Ever wonder what Damn Yankees would have sounded like without Ted Nugent? Possibly, a little like Shaw Blades. In 1995, the Nuge returned to his solo career with Spirit of the Wild. Tommy Shaw and Jack Blades had already formed a successful songwriting partnership (with an Aerosmith hit under their belts) and so together they continued. Damn Yankees drummer Michael Cartellone joined them, but for the most part it’s expert Journey-man Steve Smith — one of the smoothest drummers in rock.
Expect acoustic rock and ballads with impeccable harmonies. Boring, you say? Not at all; not when you have a batch of songs this strong. Opener “My Hallucination” is a lament for the 1960s, with an electric guitar backing up Shaw and Blades’ perfect vocals. Those two guys can hit some notes. “I’ll Always Be With You” is more like campfire rock, a summetime gem and ode to innocent love. There are some sweet Def Leppard chords tucked in there. Third in line, the strong “Come to Be My Friend” gets a touch psychedelic but it’s the smoking acoustic soloing that will blow you away. Either that or the insanely good chorus harmonies.
“Don’t Talk to Me Anymore” is the first song you could call an outright ballad even though it’s a soft album. It’s lightly arranged with a less is more attitude. Then things get upbeat on “I Stumble In”, an outstanding memorable head-nodder. Journey fans will recognize their favourite drummer’s always fascinating tom tom work. Moving on to the album’s second true ballad, “Blue Continental”, a laid-back Southern vibe permeates. It’s logically followed by “Down that Highway”, upbeat but stripped to the basics. A couple acoustic guitars, two voices, some tambourine and accents (fiddle, keys) and you have a song!
The electric guitar comes out for “How You Gonna Get Used to This”, one of the less remarkable songs compared to the catchier acoustic tunes. The mandolin makes an appearance on “The Night Goes On”, another quiet but excellent ballad. “I Can’t Live Without You” draws things to an end, but is also unremarkable. Among diamonds, it fails to shine bright enough. Fortunately, the ending it was preceding is a short track simply called “The End”, which reprises themes from prior songs, tying up the album with a nice bow.
This album produced no commercial singles, but there were two extra tracks, exclusive to the Japanese CD. “How Does It Feel” brings back the electric guitar, but it’s more interesting than the other electric songs on the album. It could be a grower. “Straight Down the Line” is the gem. It’s the fastest song of the whole bunch, upbeat but light, and a blast in the car. Tommy’s intricate little lightning fast guitar hook is a tasty delight. Tracks like this are why collectors really seek out Japanese imports. They are their own rewards.
Any version of the debut Shaw Blades is going to be thoroughly enjoyed. Get one.
Towards the end of my time at the Record Store, I saw a lot of what I call “bigwigs” floating in and out. These well-dressed business men would be visiting with the boss to discuss wheeling and dealing. They all had one thing in common: they ignored the working stiff behind the counter as if he didn’t exist.
One of these guys was in one afternoon, and as he was leaving, he said “Let me go get one of my business cards from my Hummer.”
Really?
You couldn’t have just said “Let me go get one of my business cards?” You had to add the part about your $100,000 pollution machine too? Usually, I just say “I’ll go get it from my car. I don’t say “It’s in my Pontiac G5, let me go get it.” Because I don’t care and you shouldn’t either. But some guys think they are what they drive, I guess: big suck machines?
These kinds of people really chapped my ass, but I guess it’s very hip-hop to boast about wealth. Not very rock and roll, but just another day at the Record Store.
Helix drummer Greg “Fritz” Hinz had an accident at home. He fell off a roof, fractured his skull and broke some vertebrae. He is in a medically induced coma. Injuries are supposed to be non-life threatening.
According to Helix singer Brian Vollmer, Fritz has a lot of rehab ahead. All our thoughts and prayers are with the Hinz family as they deal with Greg’s health.
DAVE ARCARI – Live at Memorial Hall (2017 Buzz Records)
The most wonderful thing about this community of writers is the chance to hear new music. I think I can safely say I have bought new music at the recommendation of just about every writer I follow. One such writer is J from Resurrection Songs, an amazing musician in his own right. I’m not sure exactly how it happened, but through following him, I also ended up following his fellow countryman, Scottish singer/songwriter Dave Arcari.
Arcari has an engaging social media presence, so after following for a while and checking out his videos and live clips, I decided to finally buy an album. I chose 2017’s Live at Memorial Hall, and a wise choice it was. I had an inkling that an Arcari live album would be the way to go.
Dave Arcari is an “alt/blues troubadour” and that description works as well as any. Hammering away on his steel guitar with a bottleneck slide on one finger and a wee dram of Scotch, Arcari has his own brand of storytelling. The sandpaper vocals sound like they’ve walked a million miles. Up there alone on the stage, Dave commands attention. You tend to associate a steel guitar with the American south and the bluegrass that came with it. You rarely think of a Scottish storyteller. Yet here he is, so enjoy.
I didn’t really know many of Dave’s originals, and only a couple of the traditionals, but this is a very enjoyable album even so. Live albums shouldn’t be mucked with, and this sounds 100% live. Some tracks are mellow and contemplative, others are fast and rambunctious. It doesn’t matter to the crowd who hoot n’ holler after every song.
Favourite songs? Sure, how about “Dreamt I Was 100”, “Bring My Baby Back”, “Devil’s Left Hand” and “Whiskey in My Blood”? The fast ones are my favourites! There are 24 songs so I’ll wager nobody’s going home disappointed.
Dave Arcari just returned home from a fall US tour. If he ever comes to Canada, I wouldn’t want to miss it. This CD will have to do for now.
4.5/5 stars
Oh! And the CD came with an autograph, and I’m pretty sure he mailed it from the US tour, since it’s postmarked from Michigan! That’s dedication!
Stan, you just had to go, I know that. You’ve been here for 95 years and entertaining us for most of them. You gave, and you gave, and you gave. You deserve your rest now.
Stan, I knew who Spider-man was before I knew the Prime Minister of Canada. You brought me the Star Wars comics that kept me going between movies. Through those pages I discovered all that so many of my favourite heroes were yours! Captain America, Iron Man, the Hulk, the Fantastic Four, the X-Men…I always preferred Marvel to DC and I can’t really explain why. I liked Superman, but the Marvel lineup was so much better than DC’s. Their characters were more interesting to me, and it was addictive, how storylines weaved through one title to another.
My dad would buy me one new comic on the trip to the cottage each time. I always chose Marvel.
I wouldn’t be surprised at all if some version of Spider-man is still popular in another 95 years. Perhaps these characters you helped create will be remembered as literary classics. If not, I am confident that the Marvel heroes will be a part of our cultural backdrop for a long, long time.
FU MANCHU – Clone of the Universe(2018 New Damage)
First the first time in a long time, “I’ve Been Hexed” by the brand new Fu Manchu album.
Clone of the Universe sounds cut from the same cloth as classic albums such as King of the Road and The Action is Go. Aside from the mind-bomb that is the 18 minute track “Il Mostro Atomico”, each song is short, riffy and to the point. “(I’ve Been) Hexed” is an immediate thumbs-up, a reminder of what we liked about Fu Manchu when we first heard them.
You can’t tell if “Don’t Panic” has anything to do with Douglas Adams, but it’s as fast and relentless as the UFO-themed “King of the Road”. Maybe the Sabbath-crawl of “Slower Than Light” is also about space travel; maybe it’s not. The fun is in the guessing, but by the end the song is at moving at warp. Both “Nowhere Left to Hide” and “Intelligent Worship” boast riffs carved from the stones of Mt. Iommi, contained with in the Fu Manchu groove. The title track “Clone of the Universe” is like a heavy metal hammer, or a stoner rock Mjölnir.
Despite the strong Fu Manchu grooves throughout, it is undoubtedly the side-long “Il Mostro Atomico” that is the centerpiece. Suddenly from somewhere left of center comes the “Snow Dog”; Alex Lifeson of Rush with his own style of lead guitar. Lifeson always had a knack for finding cool artists to work with outside his normal sphere. Hearing him rip and make noise with Fu Manchu is so right. Not to mention, this jam which keeps going on and on has plenty to offer when you listen all the way through.
Sunday Chuckle will return next week. This Sunday, we remember the sacrifices made by those who served their countries. For me in particular, it’s my Grandfather and his brother who fought against the Nazis in World War II that I like to remember. As dark forces encircle the world today, let us not forget those currently serving who are keeping us free.
Here are our past stories regarding Remembrance Day, please give them a click and a read.
GETTING MORE TALE #715: The Lost Chapters – “The First Year”
Ever seen High Fidelity with John Cusack? When Cusack says, “I hired these guys to come in three days a week, and they started coming in every day. There’s nothing I can do to stop it.” That was us. That me and T-Rev. The boss man hired on Trev in the fall, two months after I started. We worked opposite nights and opposite weekends. We were like ships passing in the night. We never would have gotten to be such tight friends if we didn’t keep coming into the store every freaking day!
See, as used CD store, we got in new inventory every day. We were getting in cool shit. I was just beginning to transfer my music collection over from cassette to CD, so I just started to upgrade and buy up old back catalogue. I snagged You Can’t Stop Rock And Roll by Twisted Sister that year, which was a big deal to me because it was deleted at the time. I got some Dio CDs that I never had before. I began collecting Rush in earnest. We had rarities too. I got a split King’s X / Faith No More live bootleg called Kings of the Absurb which is pretty damn good. I really got quite a few CD singles at that time too. A few previously unknown Faith No More singles dropped into my lap. It was crucial to come in frequently. If you didn’t, you might miss something you were looking for. Or something you didn’t know you were looking for.
After two months of shadowing the owner, I was working solo and loving it. I got to pick my own music every night, within reason. There were obscure rules. Judas Priest was out, but Soundgarden was OK. Anything that was a new charting release was considered OK for store play. We were allowed to open anything to play it, as long as we didn’t abuse that. For the first while we were even allowed to bring music from home.
That ended when I brought in a bunch of recent purchases to listen to one morning. They included an indi band from Toronto, called Feel, formerly known as Russian Blue. The sound was vital, and the early 90s buzz was that Toronto was going to be the next Seattle. I was all over these bands, like Slash Puppet, Russian Blue, Attitude (later Jesus Chris), Gypsy Jayne, and the rest.
[An aside: I caught a little flak when I took in a used copy of Slash Puppet. “This is an indi band,” the boss complained. “It’ll sell,” I defended myself. “Trust me I know this band.” I knew half a dozen customers by name that I could recommend it to. I sold it to the first of those guys to come in, this insurance guy named Tony who loved 80s rock. He bought it after one listen.]
The day I had my personal Feel This CD in the store player, a customer noticed it. He thought it was cool, wanted it, and asked how much. I had to tell him it was my own personal copy, and no I couldn’t order it in because it was an indi band. He would have to write to the band to get a copy, and I wrote down the information inside the CD for him.
The boss thought this was kind of a silly situation, and rightfully so. Why play music we weren’t selling and were not able to sell? This was a store. So that ended. No more bringing music from home. I guess I’m the guy who ruined it for generations of Record Store employees to come.
THE GANDHARVAS – Sold for a Smile (1997/1998 Universal US and Canadian versions)
What a band were the Gandharvas. Lead howler Paul Jago could hit those Perry Farrell highs, and they wrote some pretty fucking great songs including their major hit “The First Day of Spring”. An unappreciated gem would be their third and final album, 1997’s Sold for a Smile. Led by the anthemic single “Downtime”, this is a hard album to resist no matter which version you get. It even made our list: “88 Unrightfully Ignored Albums of the 90s“.
Versions? Yes, two: the Canadian and US have different track listings. In 1997, Canada got the basic 10 track CD. When it was released Stateside, a number of tracks including “Downtime” were remixed. The US and Canadian versions of “Downtime” have vastly different guitar solo and outro mixes, for example. The States also got two bonus tracks: a new recording of “The First Day of Spring” and a cover of Cyndi Lauper’s “Time After Time”. (The original album was a shorty at just under 40 minutes.)
The Gandharvas turned it up a notch for this album without losing sight of their more delicate tendencies. “Gonna Be So Loose” is a slamdance of squealing vocals and chords. (This song is available remixed on the US version.) But then “Shells” is a low, strummy song perfect for the headphones. It shows of the layered vocals that are a Gandharvas trademark. “Waiting for Something to Happen” then goes somewhere between Guns N’ Roses and screamy, psychedelic punk rock — an astounding song, which then defies all logic by going acoustic. And then all over the place.
Time for a little more pop in the rock, with “Hammer in a Shell”. Snarly pop, with a sour candy coating. “Watching the Girl” was another fine single, a more streamlined song for this album. It too was remixed on the US edition, putting the guitars way louder. Then strap in for “Sarsasparilla”, a boulder-heavy rocketship blast into space. “Into the Mainstream”, then, is a bit more complex, and perhaps a little bit epic.
“Milk Ocean” leads you to the end, with a healthy dose of acidy psychedelia. It’s the closer, “Diabaloney” that’s a real head scratcher. Is it a joke? I can’t tell. “I fuck it up, I got the fuck, I got the luck,” goes one set of lines. Heavy and screamy goodness, but a real headscratcher nonetheless. What the hell did I just listen to?
On the US version, the new recording of “The First Day of Spring” is placed third in the running order, after the remixes of “Downtime” and “Gonna Be So Loose”. It’s quite a bit heavier than the original, though a brilliant song it remains. Could it be actually a polished up live version? Why does Paul Jago yell out “Colorado!” in the middle? For fun? This band is from London, Ontario not Colorado! And “Time After Time”? They twist it up, give it bite, and for better or for worse make it their own. Unless you have a serious attachment to the song, the Gandharvas’ interpretation is quite cool.
As if you can’t tell, this is an album you should own. Get one or the other, or both!
They probably thought I was going to hell the day I showed up on the first day of school in that Judas Priest T-shirt. Mrs. Powers was a devout Catholic, with a judgey side to go with it. She enjoyed publicly humiliating her “misbehaved” students. I can only imagine what she really thought. Here was her “A” student, and over summer holidays, he’s got himself a T-shirt that says “Judas Priest” on it. He’s drawing pictures of guitars in art and doing his class speech on a band called Kiss. What the devil is with that Ladano kid?
If Catholic school was ever too sedate or solemn, this was magnified 100-fold in the lenses of the 8th grade.
It was the year you made the choice of which highschool to go to. You’d undergo the Sacrament of Confirmation. It was their last chance to make sure you didn’t go off the rails and do something stupid, like do drugs or leave the church!
There was a weeklong Catholic retreat to an old convent in Ancaster called Mount Mary. “Every student I ever had who did not go to Mount Mary grew up to do drugs, or killed themselves,” said Mrs. Powers. Holy shit! I didn’t want to be there and it was obvious. It was the middle of winter and every day had extensive outdoor activities, but worse, you were not allowed to bring any of your music. No Walkmans, no tapes. There was a radio tuned to an approved radio station in one of the activity rooms. I didn’t know what to do, so before we left, I listened to and memorised as many Kiss songs as I could. Double Platinum worked for my last minute Kiss cramming session. The song I was most successful with was “Love Gun”. I had just received a taped copy of The Elder but did not have time to investigate it much. I had to go to Mount Mary instead. This intrusion into the wants and desires of my musical passions kind of pissed me off. I had to wait a week to get into The Elder. Stupid retreat. I was so scared of being caught with any contraband that I flushed my candy before getting on the bus. Humming “Love Gun” in my head, we were off.
Mount Mary conjures up some real discomfort. They were trying to teach you to be open minded about it but all I can really recall are negative feelings, and some disgusting hot chocolate. I was isolated from everything I loved and stuck with a bunch of people who I didn’t particularly like, and felt the same towards me. I knew this because we had to form circles and tell everybody something we liked about them. Nobody seemed to know much about me at all. “You like Star Wars, uhhh…and I don’t, but that’s cool.” was the most memorable.
There was a day spent outside in the snow as “hunters” and “hunted”. I don’t remember the moral of this activity. The hunters had wooden sticks as rifles, and my bully Steve Hartman was one of them. The role playing had a bizarre shade of reality. There were no explanations to us as to why people were selected for their roles. The hunted were supposed to find some specially marked trees, but I spent most of the time just hiding in the woods from hunters and teachers alike. There was another day including a long hike up something called “Agony Hill”.
The day we were released from Mount Mary and sent home was cold and wet. The snow was melting, but it was just dirty slush. My parents were supposed to pick me up when the busses arrived at the school, but I didn’t see them and vice versa, so lugged a giant heavy suitcase home through the snow. At least when I got there, a brand new Marvel Transformers comic was waiting for me with my mail in the kitchen. #17, “The Smelting Pool”, considered one of the best of the series.
“Well that’s over,” I said to myself. “Now I just have to get through the rest of this school year and it’s freedom.”
That teacher just had a bad impression of me. There was the rock and roll devilry which seemed to bring humiliating public interrogation.
“How many of you went to church this past Sunday?” she questioned the class. “Put up your hands.” She was determined to find out just how devout our behaviour was. No excuses.
About half the class raised their hands.
“How many of you were there last week?” A few more hands went up.
“And the week before?” A couple more. “How many have been to church in the last month?” She noticed me, and I noticed her. My hands were in my laps.
“MICHAEL.” Radar locked.
“WHEN WAS THE LAST TIME YOU WENT TO CHURCH?” she boomed.
My sister dubbed it “The Hell Hole”. The school and church are right across from each other
It had been a couple years. Powers had her “no excuses permitted” policy regarding going to church, so I didn’t even try to explain. (Essentially her policy was: You are old enough to go to church on your own now, so don’t tell me your mom was sick.) I just endured the firepower of Mrs. Powers. What else could she do; send a note home to my parents? If I wasn’t going to church, chances are they weren’t either. And there was a reason for that.
It was an Easter service a couple years prior. Good Friday mass, very busy, and the church was packed. My dad always liked to get an aisle seat so that’s what he did on Good Friday. That was his mistake.
My sister and I had better instincts. We preferred to hide somewhere in the middle of the pews. Do you know what our least favourite part of service was? The part where you have to shake hands and greet your neighbours. We were shy and would rather not, so we just turned to face each other. We’d shake hands and say, “Hello sir how are you today?” “Oh, I’m good sir and how are you?” We’d do this for as long as we could credibly ignore the adults around us trying to shake our child hands.
On Good Friday we tucked in down the pew while dad sat on the aisle, when the Priest announced that for this special service, volunteers would come and wash your feet if you were sitting on the aisle. John 13:34: “If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you.” My dad has a hard time saying no. He kicked off his shoes and socks and politely pretended not to be hating every second. And the family simply stopped going to church after this. Coincidence?
Mrs. Powers, you can judge all you like. Maybe my dad was sick of church and I was sick of your shitty school.
One of the heavy metal albums from my childhood that reminds me most of that period is Born Again, by Black Sabbath. Boy, Powers sure would have hated those lyrics. “Good life is contradiction, because of crucifixion.” You can only imagine, if she knew what was I was hearing!
The devil and the priest can’t exist if one goes away, It’s just like the battle of the sun and the moon and the night and day, Force of the devil, that’s what we’re all told to fear, Watch out for religion when he gets too near, too near….
Of course Ian Gillan isn’t a satanist; he’s just a singer! But those lyrics would have set her head on fire, if the album cover didn’t do that first. Do we mind “Disturbing the Priest”? The truth is, the words were inspired by the rehearsal sessions for the album. They were receiving noise complaints from the local church. Do we mind “Distrurbing the Priest”? “Not at all, not at all, not in the least.” Once you know the genesis of the song, the lyrics fall into place. Not exactly Catholic-friendly, but certainly not evil.
Evil-sounding though? Absolutely. Born Again might be the most traditionally evil sounding metal album in the history of the genre. That’s why the original mix is so important even though it sounds like the refuse of the Golgothan excremental demon. The lack of clarity, the muddy haze, and the echoing bottomlessness of it just add to the mystique. You should not be able to clearly hear what the singer is saying. It should remind of you a bad hazy dream. Hell, it’s not the lyrics that make it evil; it’s Geezer’s fuzzy bass!
This article was produced after discussions with friends and acquaintances from different faiths and backgrounds. Some had similar experiences. Some are still dealing with residual Catholic guilt. We were talking old church stories, and all this stuff came flooding back. The sitting, the kneeling, the hand-shaking…my sister and I singing “Stars” by Hear N’ Aid instead of the hymns…the good and the bad.
One of the school bully kids was killed four years after Mount Mary, riding his motorcycle to work. I morbidly wondered what Powers thought of that; he went to Mount Mary yet he was on her dead roster. Would she add that detail for next year’s class?
It’s obvious I still hold a lot of resentment to those school years. I wonder if that’s why I have such a strong attachment to the heavy metal music of the era. Let the psychoanalysis begin!
SHAW BLADES – Shaw Blades (1995 Warner Japan)
mikeladano.com 