GETTING MORE TALE #579: Entering the Asylum (Supplement to the Re-Review series)
Back in Record Store Tales Part 3 (!), we took a nostalgic look at my first ever Kiss albums, that all arrived in one glorious batch. The year was 1985, but Kiss also had a new album coming out in a matter of days. Now that I had started on a Kiss collection, I would have to get their newest album too, called Asylum. I didn’t even know how to pronounce “asylum” correctly, nor did I know what the word meant, but I did understand that it was their third album without makeup.
Next door neighbor George, who was my introduction to Kiss, came over one day talking about the new single “Tears Are Falling” and how much I would love it. I didn’t have much money but by the time the snow fell, my dad bought me a copy of Asylum on cassette. We got it at the Zellers store at Stanley Park Mall in Kitchener.
My meager Kiss collection at that point consisted of Alive!, Asylum (cassette) and a bunch of LPs I recorded off George. I didn’t know much about the discography but George was a good teacher. George actually named one of his first bands Asylum. Before long I could name all the albums, in order. I even predicted that the next single would be “Uh! All Night”. I didn’t foresee the third single “Who Wants To Be Lonely” because Kiss hadn’t done a third single in ages!
George was only missing two Kiss albums: The Elder, and Double Platinum. He was dying to get both and finish the collection. His record collection was fascinating to me and a goldmine of music to tape and explore. The album covers, particularly for Kiss and Iron Maiden, had me hooked.
As my interest in Kiss grew, a new kid at school who I later found out was a “liar liar pants on fire” claimed he had “all” the Kiss albums at home. His name was Joe Ciaccia (pronounced “chee-chaw”). I asked him if that meant he had The Elder. He said yes. I told George I knew a kid who owned it, and he just about shit his pants. I made arrangements with Joe to meet up at his place on the next Sunday to do a trade. All I asked for brokering this trade was recording the album.
George was really excited. “I don’t care what he wants for it, I’m not leaving without that record.” I distinctly remember a small group of us trudging through the snow to meet Joe at his apartment. Who came with us? I can’t remember. Joe lived on Breckenridge Drive, just down the street from Brian Vollmer of Helix. One thing that I can remember very clearly was grabbing my Sanyo ghetto blaster loaded with D-cell batteries, my Asylum tape, and rocking while walking to Joe’s.
Listening to a cassette on a ghetto blaster powered by D-cells was a warbly experience that kids today don’t understand. Our small group lollygagging through the slush listening to “King of the Mountain” on that old Sanyo is an image I’ll always remember. I carried it through the wet melting snow. Those Sanyo ghetto blasters were built like tanks! You could drop them and they’d keep on ticking.
We arrived at Joe’s apartment and buzzed. No answer. Buzzed again. No answer. I began to realize my fears. Joe was all talk and no Elder. We hung out down there a while but there was no sign of Joe. George was partly crushed and mostly pissed off. At school, Joe gradually earned a reputation for tall tales. His were beginning to rival the lies of Ian Johnson – they even lived on the same street.
We flipped the Asylum tape over and began the walk home. A wasted trip, and Joe dodged me at school the next day. George kept pestering me to arrange a second hookup with Joe, thinking he still had that copy of The Elder that he wanted so badly. I realized Joe was full of shit and told George the sad truth. The record was not there. Joe was telling stories, trying to seem cool to me for having all the Kiss albums. Then he got caught in the lie, after going so far as to arrange a trade and giving me the address. Very un-cool.
George did get a copy of The Elder a few months later, and he still taped me a copy. It was a strange album, after being immersed in Asylum for many months. Then, I definitely preferred Asylum. Asylum was special to me. It was my first “new” Kiss album since getting into the band! I had boarded the Kiss train and I wasn’t getting off!
Directed by Michael Crichton and featuring Gene Simmons
Being in was never enough for Gene Simmons. Dating Cher and Diana Ross gave him a taste of Hollywood stardom. He saw movies as his next mountain to climb. Gene secured an audition with novelist and sometimes director Michael Crichton. Crichton asked Gene to communicate, without saying any words, his desire to kill him. Whatever Gene did worked, and he scored the role without even having to read for it.
Crichton’s next film Runaway was a Tom Selleck sci-fi vehicle and Gene played the villain Dr. Charles Luther. Turning his back on Kiss and leaving Paul Stanley to do all the heavy lifting, Simmons cut his hair and got filming.
Set in the “near future”, Runaway depicts an America in which robots are commonplace. Every household has some, and they have failsafes built in to protect humans. Selleck played Jack Ramsay, a veteran cop now on the “runaway squad”, a quiet department dedicated to capturing errant robots. His latest case is a shocker. A robot has committed the first ‘bot-human homicide in history. What caused it to malfunction and deliberately kill its owners? Ramsay discovers a strange chip inside designed not only to override its safety protocols, but also to order the robot to kill. But who would do such a thing?
Who else? The evil Dr. Charles Luther played by the God of Thunder himself.
Dr. Luther developed new templates that allow robots to identify and assassinate specific humans. They are worth a fortune on the black market, and so Luther killed his partners and went rogue. However his ladyfriend Jackie (Kirstie Alley) doublecrossed him and stole the chips. When Ramsay and his cop partner Karen find Jackie, they narrowly escape Luther who was tracking her. Not only does he have killer robots, but also a huge-ass handgun that has homing bullets that can even turn corners. They try to set up him by having Jackie return the stolen chips, but in one of his best scenes, Gene Simmons stabs her in the back in the middle of a kiss.
Jackie didn’t turn over all the chips. Ramsay still has some. Being the evil genius that he is, Luther hacks the police computers and finds out where Ramsay lives. This leads to a very typical final confrontation, in which Luther kidnaps Ramsay’s son and brings him to an under-construction skyscraper. Of course he would. It’s a standard movie cliche involving elevators and heights. Conveniently, the movie establishes early that Ramsay has a fear of heights. Of course he does!
Luther does have one neat gadget for this long and fairly boring ending. He has robotic spiders that spit acid, programmed to kill anything that comes down from the building. Tom Selleck eventually bests Gene Simmons as you knew he would, but Gene also gets one of the cheesiest movie after-deaths you will ever see. You know those scenes when you think the villain is dead, but he’s not? Gene gets to make a funny face and go “RAAAAHHHHH!” before dropping down dead for real this time.
Michael Crichton was certainly a fine science fiction writer, with titles like Jurassic Park and The Andromeda Strain to his credits. As a movie director, he was less successful. The Great Train Robbery (1979) starring Sean Connery and Donald Sutherland, and based on his own novel, was his best work. Others point to Westworld (1973) as his best work as a director. The main point is, nobody looks to Runaway for movie gold. It’s sluggish, clunky and at times pretty goofy. As a science fiction film, it utilized intelligent concepts and envisioned a future that was very different for the cinema in 1984. Runaway had a story idea. Jack Ramsay was a complicated character, with a cliche but workable back story. It was just poorly executed. One redeeming value is its Jerry Goldsmith score, which was his first all-electronic soundtrack.
While Runaway isn’t considered Michael Crichton’s best film, it might be Gene’s. His next roles were less flattering. He played a transvestite villain in Never Too Young to Die with John Stamos. There was a cameo in the horror cult classic Trick Or Treat. Opposite Rutger Hauer, he played a stereotypical terrorist in Wanted: Dead or Alive. His last film before returning to Kiss full-time was an early George Clooney film called Red Surf. Gene was a friendly weapons dealer.
Meanwhile in Kiss, Paul Stanley had clearly taken over leadership. All the singles were his. Since Gene had short hair, he wore a pretty silly wig on stage with Kiss. None of this helped his image in the eyes of fans. He did earn a good review for Runaway from Roger Ebert, but otherwise the movie was a dud.
Hold onto your scraplets, I have literally a shat-ton of photos from Toronto TFCon 2017!
I’ve never been to TFCon before. Buddy Jason has been trying to get me to go for years. This is the first time the planets aligned and I went with Jay with two goals:
Pick out a gift for myself from my mother-in-law (who is awesome that way).
Pick out something smaller for myself.
Jay picked me up around 7:00 am and we hit the road. We discussed strategies and vendors and I quickly realized that this was going to be epic.
I’ll let the massive photo gallery here speak for itself. For official and third party figures, I have never seen anything like it before.
The goodie bag you get for paying your $35 entrance fee was kind of crap. It had some flavoured water and a Schick razor. The TFCon bag itself will get more use than the Schick.
One of the coolest figures was the Con exclusive from OcularMax. Diaclone Paris Dakar Rally Terraegis is a mouthful, but it’s the yellow truck in the gallery below. Look at the detailed deco. Those aren’t stickers!
They also had prototypes of forthcoming third party figures. One of these was the giant FansToys Omega Supreme (mentioned earlier here). Another was a really sharp looking pair of jets for a new Masterpiece Aerialbots set.
The items I purchased were:
Takara Titans Return Wheelie from the fine folks at TF Source! – $25 Canadian. A real winner.
Transformers Collectors Club Impactor – $120 Canadian. Cheapest I’ve seen.
Third party company FansToys Phoenix – an homage to G1 Skyfire in Masterpiece scale. From The Chosen Prime.
I just found a new annual pilgrimage. Thanks Jay — can’t wait for next year!
Sometimes you see something so absurd you have to take a picture. This is the Zehrs store at Stanley Park Mall in Kitchener. (I used to work there in fact.) At what point do people say, “Gee, there isn’t room for any more carts??” But no….
Mrs LeBrain and I have been married nine years. It is an incredible feeling, to have found the one made for you. I thank God every day. We still frequently talk about the wedding day itself, the most amazing day of my life. The bachelor night before was legendary, but the wedding was perfect.
Well, except a few minor details.
With the benefit of 20/20 hindsight, there is one thing that really bugs me today, and that is our wedding CD. Specifically, one track on that wedding CD.
I personally selected and approved most of the music for the day. I was very proud to work Frank Zappa into the reception music (“Peaches En Regalia”). I also had to make sure I had a Kiss song, so I chose “And Then She Kissed Me” from Love Gun. We focused on Johnny Cash and the Beatles for the ceremony, killing two birds with one stone on “In My Life” for the signing of the registry. As soon as we started sending out the “thank you” cards to all the guests, I compiled and burned dozens of copies of what you might call The Official Soundtrack Album to Our Wedding. I squeezed in everything I could, but Jennifer insisted we include one specific song for her maid of honour, Lara. [Note: Lara is not evil, but she will be portraying the antagonist in an upcoming store called “Seven”. Stay tuned.] I guess when they used to work together in a video store, they would play “My Own Worst Enemy” by Lit a lot. Some customer gave Lara a CD with that song on it and only that song…on repeat. I guess this inside joke meant that “My Own Worst Enemy” was Lara’s entrance music at the reception. And I guess that justified it being on the soundtrack CD. That is, by far, my biggest wedding regret. It never should have been on the soundtrack CD. It’s the only song I absolutely have to skip every time. It’s shit. Sorry Lara, but your tribute song sucks!
Jen has her own decision that she would go back and change if she could. We had the proverbial “bridesmaid from hell”. Bridesmaidzilla, or ‘Zilla for short, was drama from start to finish. Without getting into too much detail, ‘Zilla was at the bottom of the bridesmaid totem pole but tried to manipulate certain things to be about her. The highlight of these efforts was what we call the “caesar salad saga”.
It’s quite simple, really! Jennifer has a seafood allergy, and any decent caesar salad dressing has anchovy paste in it. We never take any chances, so we requested a regular garden salad for the dinner reception. No big deal, right? It’s a salad, but most importantly, it’s Jennifer’s wedding. You wouldn’t believe how this salad became a bone of contention between them! ‘Zilla looked up recipes for vegan versions online. The salad was repeatedly brought up, but Jen had never really had caesar salad before due to her allergy. Why would she suddenly want one for her wedding? Bottom line, Jen chose the salad she wanted. And for the record, since that time, she has tried vegan caesar salad and likes it. But why would she gamble on something like that for her wedding night? No, pick the salad you want. Bottom line, end of discussion.
Drama continued right up to the morning of the wedding day. As maid of honour, Lara was in charge of the bridesmaids and all communication was to go through her to relieve the pressure from Jen. Lara would take care of any minor details so Jen would not have to be bothered. Well, apparently a bra was needed on the wedding day, and so I received a 7:00 am phone call about it. ‘Zilla didn’t want to call Lara because they were not getting along, at all, so they thought it would a good idea to call the groom on his wedding day, about a goddamn bra. They actually called me to ask where you can get a bra on a holiday weekend. Are you kidding me?
They must have called Lara and gotten it sorted because they got the bra situation taken care of without the groom having to intervene. The wedding went off perfectly and the reception was even better. I did my best to curate some cool music, and as a special treat, my sister Kathryn performed at the reception. It was a jazz quartet — bass, bass clarinet, drums, guitar. The crowning moment of their performance was a jazzy rendition of the “Cantina Theme” from Star Wars. My sister had to order the sheet music which wasn’t cheap. Her band’s performance that night was her wedding gift to us, and that reminds me that I do have one more regret. That is, I wish I had filmed it.
After dinner, after the cake was served, and I was taking a rest between songs (I was a dancing fiend) I sat at ‘Zilla’s table for a bit to chat. Jen’s friend Gordie, who is hilarious by the way, and married to one of the good bridesmaids, was also sitting with a few others at the table. Knowing full well the drama that had gone down, Gordie mischievously commented, “That was a great wedding, Mike. Everything was perfect and I am so happy for you and Jen. The cake was great…the only thing I would change is the salad, if it was caesar it would have been perfect.” Then the husband of ‘Zilla said, “We even gave them the recipe to make it…”
The last bit of ‘Zilla drama happened later in the evening as they were leaving. The DJ played one of the special songs I picked, which was “Sweet Caroline” by Neil Diamond. My mom, sister, aunt and new wife started dancing to it and I shouted “It’s the Ladano girls dance!” My sister, who was right drunk at that stage, yelled out, “LADANO GIRLS, YAAAY!” They joined with me in a circle and we danced away to Neil, singing along, having a blast, laughing. ‘Zilla was, apparently, standing nearby waiting to say goodbye. I felt a tap on my shoulder and she very bitchily said “BYE!” while making a talkie-talkie motion with her hand. Yeah, bye!
Jen and I will soon be celebrating our anniversary again, and we’ll probably play that wedding soundtrack CD and relive the good memories. And I’ve convinced her to skip Lit from now on. Small victories are still victories.
It’s true: By all measurements, Hero, Hero is an exploitive compilation of Judas Priest material. Their first record label, Gull, was prone to do this. However this is no typical “hits” set; this one is of interest to collectors and die hard fans.
Hero, Hero (named for a lyric from the song “Dying to Meet You”) was originally released in 1981 to take advantage of Priest’s rising star. The original two releases on Gull records, Rocka Rolla and Sad Wings Of Destiny, had been exploited previously in a compilation called The Best Of Judas Priest, which was a single record. Hero, Hero was a double record which included all of Rocka Rolla and most of Sad Wings, as well as the crucial Joan Baez cover, “Diamonds and Rust”, in an alternate take (previously heard on Best Of).
So, if you have all that material already, why is this album required at all? Cover art aside, of course. That cover (a pre-existing painting) is brilliant. There is also a Kiss bootleg called Barbarize with the same cover.
The reason is revealed in the liner notes. All of Rocka Rolla had been remixed for this release. Why is unknown, as that record sounded just fine for what it is. The remixes are, in general, not even all that different. The major changes are made during “Cheater”, the “Winter” suite, and “Rocka Rolla” itself, during which major portions of the songs are noticeably shifted around. “Rocka Rolla” has its verses rearranged, and there’s a burst of harmonica in “Cheater” where there never was before.
The remix done to Rocka Rolla doesn’t really add or subtract anything from the album, which makes it that much harder to understand why it was done. Why Gull records spent the money to remix these tracks is unknown, and the names of the engineers involved are a mystery. But there it is: Rocka Rolla remixed in its entirety but not in order, here on the Hero, Hero album. Because they’re less familiar to the ear, they sound fresh, but in many cases you’d struggle to point out differences. A little reverb here, a little echo there.
Highlights including a bluesy “Cheater” and the flanged chug of “Diamonds and Rust”. The six tracks from Sad Wings of Destiny are brilliant. “Dreamer Deceiver” and “Deceiver” are used to open this CD, but that is not the original running order. Normally the album begins with “Prelude” and “Tyrant”, also from Sad Wings. The original Canadian cassette version on Attic maintained the original running order with “Prelude” at the start. Essentially, the Connoisseur Collection CD has side one and side two flipped.
Fair warning to CD buyers: There are some shoddy reissues of this album that don’t have the remixed tracks. Transluxe is one such version. To make your life easier you might just want to look for an original 1981 LP. The pictured CD from Connoisseur Collection (1995) does have the remixes, so you’re good to go if you spot one.
– Animalize Live Uncensored(from 4 CD set Radio Waves 1974-1988) (2015 American Icons broadcast release)
The Animalize tour was the most successful that Kiss had done since the original lineup. It was an exciting stage show including a finale with the band playing on a levitating platform over the stage. It was logical to film the Detroit concert, returning to the Cobo Hall where much of Kiss Alive! was forged in 1975. It had been a long time since Kiss released anything live. The sequel album Alive II came in 1977, and then Kiss underwent radical upheaval and change, as we have documented through this series. In the 1970s there was a pattern: Three studio albums and then a live album. Animalize was the sixth studio album since Alive IIwith no Alive III on the horizon.
Fans had their own theories as to why Alive III never materialized when due, but it likely has a lot to do with the lineup changes, shifts in direction, and fading fortunes. These events all struck right around the time when the third live album would have been appropriate, but as Kiss replaced members and took off the makeup, they had to re-establish themselves as a valid, current entity not dependant on past glories.
The Animalize Cobo Hall concert that was filmed was released in 1985 as the home video, Animalize Live Uncensored. For an entire generation of Kiss fans, Animalize Live Uncensored was our own Alive III. You could break down KISStory up to this point into three distinct eras as seen in the chart below. Kiss had a whole new generation of fans, the MTV generation, who associated the makeup with ancient history. We didn’t have our own Kiss Alive. Without one, we made Animalize Live Uncensored into our unofficial Alive III.
Kiss were introducing yet another guitar player to the fans, but Bruce Kulick was fitting in great. Animalize Live Uncensored gave the fans at home a chance to check out his interpretations of new and old Kiss classics. He gave the Mark St. John tracks a smoother soloing style with more emphasis on hooky licks. The threw on tons of the flash that was in vogue at the time, but he didn’t showboat. He did exactly what the bosses (Paul and Gene) wanted, and he did it well enough to win over fans and keep the gig.
The Kiss of the 80s were way, way faster than the Kiss of the 70s. Eric Carr could play things that Peter Criss couldn’t, and speed was in fashion. Even old songs like “Cold Gin” and “Detroit Rock City” were sped up and 80s-ized. The fast stuff from their 80s albums, like “Fits Like a Glove” and “Young and Wasted” are done up even faster. Lots of songs by the original band such as “Shout it Out Loud”, “Christine Sixteen”, “Firehouse”, “Strutter” and many more were dropped in favour of new ones. “Under the Gun”, “Thrills in the Night” and “Heaven’s on Fire” were the newest, while plenty of songs from Lick it Up and Creatures were also retained. Using the chart above for reference, only five Kiss songs from the first two eras combined were included. The third era, never before represented in live form, gets ten tracks. The rest of the space is taken up by solos: Paul Stanley (guitar), Gene Simmons (bass) and Eric Carr (drums). There is no Bruce Kulick solo. As you have probably surmised, a Paul Stanley feature solo is as basic as they get, with Gene’s only a modicum more memorable. Eric Carr’s is fun and flashy — more so on video.
One big highlight of Animalize Live Uncensored is Eric Carr’s lead vocal debut on a Kiss release. The Fox was given “Young and Wasted” from Lick It Up to sing, in addition to Peter Criss’ part in “Black Diamond”. And so Kiss fans began a long and painful wait to hear him sing something on a Kiss studio album.
For dyed in the wool Kiss fans, Animalize Live Uncensored is universally remembered for mainly one thing: that is Paul Stanley’s epic song introductions. “Love Gun” is the most legendary, a tale of Paul “partying” too much and having to go to the doctor to get himself checked out. The nurse decides to “start this examination just a little bit early” and asks Paul to remove his pants…where she discovers his (wait for it) “LOVE GUN”! There are so many great Paul intros on this video that it’s worth checking out for them alone. Full visuals help.
But what about a CD release, for that generation of fans for whom this is their Alive III? There are options. None are perfect. In fact, there isn’t even a DVD version. There are only semi-official looking bootlegs and the old original VHS. For CDs, you must go with a radio broadcast release, and none are perfect. Single disc versions are obviously trimmed for time and usually have 15 tracks including a couple solos. There is also a two disc broadcast from WLLZ in Detroit which has all 18 songs and all the solos too. This is available on a quadruple disc set called Radio Waves 1974-1988, released in 2015.* It even has intros and raps not included on the original Animalize Live VHS release! “Black Diamond” has a much longer introduction and much of the talking isn’t available elsewhere. During the encores, they mess around with the traditional “Oh Susannah”. The other intros and raps, the classic ones, are edited or missing completely! You just can’t win.
Only one track from this concert has been officially released on LP and CD: “Heaven’s On Fire”, which was Kiss’ contribution to Ronnie James Dio’s Hear N’ Aid – Stars album in 1986. Kiss completists will want to make sure they have that one.
One could meticulously paste in all of Paul Stanley’s missing and edited stage raps, and add them to your tracklist. It would be bloody time consuming. You’d have to listen to your compiled creation a few times to justify the time spent putting it together. But it could be done. It really is a shame that this broadcast CD is a few intros shy of complete. The sound is iffy at times too, with a lot of static where there shouldn’t be. But for the time being, it’s the best we got.
GETTING MORE TALE #576: “Why’d You Lick My Pee-noose?” The Sausagefest 2017 Countdown
By the time it was all over I fairly surmised that, personally speaking, Sausagefest 2017 (the 16th annual) was the best one yet.
There are many reasons for this. One happened by pure change.
The weather reports for the weekend were changing daily. I contacted Uncle Meat on Wednesday to tell him they were calling for rain all weekend. He responded, “No they’re not, are you new?” But they were! And the next day, the forecasts had changed again.
By our Friday departure the skies were partly cloudy, but we’ve seen worse. After we arrived and set up our tents it started pouring for a short while. The old fire pit was flooded. When the rain stopped the decision was made to move the location for the Countdown, uphill on dry land. This was the first time the actual location had ever been changed after 15 years down by the river. It turned out that this was the best possible decision. The new location was wide open, more conductive to mingling and conversation, and as you have seen, provided some beautiful photographs. The new location will be permanent from now on.
I felt one of the reasons things went so well for me was good preparation, but that may not be the case. Uncle Meat also had a great time, and was so ill-prepared that he only arranged a tent to sleep in when we were halfway there! Way to be ready, Uncle Meat!
The vibe was right from the get-go and the Countdown began on time.
Highlights from the first night included some lesser-heard tracks:
Queen – “We Will Rock You” – the “fast” version
Deep Purple – “Vavoom: Ted the Mechanic”
Kiss – “Shock Me” – live version from Alive II with solo
The Beatles – “Helter Skelter” – mono version
Queen – “My Fairie King”
Mercyful Fate – “Into the Coven”
There were lots of cool tunes this year: 87 in total including tributes (more on those later). “Indians” by Anthrax was a perfectly appropriate song this year too, since I pulled a large chunk of my own recorded bits from the Brocket 99 CD, a spoof of reservation radio stations. (I voted for “Indians” as #22 on my list.)
And plenty more! You can check out the Countdown list yourself. It was also a treat hearing Ray Charles’ “Mess Around”, which you probably know from John Candy in Planes Trains and Automobiles. Rainbow’s “Light in the Black” was a personal favourite for my air guitar workout.
The comedy sketches were on-point, and I had tears streaming down my face laughing so hard. The Lord of Lamb, Zach Britton, wrote a sketch regarding my insistence that a Bacon Big Mac is not the same thing as a Big Mac. Bacon is not in the Big Mac song, therefore a Bacon Big Mac is not the same thing. Britton rebutted me successfully, and hilariously. “Loosey Goosey” is now a catch-phrase. As a peace offering, he gifted me a bottle of Big Mac sauce.
The first night it rained, but it mattered not as we huddled in our waterproof tents. We were up by the crack of 10:00 to grab breakfast at the Spatula – not the “Flying” Spatula anymore, please note. They have officially changed the name of the place, but still offer the “Flesherton Fill-up” for breakfast. Not as large, nor as good as it was in the past. On the way up, Uncle Meat yelled “Loosey Goosey!” at anyone we passed on the road.
You have to give credit to our Spatula server Heather. I sat with Max “I’m kind of a big deal” the Axe, and I got to witness him working his magic on Heather the server. He promised her the last CD copy in existence of one of his albums. What a deal! Max told me I had a good singing voice. Was he hitting on me, too? Wayne also had a golden line at the store Top of the Rock, with the girl who was distributing bags of ice. “Are you the ice lady? Ice to meet you!”
There was a new exciting twist this year at the 16th Sausagefest. Submitting lists (aka “paying your rock and roll taxes”) has long been a problem. Some people are always prompt. Those people were rewarded with an extra song, a “tribute” this year. Mine was The Police – “Next to You”. That was a blast for air guitar. You can see by the list at bottom, only eight people got tributes. That means only eight people got their lists in on time without nagging! Due to the amount of time it takes to compile the votes and actually record the Countdown, it was decided that this time, you must vote for 2018’s songs by the end of the weekend. And so Saturday afternoon was spent socially compiling lists. It was weird seeing a bunch of guys at Sausagefest with clipboards and pens, furiously writing, colluding and discussing. It was also successful. All lists are in. There will be a whole year to compile and record for 2018!
The second evening had more great rock. Ghost, Dunsmuir, The Sword, Iron Maiden, CCR, Floyd, Purple, Tenacious D, Sabbath and Zeppelin…all building up to the top ten. Not only building up to the top ten, but also setting up the very first Sausagefest live theater….
There were plenty of fake-out tracks in the top ten, as they pretended they couldn’t read the songs written on Uncle Meat’s upper thigh. Sabbath, Rush and Metallica were played eventually. After the #2 track “The Immigrant Song” (Zeppelin), there was an announcement made.
Tom, father of four, the co-founder, the Captain himself, wanted to take a step back. Recording the Countdown was no longer possible for him, due to family demands at home. This made sense, since the guy does have four rugrats and was absent from some of the top ten due to a supposed argument with his wife about it. They saved the announcement for the #1 spot. Only one person was told in advance, and that was the immortal Lord of Lamb himself, Zach Britton. As the song lyrics state, “He is the reason we still do this shit.” He was given a 20 minute heads-up to collect his emotions.
As the announcement was made, they said there would be no #1 song this year. They’d play it first in 2018. Instead, they played the traditional “Happy Trails” by Van Halen as Tom clinked glasses and shook hands with attendees. And then Zach got up to make a speech. He was obviously still shocked and upset by this sad turn of events.
His speech began as expected: melodramatic, sad, and stirring…until it was interrupted.
There was a 4 minute 30 second gap built into the Countdown…specifically timed for Zach to start his speech but not finish. All part of the pre-planned “live theater”. Then….
“ZACH BRITTON!” boomed the speakers.
Suddenly the Countdown recording continued, as a pre-recorded Bucky urged Zach to shut the fuck up and sit back down because he had just been pranked! Tom wasn’t retiring. Zach didn’t have a clue, nor did any of the rest of us! We all bought it, hook line and sinker, even though Tom has 12 months to record for 2018. It seemed so believable especially with that supposed “argument” with his wife built into the recordings. So I raised my goblet of Romulan Ale to Zach “the Lord of Lamb” Britton for being a great sport and a diamond geezer! The “live theater”, the first ever attempted at Sausagefest, was a tremendous success. As Uncle Meat said afterwards, “They will never ever trust us again.” It easily could have gone sideways, if Zach didn’t stand up to make his speech. They were counting on him and he fell right into it. Brilliant live theater!
The actual #1 song, played after the live theater, was “Cygnus X-1” by Rush, a fantastic song on which to close.
The following morning, we packed up to go home. As per usual, Uncle Meat kept singing and repeating one sentence. This year, it was a ditty called “Why’d You Lick My Penis (Rectum)”.*
“Why’d you lick my pee-noose…why’d you lick my pee-noose, rectum…” Over and over again. You can hear this on the Sausagefest video.
We made our way home, but for many of the guys, it was time to rock again. Five Alarm Funk played a free show in London on Sunday night, and a few tired ‘Festers trekked out to party some more. Totally fitting, since Five Alarm Funk had three songs on this year’s Countdown.
What a Sausagefest! Best one ever? Until next year, maybe….
Re-Review series)
was never enough for Gene Simmons. Dating Cher and Diana Ross gave him a taste of Hollywood stardom. He saw movies as his next mountain to climb. Gene secured an audition with novelist and sometimes director Michael Crichton. Crichton asked Gene to communicate, without saying any words, his desire to kill him. Whatever Gene did worked, and he scored the role without even having to read for it.
mikeladano.com 