dramatic metal album with light and shade.
Song of the year: “LeBrain Train“ by T-Bone Erickson
Single of the Year: Mammoth WVH – “Distance”
Ultimately whether or not you liked the new Ozzy, its success or failure falls at the feet of producer/guitarist Andrew Watt. He is already working on the next Ozzy album, so….
Huge thanks to T-Bone Erickson for the “LeBrain Train” theme song, which amazingly and unexpectedly became the song of the year in 2020! Weird how that happened. No bias here I assure you.
Finally, Wolfgang Van Halen finally released his first solo music under the name Mammoth WVH. The non-album single “Distance” is dedicated to his late father Eddie. Though musically it’s a modern power ballad, the lyrics and especially the music video evoke serious emotion. Well done Wolfgang. Can’t wait to check out his album in 2021.
There were a lot of cool rock releases in 2020, so we need more lists! Of course the brilliant new live Maiden deserved some loving attention. Meanwhile, Sloan, Def Leppard and Thin Lizzy have continued to put out quality collections of rarities & unreleased material, well worth the time and money you’ll spend on them. The Sloan collection is a vinyl exclusive and the first in a series of LPs re-releasing some of their B-sides and non-album and bonus tracks. Finally, Metallica delivered the goods even without Michael Kamen on S&M2, a very different live set than the first S&M. That’s the way to do it!
It’s naive to assume that major touring and concerts will return in 2021. This appears highly optimistic at present, with Covid still ravaging the landscape and vaccinations only just beginning. Instead of looking ahead at things like the resuming Kiss tour, or the Motley Crue reunion, we should continue to put our faith in new music.
Accept have a new album due January 15 intriguingly titled Too Mean to Die. It is their first without bassist Peter Baltes. Steven Wilson has a new record out at the end of that month. In February we get new Foo Fighters, The Pretty Reckless, Willie Nelson and Alice Cooper. Greta Van Fleet, Weezer, Rob Zombie, Ringo Starr, and Thunder will be back soon too. Many other bands are writing and recording without an announced due date. Ghost, Marillion, Scorpions, Megadeth and even Ratt are hard at work to make next year suck a little less. Support the bands by buying the music.
Here’s my list, for what it’s worth. Turns out I didn’t go watch many movies in theatre, but did stream a lot of content. It also seems I like watching cartoons and anime, but that’s not really a surprise. – Frank
Film and Streaming
Blood of Zeus, Netflix Castlevania Season 3, Netflix Dragon’s Dogma, Netflix The Mandalorian, Disney+ 1917 The Boys season 2, Prime Bill and Ted Face the Music Altered Carbon Season 2 Netflix October Faction, Netflix Bosch, Prime
Music
Testament, Titans of Creation, track “Night of the Witch”
Static-X, Project Regeneration Vol 1., track “Hollow”
Sepultura, Quadra, track “Raging Void”
Trivium, What the Dead Men Say
Five Finger Death Punch, F8, track “Scar Tissue”
MICHAEL, MAX THE AXE’S STUNT DOUBLE
Gorillaz – Song Machine
Warbringer – Weapons of Tomorrow
Lamb of God – Lamb of God
Run the Jewels – RTJ4
Poppy – I Disagree
The Chats – High Risk Behaviour
Oliver Tree – Ugly is Beautiful
King Gizzard – K.G.
Testament – Titans of Creation
Atomic Bitchwax – Scorpio
Runners Up
Flaming Lips – American Lips
Midnight – Rebirth by Blasphemy
Deep Purple – Whoosh!
Jeff Rosenstock – No Dream
Blue Oyster Cult – The Symbol Remains
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:
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!
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.
I started making sticky notes for live streams back in the spring. It started with me simply writing “Are you ready for another Friday live stream?” and posting it on social media. They got more elaborate from there. Then I started saving them on my calendar. Over the months, I kept some of my favourite sticky notes. Here are some memories from LeBrain Trains over the past six months.
mikeladano.com 