This week, Ontario heads into “Phase 2” of re-opening. With gatherings of up to 10 people permitted, it’s about time to release this review I’ve been sitting on for three months!
EXPLODING KITTENS (2015 card game)
Quick and simple card games are great for work lunch hours. Here’s one that you can play a round of in 10 to 20 minutes. Although the game states it’s for 2 to 5 players, it works best with 4 to 5.
Exploding Kittens is very simple. There is a deck of cards with different kinds of kittens on them. You don’t want the exploding kind. If you draw an exploding kitten, the only way to survive is with a defuser card. Once you run out of those, you better watch out.
There are all sorts of cards to help you stay alive. The “See the Future” card will allow you to view the next three cards in the deck. If you don’t like what’s next for you to draw, you could play a “Shuffle”, “Skip” or “Attack” card, forcing somebody else to pick it up. If you don’t want to be forced, you can play a “Nope” card to cancel it. But it’s just as easy for somebody else to “Nope” your “Nope” card! We had a chain of four “Nopes” in a row.
The simplicity of the game is what makes it enjoyable, although the amusing cat artwork on the cards is also worthwhile. There are certain cat cards that you can collect to put together combo moves. Stealing cards from an opponent can be a killer move (literally!) if you can get their defusers.
For added fun (and players) you can pick up an expansion pack with even more kittens, though we have a blast with just the basic game.
GETTING MORE TALE #836: Transformers 2 – Revenge of the Schnauzers
For one weekend in the summer of 2012, I put the music on pause. Transformers 2 – Revenge of the Schnauzers was the title. It was a series and I made four movies in total. Five, if you count the final one that I shot but never edited. There’s something so satisfying about animating Transformers. I wanted to go big or go home this time, and what I ended up with this time was a 44 minute movie (originally split into two parts for file size reasons).
It’s amazing to think I did this movie in a single weekend in July 2012. Probably Canada Day weekend. I filmed the whole thing in just two days. You can see the the light change as I filmed from sunrise to sunset, in order to squeeze time out of every minute. And this movie was just my side project! At the same time, I was also posting 1-2 articles per day for my main gig: reviews and Record Store Tales.
I came prepared for Canada Day weekend with my Nokia C3 cell phone as my only camera. Here’s something you didn’t know. Cell phones back then were so much easier to do primitive animation with. There’s a pause button you could hit when you’re making a video, and it essentially allowed me to do the stop motion very single-handedly, very quickly, just by hitting that pause button. Sure, I made a few mistakes along the way. I had to reshoot entire scenes when I didn’t know I was pausing “off” instead of “on”, but it did enable me to do this entire thing in just two days. I barely stopped to eat, and I was just wiped by the end of it. I think it was a manic episode to be honest with you, but a doctor never diagnosed that so it’s just my opinion.
I chose the characters (and more importantly, toys) that I wanted to use for the movie. Most of them are from the Generations lines, with some third party add-on kits for Hound and Goldbug. Others are reissues of G1 originals: Soundwave and his tapes, Predaking, and Ultra Magnus. I needed figures that would be easy to transform on the fly. Magnus and Predaking were brand new in my collection and I wanted to show them off. I decided to bring more Decepticons with me than Autobots to give them a real disadvantage. I built the teams and roughed out a story. Dialogue was improvised on the spot but not fixed in place until the editing stage a few days later!
I used Windows Movie Maker, then and now, to edit. It was much less stable then (or at least my computer is more powerful now). The amount of edits I used numbered in the hundreds and crashes were frequent. Even though I was essentially editing “live” in-camera as I filmed and animated, I was also tightening up those edits with Windows. Funny enough, Windows has no more features in the current version than it did in 2012. For the laser blasts, I added a “split” and inserted a “fade in from white” effect. They are remarkably effective.
I originally edited the movie with mainstream rock music as the soundtrack. I used Van Halen, Black Sabbath, Iron Maiden, Bruce Dickinson, and AC/DC among others. Needless to say, YouTube never let me upload it, so it sat on my various hard drives and DVDs all these years. Until I recently had an idea.
Uncle Meat’s hatred of my “playing with action figures” inspired me to use his music to get around the YouTube issues. More accurately, Max the Axe’s music (with a little of my sister’s mixed in). It worked brilliantly. Just as well as the original version, though with music you’re not familiar with.
Now you can hear many of these great Max the Axe tracks for yourself. While watching robots blow each other to bits!
Sure, it was cool when I used “Accident of Birth” by Bruce Dickinson as the entrance music for the Colossus Schnauzers and….
Oh! You’re confused about the Schnauzers. Having grown up around the wee beasts, I realized that in action figure scale, you could use them as giant monsters if you could get them to do what you wanted them to do. With Kathryn Ladano’s help, we used treats as incentives to chase and attack Autobots. I affixed Decepticon logos to their foreheads and wrote them into the story as Shockwave’s latest creation: Colossus Schnauzers. With DNA stolen from a secret lab (named after the two doggies Laci and Ali), the Decepticons engineered giant versions of the beasts.
It’s up to the Autobots to find out what they are up to, with a small squad led by Ultra Magnus. (I had focused on Optimus Prime in the preceding chapter with his death and rebirth as Powermaster Prime, so I wanted a different leader figure this time.) I used two Bumblebee figures. One was modified with a third-party head that made him into a Generations version of Goldbug, his rebuilt form. This is all roughly based on an original Marvel comics storyline. I also took inspiration from the TV show. One figure that I wanted to show off next time was my transparent “Ghost Starscream”. I didn’t have time to get into that with this chapter, so I ended it with some foreshadowing that would allow me to introduce my ghost version of the figure next time.
I coloured the dialogue to make it easier to tell which ‘bot is talking. I did an “infodump” introduction for the Predacons. This is the much-critisized technique used by Bob Budiansky in the 80s Marvel series. Each new toy had an introduction, because the comic was just a device to sell toys. That was my homage to Budiansky. The characterisations of the figures in my film are meant to be true to their toy bios and comic book appearances. Although my story takes place in a universe all its own, it’s similar to the ones you know. The “release the Schnauzers” scene is of course a parody of the the Kraken scene in Clash of the Titans. I wanted something that reminded me of Poseidon pulling the chain that opened the big gate.
I haven’t watched this movie for a long time. I had forgotten that I even included a “blooper reel” at the end. This is the only part of the movie that still has its original music soundtrack. Though I’ve forgotten the name of the track, that’s Kathryn Ladano’s music playing and that’s her in her only cameo!
Consider that I shot this thing in two days, sunrise to sunset, and edited it together in a couple more, all while posting new daily reviews and Record Store Tales. That’s unbelievable and probably also unhealthy. But I still enjoy the results! I legitimately like this. I also enjoyed adding the new music by Max the Axe and seeing how it worked out. I’m proud enough to post it here for you to enjoy. And I hope you do!
It wasn’t that long ago that Styx re-emerged with their best new album in decades. Now their original singer Dennis DeYoung has done the same on his own. They say 26 East (to be released in two separate volumes) is to be his retirement album. If so, Dennis has gone out on an exceptionally high note.
It’s clear from this release that DeYoung is reclaiming his throne. The final track “2020 A.D.” is a essentially another part of Styx’s “A.D. 1928”, a cornerstone of their progressive monuments. The three trains on the front cover, with the words “Trade Winds” and the year 1962 refers to the origins of Styx. The trio is Dennis, Chuck & John Panozza — the founding members.
With 26 East, Dennis has turned up the rock side significantly more, to a vintage Styx-like balance of guitar thrills and concrete keyboards. His voice has lost very little over the years. His depth and expressiveness cannot be touched, nor can his sense of melody. Hooks! Styx albums were always loaded with hooks. Dennis has not forgotten how to write them. Not at all.
The epic tracks contain sentiment, humour, anger and the whole gamut of human emotions. There are rare political slants to songs like “With All Due Respect”: “Fake fun, fake facts, hey look new tax!” DeYoung’s patriotic pride comes out on “The Promise of This Land”, and he incorporates influences from coast to coast. From church choirs to stage productions, all elements are included.
All the tracks are special, but one of the most chill-inducing is “To the Good Old Days”, a collaboration with Julian Lennon. And to say the least, it has clear shades of John. Picking other favourites is more difficult, but it’s hard to ignore the bombast of the opener “East of Midnight”. For something a little different, “A Kingdom Ablaze” has Floydian guitar twangs that really feed the soul. “Run For the Roses” is a pure epic Styx high-water mark, which when chased by rocker “Damn the Dream” is only that much sweeter. “Unbroken” offers upbeat feelings that would have fit in on Styx’s 1990 album Edge of the Century. There are no weak tracks and nothing to skip. Dennis and co-writer Jim Peterik have really put together an incredible album worthy of its place in the catalogue.
Thanks for watching the Saturday live stream! If you missed any of it, it is now available below via YouTube. I ran into numerous technical issues, so apologies are in order for bad audio, bad video and audio lag.
Content-wise though, woah nelly! You are in for a treat. Here are some highlights:
For a live interview with Geoff Stephen of 1001 Albums in 10 Years, skip ahead to 0:07:00! He is doing something really special for healthcare workers, so check out what he has to say.
To check out some unboxings, go to 0:12:40 of the stream.
BONUS FOOTAGE – For a sneak peak at an animation test (not part of the actual live stream) you must go to 1:26:06.
For the Uncle Don Don Cutoff Shorts Countdown, start at 1:26:10 of the stream.
For a special Star Wars chat with all-around awesome guy Kovaflyer, go to 2:01:30 of the stream!
Technical issues aside, this live stream set one new record. It represents the longest span of time in a single day. I’ve done longer streams but this one had segments ranging from 7:00 am to 9:00 pm, a 14 hour range. It was fun for me and I hope you enjoy despite the quality problems.
I froze and reverted back to my basic phone instincts. I hung up.
Long story shot, Kathy called back two more times thinking we just got disconnected. The second time I still thought it was my dad! It is comforting to know that the Jehova’s Witnesses have evolved to deal with the pandemic! They are not able to go door to door, so now I have to avoid them in different ways!
ALICE COOPER – El Paso County Coliseum: The Classic Texas Broadcast -1980 (2016 Zip City)
At 80:33, the Alice Cooper Texas Broadcast CD release by Zip City is additional proof that you can indeed squeeze more than 80 minutes onto a CD! The Flush the Fashion tour presented a whole slew of tracks that were rarely if ever played again. Broadcasts of tours such as this are more than just curiosities to fans who already have all the official live releases.
An instrumental snippet of “Elected” precedes opening number “Grim Facts” from the current album. It’s not the most outstanding song from an uneven album, but it does have a nice choppy guitar riff and solo. Then it’s the familiar, slinky bassline that opens “Go to Hell“. Alice’s vocal is a little erratic but of course you have to remember he’s moving around on stage, playing a part while trying to sing. The audio is close to official live album quality, with very little excess noise. From the same album, “Guilty” is a treat. It’s one of the increasingly fewer rock-and-rollers that Cooper recorded after the original band split. Alice can’t quite hit the note from the chorus hook, but that’s live music for you. Better than an overdub recorded six months later in a little studio in another state.
Flush the Fashion boasted some really excellent tunes among the filler, and “Pain” is one of them. Live it doesn’t punch as hard, but Alice delivers a passionate vocal. “Talk Talk” is one of the new Alice tunes that took him into a Cars-like New Wave direction. Filler for some, treasure for others. Not as good as “Pain” for certain.
The first seriously classic dinosaur oldies rolled out are “I’m Eighteen” and, oddly enough, “Gutter Cat Vs. the Jets”. Pouring on the melodrama, “Eighteen” is one for the record books, a top-notch version better than some of the official ones. “Gutter Cat”, though? What an odd one to pull out of the hat, and as soon as that bouncy bassline and quirky keyboard drop, we’re jumping up and down. The arrangement’s been slightly modified from the School’s Out original but we’re just glad to hear it.
The set bounces back between old and brand new, and up next: “Clones”, probably the undisputed best of the new Alice tunes and the only one that could be considered a hit. Screams fill the air as soon as that synth riff hits. A tight, feedback-laden version is rolled out in under three minutes. Then it’s a bit of filler (“Nuclear Infected”) before they revert back to the oldies with “Billion Dollar Babies”/”I Love the Dead”. Some blistering guitar work on “Billion Dollar Babies” would have you thinking this version was from a far earlier vintage. Slicker than a weasel indeed!
Alice takes a break while the band do a long jam to some riffs from Alice Cooper Goes to Hell. When Alice returns it is with an excellent rock & roll version of “Dance Yourself to Death”, far better than the Flush the Fashion original. One dig at John Travolta snuck in, and from this point forward the Alice Cooper show is all about the classics. The unmistakable “Only Women Bleed” provides a musical respite with understated drama. Back to the rock with “Road Rats” from 1977 (OK, not that old by contemporary standards, but definitely of an earlier era). The ode to roadies is seldom played but shouldn’t be.
“Sick Things”, “Is It My Body”, “Black Widow”, “Elected” and “School’s Out” are the final five, and yes that means Alice neglected a few hits. There was no “Hello Hooray” nor “Welcome to My Nightmare”. It doesn’t seem like anybody would have gone home dissatisfied.
The sound quality changes and improves partway through this CD, and a look at the actual setlist for this show reveals why. Alice played “I Never Cry” that day between “Pain” and “Talk Talk”, and didn’t play “I’m Eighteen” until closer to the end. He also apparently opened with “Model Citizen”, absent here. He didn’t play “Billion Dollar Babies” or “I Love the Dead” at that show, but here they are. That means this CD is not a single complete gig, but has been edited together from additional sources.
Given the rarity of most of the these tracks (many of these were the first time they were ever played live), buying this CD is a slam dunk win for any serious fan. For the casual, you will hear a slew of well recorded Cooper classics and plenty of songs you won’t know but may end up loving. It’s like a win-win. Shame it’s not a full single show, but it’ll have to do for now.
QUEEN + ADAM LAMBERT – “You Are the Champions” (2020 iTunes)
Queen were one of the earlier groups out of the gate with new “lockdown” recordings. From their homes they re-recorded “We Are the Champions”, dedicated to frontline workers, with Adam Lambert to raise money for the World Health Organisation’s “Solidarity Response Fund”. Whatever the cause may be, we are here to review the music.
The idea here is that Queen are not the champions this time — we are! Together we have locked down and sacrificed, and we are doing it for each other. The lyrics don’t really fit but we know what Queen meant. Lambert doesn’t actually change the words to “You are the champions” until the halfway point.
This track is the familiar Queen arrangement, though shortened by a verse. Adam Lambert is a fine singer, as he proves in the outro. Queen didn’t go with the big layered vocals here; perhaps you need a recording studio to do that. Instead Lambert’s voice takes the spotlight by itself. Even the instrumentation is sparse — no solos, and only a couple Brian May guitar noodles to savour.
There’s a striking music video with stark footage of empty streets. I like that Lambert did his hair and makeup to the nines while the other two look casual. Let’s join Queen and Adam in thanking our frontline healthcare workers — and thank you Queen for recording again. How about a new album next time?
My Uncle Don was the only rock n’ roller in the family. When we were kids, we called him “Uncle Don Don”. Our cousin Geoff already had an Uncle Don (my dad), so my mom’s brother became Uncle Don Don. It’s just much simpler for kids if everybody has a different name.
Uncle Don had curly, flaming red hair. Those Scottish roots. In the old days he wore it long. Come summer, he’d be at the cottage in nothing but a pair of old cutoff jean shorts. Whether he was playing badminton with us, or just drinking a beer with the adults, he was always there with the jean shorts.
“Occasionally we would hear rumours. Usually these ‘little known facts’ would come from that one uncle that everyone had, the one who wore no shirt, watched a lot of football, and had a handlebar moustache. Usually this stereotypical uncle would say, ‘Yeah, Helix have been around a long time, like 20 years, I saw them when they were still a country band. My buddy was in the band too.'”
Uncle Don was the very uncle who told me that Helix were once a country band. That was him. No shirt, football and that moustache! Flaming red. And jean shorts.
As I got older and into classic rock, we started to connect a little bit. We were closer in the late 80s and early 90s. He used to come over to the house and borrow tapes off me so he could record them. He liked my Zeppelin and my Deep Purple. From him, I recorded Alice Cooper’s Greatest Hits — my very first Alice. That happened in the summer of 1989, and I had no idea what to expect from Alice. I also have a fond memory of us hanging out at the beach one afternoon, just the two of us. It was a wavy day in August 1992. I wonder if he wore the jean shorts that day too?
As the years passed, Uncle Don became more reclusive. I had not seen him in many months. He was not well. Cancer was slowly starting to take him. He knew he was going, and he knew he didn’t have many days left. At least we had time to prepare. My mom and aunt, and especially my grandmother, will miss him very much. Uncle Don was the “baby of the family”, born much later than his two older sisters. In many ways he had to live with being the “baby of the family” for his whole life.
Uncle Don passed away this afternoon at Freeport hospital in Kitchener. As a family, we are all relieved that he is no longer in pain. It is going to take time to process these feelings. I worry about my grandmother, who still lived with him. She is 95. I spoke to her just yesterday. She is prepared to go on without him, but I worry all the same.
There was nobody else in the family with long hair, listening to Alice Cooper. It was nice having somebody else with the same tastes. I thought a bit about what song he would have liked for this post. I thought about “Over the Hills and Far Away” by Zeppelin, but I think I need a song for me this time. From Alice Cooper’s Greatest Hits, it’s “Teenage Lament ’74”. The song that jumped out at me immediately as something really special. The song I played over and over again, trying to figure out the words. The song that just inexplicably connected with me. I thought it was neat that I was going into my teens, listening to the music he listened to in his teens. I started collecting Alice Cooper immediately. Trash was next, followed by Billion Dollar Babies, School’s Out and Welcome to My Nightmare. Thanks for introducing me to Alice Cooper, Uncle Don. You changed a life. I will never forget you.
What a drag it is, In these gold lame jeans. Is this the coolest way, To get though your teens? Well I cut my hair weird, I read that it was in. I look like a rooster, That was drowned and raised again.
What are you going to do? I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. Why don’t you get away? I’m going to leave today.
I ran into my room, And I fell down on my knees, Well I thought that fifteen, Was going to be a breeze. I picked up my guitar, To blast away the clouds, Somebody in the next room yelled, You got to turn that damn thing down.
What are you going to do? I’ll tell you what I’m going to do. Why don’t you get away? Well I’m going to cry all day.
DARRELL MANSFIELD – “Thunder and Lightning” (1985 Broken Records, from Revelation)
Back in old ’86, Bob Schipper taped a bunch of Christian rock bands from a co-worker at the local Harvey’s. He recorded five songs by two artists: REZ and Darrell Mansfield. I, in turn, recorded them from him. Those artists, Rez and Mansfield, were hard to find at retail. We’d never even heard of them before. As time went on, 12 years at the Record Store, I never saw them. You had to go to a speciality Christian record store. (Or, in the 2000s, just look online.)
The one Darrell Mansfield track that I really liked from that tape was called “Thunder and Lightning”. We both loved it. Didn’t know anything about the guy. Couldn’t find his albums. The tape eventually became unplayable. What to do?
The easiest thing was just to download the song off iTunes. Eager to hear it again, and unsure if I wanted a whole Mansfield album, that’s exactly what I did.
From his 1985 disc Revelation, which boasts cover artwork that I liken to God meets Judas Priest, “Thunder and Lightning” is the opening track. Appropriately it commences with some rip-roarin’ guitar soloin’.
So here’s the thing about Christian rock. You either dig it or not. There is plenty of guitar and vocal howls n’ shrieks to entertain the masses. Mansfield’s lyrics are not heavy handed; they can be ignored. It’s pretty obvious what they’re about if you pay attention, but only if you pay attention.
“The wind is blowing like a rolling stone, all the believers will be goin’ home. Don’t be caught in the fallin’ rain. Don’t need to suffer, don’t need the pain.” The only clue to Darrell’s true message here is the word “believers”.
“Come on, don’t lose control. Come on, don’t lose your soul. Come on, put your feet on a rock, come on get your neighbours and rock!” Anyone familiar with Christianity knows that one of several meanings of the word “rock” is a metaphor for faith. Subtle enough. One of the more blatant lines is “We wanna meet you in the Heavenly cloud, don’t be reluctant don’t be too proud.” Still easy enough to miss.
“Thunder and Lightning” seems to be about one of those end-of-the-world scenarios. Disaster looms, but the faithful are saved. Mansfield refers to the “Storm-catcher” without naming Jesus. It’s actually better done than a lot of Stryper lyrics.
There’s a smoking 40-second guitar intro,and the another 40 seconds of blazing mid-song. That’s a pretty generous amount of guitar for a 4:48 song. (Apparently future Mr. Big guitarist Paul Gilbert played on some of the other album tracks.) What sells it though is not just the insane-o guitar playing, but also Mansfield’s powerhouse voice. When the guy makes his voice crack, Tyler-esque, on certain words, it just hits the spot!
This is a brilliant track that, whether you’re a believer or just a rock n’ roller, deserves to be heard again.
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