RECORD STORE TALES Part 278: The Return of Dan Dan the Box Set Man
Astute LeBrain readers may recall that one of my customers, Dan aka “Box Set Man”, always had cool stuff in his collection. It was he that gave me an original Ritchie Blackmore photo from a private collection in Part 168: The Constipated Ritchie Blackmore. In January 2005 he appeared at my door once again to sell me some goodies. While I did not record everything Dan sold to me that day, I did take note of the five that I was going to add to my personal collection!
Please excuse me if I sounded a little over excited. I always tried to journal honestly!
Date: 2005/01/11 21:43
WOW.
HOLY SHIT.
Oh God oh God oh God!
YOU WILL NOT BELIEVE THE AMAZING ITEMS THAT CAME INTO WORK TODAY. I am going to have an expensive January. I am going to MISS this part of my job. [I had applied to several jobs.]
Here’s the complete list of cool shit that I need to buy:
1. DVD – Harold & Kumar. We got in two used copies already! [It was only released the week before, on Jan 4.]
2. CDs – Deep Purple 25th Annivesary box set–JAPANESE IMPORT BABY! Not much on there that I “need” but it does have all three edits of “Burn”, in fact it looks to have every single edit from every 7″. Also has two mono mixes. Must have.
3. CD – Jethro Tull – Bursting Out-Live (remastered)
4. CD – Jethro Tull – Jethro Tull Christmas Album
5. CD – Queen – On Fire: Live At The Hollywood Bowl
One cool thing is that I still have all five of these items, all still in the same condition that I found them in! Thanks Dan, wherever you may be….
RECORD STORE TALES Part 277.5: Klassik Kwote – The Dandy Douche Strikes Back
I’m a pretty big Led Zeppelin fan, having bought all their albums more than once (and at least once more) over the years. When this Robert Plant CD came out in November 2003, it was high on my radar. I didn’t own any Plant solo albums (beyond The Honeydrippers), but wanted something of his in my collection. This compilation of hits and rarities was perfect for my needs.
I was listening to it in the store one afternoon when Dandy sauntered in. Always eager to criticize my musical selections on any given day, he had this to say about Robert Plant’s Sixty Six to Timbuktu:
“I was talking to my dad about why Led Zeppelin sucked,”he said. “Now I know. It’s not Led Zeppelin that sucked, it was just Robert Plant all along.”
It’s the regular feature where I reveal weird search terms that somehow led people here. These are the WTF Search Terms!
WTF Search Terms XVIII: A Mixture of Elements edition
Welcome back to WTF Search Terms. Today, instead of presenting search terms of a similar theme like I normally do, I thought I’d just give you a mixture of different basic elemental varieties that I get every day at mikeladano.com! A little bit of normal, a little bit of sex, and a little bit of disgusting. (For the last installment, Whole Lotta WTF edition, click here.)
10.who was the topless girl on kiss: exposed
There was more than one, wasn’t there?
9. worlds best pictures
I’m flattered that Google led somebody here to find the world’s best pictures, but I don’t know why.
8.dwarfs extrem
Whatever floats your boat man…
7.sexgorilla and girls
…Except that, that sounds really gross.
6.sreet bob special edition
A true WTF, this one has me baffled as to what they’re looking for.
5. got his pierced
Can you be more specific?
4. do people usually get both tragus pierced
How the fuck should I know?
3.dad number like scary carrie
Once again I have no idea what this guy’s looking for.
Who would have thought that little band from Quebec, VoiVod, could have survived so much adversity. The death of Denis “Piggy” D’Amour (guitar) in 2005 should have been the end, but yet the band has soldiered on with two albums utilizing his guitar parts recorded just before his death. In addition, unbelievably, the band has even continued on with returned original bassist Blacky (Jean-Yves Thériault) and new guy Chewy (Dan Mongrain) on guitar!
For those who don’t know, shortly before Piggy died of cancer, he had been working hard at recording every idea he had onto a hard drive. He explained to the band, that if they went into his PC they would find hours of meticulously recorded music and detailed instructions on how to use it. From there, Away (drummer Michel Langevin), Snake (singer Denis Belanger) and Jasonic (bassist Jason Newstead, ex-Metallica) buckled down and created the surprisingly awesome Katorz. Incredibly there was still enough music left to create one more album, 2009’s Infini. The fact that both albums are excellent, coherant pieces that add to the already rich VoiVod body of work is nothing short of astounding. It is a tribute to Piggy as an artist and as a person.
What VoiVod have created here is yet another astounding progressive metal headbanging experience. Loads of droning Piggy chords, odd Piggy solos, insane time changes, and cool lyrics abound. Snake’s lyrics are both thought provoking and cool sounding through a Francophone lens. Even the song titles alone evoke multiple images.
I’m pleased that the band has continued on with Blackie and Chewy. Their last album, Target Earth was also challenging and excellent. But that’s another review. For now I am blown away and grateful that the band have created two monstrously great albums in a row after the death of the man who seemingly defined their sound. As a metal fan, and as a fellow Canadian, I am proud of our metal heritage. I feel Piggy is a huge part of that heritage (the CD itself has Maple Leafs and Fleurs-de-lis emblazoned upon it), and I hope his music continues to live on in the new VoiVod.
Highlights:
“God Phones,” “Destroy After Reading,” “In Orbit,” and “Earthache”. I love the thunderous chorus in “Earthache”: “Blah, blah blah, is that all you say?”
Infini is not quite the album that Katorz was, it’s more challenging and abrasive, but it’s definitely one to be proud of. Very few bands could produce an album of this complexity and intensity.
When Piggy (Denis D’Amour) passed away of colon cancer in 2005, I thought it spelled the end of VoiVod. It was such a sudden, unforeseen tragedy. He was only diagnosed that year; the cancer had spread so rapidly that any operation was deemed impossible. However, Piggy loved VoiVod and he loved music. Knowing his end was near, he recorded hours of new music with his guitar onto a computer. Before passing he instructed the band on how to access the music he’d left them, and they realized the VoiVod dream was not dead. Away (Michel Langevin), Snake (Denis Belanger) and Jasonic (ex-Metallica bassist Jason Newsted) painstakingly went through his final recordings and realized there was an album there. (In fact there were two albums there, but that’s another story.)
Katorz (“fourteen”, their 14th release) was assembled from these parts. It is a loving tribute to the man who defined the VoiVod sound, and it is a gift to us, the fans. As Canadians, we should be very proud of VoiVod. They never made it big like Rush, although Rush certainly took them under their collective wings on the Presto tour. Their sound is anything but commercial — it’s a stunning, disorienting array of unusual droning chords, complex themes and precision drumming. The band have also inserted some of Piggy’s beautiful final acoustic passages in between songs as transistions, all of which are haunting statements about his impending death. Piggy was not known for his acoustic work, until now, which makes it that much more powerful. (The band has suggested in the past that there may be an entire Piggy acoustic album to come.)
Through all the hardship, VoiVod have only perfected their art of songwriting. The songs on Katorz are among the best of the VoiVod back catalogue. They have come far from their thrash metal n’ studs roots. From the band that once did a thrash version of the “Batman” theme, their music is still heavy. The complexity that they gradually began integrating in the mid-80’s is tied together with more melody and groove. Certainly, you can find few drummers as talented as Away, and his drumming here is astounding. Away jumps from time change to time change effortlessly.
The always nasal whine of Snake will not appeal to all, but it is part of the VoiVod sound and identity, and his lyrics are as jittery and potent as ever. To me it’s like Megadeth. I can’t handle a lot of Mustaine’s singing in a day, but in small doses it’s quite palatable.
Perhaps the most impressive thing about Katorz is that you cannot tell that anything is wrong with Piggy or the band. His playing is as unique as ever, pushing the boundaries as he always has. Check out the noise solo on “Mr. Clean” and you’ll see that Piggy was stretching out to the very end. Song-wise, Katorz is seamless. It sounds as if the band wrote and recorded it together, as they always have. There is a certain coldness to Katorz, but that’s VoiVod.
Katorz is thinking-man’s metal. It is over-caffeinated, constantly pushing the extremes (X-Streams?) and restless. More importantly, it is a tribute to one of the great guitarists that made Canada proud. Piggy was great not because of his speed or dexterity, but because of his sonic uniqueness. Piggy’s sound was like no other, droning and headache-inducing, just like VoiVod’s music. Our country is a sadder place without him.
Highlights:
The whole album, but especially “The Getaway”, “Odds & Frauds” and “The X-Stream”.
Early September. Our stores were flooded with students new and returning. This is an exciting time for many. For the students, it’s another exciting year at one of our local colleges or universities. For me, it was meeting and hopefully keeping new customers. Sometimes though, there were some customers that were just never meant to be.
I remember ringing in one used CD for a customer. He was a young guy, a new student in town. If you’ve ever been a young student (Lord knows I once was) sometimes you run into those that “know it all”. I was one of those, too. This guy was one as well.
I rang in his CD sale.
“That comes to $13.79 please,” I said as the computer calculated the Provincial Sales Tax and the Goods & Services Tax. Some, such as people with native status cards, are exempt from PST. Most were not and had to pay the full (then) 15% tax. Yeah, it’s a lot. We Canadians pay a lot of sales tax.
“Is there tax on this?” the customer asked.
“Yeah unfortunately,” I responded.
“That’s wrong,” he answered abruptly.
Not understanding his full meaning I responded sympathetically, “Yeah, I know, but what can you do. The government’s going to take their part.”
“No, I mean that’s wrong, that’s not correct. You can’t charge tax on a used CD.”
Hooboy. I don’t know where this guy came from, but he’d obviously never bought a used CD before. I tried to explain, as a line began to form behind him.
“We have to charge tax on a used CD, because the government’s going to collect it from us whether we want it or not,” I said. “We’ve been selling used CDs in this province for over five years now, and reporting it to Revenue Canada. Believe me, if we didn’t they’d be in here pretty quick with a nice audit.”
He appeared stubbornly stumped. Not understanding the concept of sales tax applied to the end-user, he repeated “That’s not right. A used CD isn’t the same as a used car. You can’t charge sales tax on a used CD.”
At this point I didn’t have much else left to add. “Well, you can certainly check this out for yourself, but every used CD store here in town charges PST and GST on every used CD they sell.” I fibbed slightly; there’s a store in uptown Waterloo called the Orange Monkey that seemed semi-legit at best. They had no cash register, no debit machine, and charged no tax on anything in their store. I don’t know how they did it. Leaving them out of the equation, I continued. “Every used CD store I’ve been to in this province has charged me sales tax on every CD.”
“This is really irregular,” he said frustratingly as he finally paid for his CD.
It might be irregular, but all used CD stores in this province still charge sales tax on used goods. That’s a fact Jack!
The Icon series of compilations is mostly shit. One of the stinkiest of the shit is Nirvana’s installment of Icon. Where’s “Sliver”? There’s not one song here from Bleach. “About A Girl” is from the Unplugged CD and “You Know You’re Right” was a “new” song added to Nirvana’s first and only official greatest hits set, Nirvana. In fact, every song here can be found on Nirvana.
Rather than bitch bitch bitch about how shitty this CD is, and how pissed Kurt would be to have his music released in configurations that nobody in the band authorized, I’d rather just rate it and change the subject. Enjoy the following essay.
1/5 sharts
A Brief History of Kitchener, Ontario by Michael Ladano
Kitchener, a city of 220,000 in southern Ontario, was settled around the year 1800 on lands by the Grand River. The Crown gifted this land to the Six Nations, who sold it. It was settled by loyalist German Mennonites from Pennsylvania, to escape religious persecution in the United States. The Mennonites who settled here included families such as the Schneiders, Webers, and Ebys whose names can be found on streets and buildings all over town today. They named the settlement Sand Hills, within the Township of Waterloo.
Land was converted to farms, and the Grand River enabled an early sawmill industry. Streets such as the present day King Street were built, as were landmarks such as the Heuther Brewery, in the early 1800’s. The town grew with waves of German immigrants, and in 1833 Sand Hills was renamed Berlin.
In 1856, Berlin was connected to railways, and industry grew. In 1912, Berlin was declared a city. During the First World War, anti-German sentiment in 1916 caused the town to be renamed Kitchener, after Lord Kitchener, a British war hero. His famous face adorned many British recruitment posters. The bust of Kaiser Wilhelm was thrown into Victoria Lake.
Although some still wish to rename the city Berlin, Kitchener today boasts strong industry, easy access to excellent post-secondary education, and a huge annual Oktoberfest honoring its German heritage. It is known for its OHL hockey team the Rangers, and for spawning many NHL athletes. It is also known as the birthplace of William Lyon McKenzie King, Canada’s longest-serving Prime Minister and possibly the only one who regularly sought advice from a crystal ball.
Kitchener is also known for its music. The annual Blues Festival is always popular. Kitchener has also spawned such international musical artists as Rob Szabo, Helix and Kathryn Ladano, and world famous writers like Michael Ladano.
Come to Kitchener (only 100 km west of Toronto) in the summer to enjoy boating, hiking, biking, music festivals, and much more, including a large population of Miniature Schnauzers. Don’t bother coming in the winter.
Slippery When Wet sold 28 million copies and went to #1 in over half a dozen countries, including Canada. The easy way to follow that might have been creating a carbon copy album, a sequel to follow it. Bravely, Bon Jovi chose not to do that. Their ambition was running high. The next album (tentatively titled Sons of Beaches after a line in the song “99 In the Shade”), was intended to be a double. The record company ixnay’d that due to the cost, but Bon Jovi had written and recorded plenty of good songs. The proof of this is that some of the best, including the B-side “Love Is War”, didn’t make the final single disc album.
New Jersey is not a carbon copy of Slippery nor any other Bon Jovi record. It’s more raw, more rock and roll, with bluesy elements added. There are dueling solos, long song structures, live jams and even a song in mono! Bon Jovi’s three main musicians (Richie Sambora, David Bryan, Tico Torres) performed and recorded some of their best playing on this album. Indeed, if New Jersey had come out under a different band name I don’t think many people would have recognized it as Bon Jovi. I think it remains one of their highest achievements, if not the very highest. Clocking in at almost an hour, it was a long varied album even if it wasn’t a double.
Slippery began with a long, ominous opening and New Jersey maintained that. “Lay Your Hands On Me” begins with drums and chants, but soon morphs into a top-ten (US) soul-rock single. The guitar is muscular and song is about as heavy as Bon Jovi get. “Bad Medicine” follows; the first single and one of the more pop-rock oriented songs. On the last album, Jon claimed he had a “Social Disease”, this time he needs a shot of “Bad Medicine”. I don’t think “Bad Medicine” is one of their best songs (I felt it was “just another Bon Jovi song” back then) but it sure had legs. It’s still a concert highlight today. I do prefer the album version to the single version with its playful, “Wait a minute, wait a minute, I’m not done!” false ending.
“Born To Be My Baby” was written acoustically and intended to be “the hit”. I think it’s just fine electrically, which is how it was recorded. I got this one as a single in a cardboard sleeve with post cards (see below), and I prefer it to “Bad Medicine” by a fair deal. The “na na na, na na na” vocal part is catchy as hell and the song rocks hard enough for the dudes. The ballad and single “Living In Sin” follows. It too was a huge hit, helped by a black & white video with some blonde-haired male model that looked like Mike Tramp, for the ladies.
Side one’s closer was the heartfelt epic “Blood On Blood”, which was not a single, but still gets played live today. Once again, Jon has managed to capture the essence of his young adulthood, growing up in Sayreville, New Jersey. Jon, “Danny” and “Bobby” are three friends who went through everything together. But with the years and miles between them, Jon lets them know that if he got that call, he’d be right by their sides. Lyrically, it’s this kind of thing that was Jon’s bread and butter, and it also resulted in a great song musically. “Blood On Blood” is one of the band’s proudest achievements.
If “Blood On Blood” was not enough musicality for ya, then “Homebound Train” is Bon Jovi at their most impressive. A 5-minute blues-rock workout, “Homebound Train” is one of those tracks that laymen just won’t believe is Bon Jovi. The band laid down some harmonica and guitar solos backed by some serious groove, something not often associated with Bon Jovi. “Homebound Train” would have to be among the band’s best tracks, and it serves to open a killer side of vinyl.
“Wild Is the Wind” might be considered a ballad, I think it’s more an anthem. If you can’t stop singing along to it, congratulations, you have a pulse! The chorus is brain-explodingly good. “Ride Cowboy Ride” follows, which is a brief instrumental in mono. Although it’s intentionally just an intro to the next song, on its own it’s an enjoyable listen – in fact it made my own mix tapes on its own a few times. “Ride Cowboy Ride” serves to introduce another cowboy anthem, “Stick To Your Guns”. The title reflects the positive affirmations of the lyrics, but this is just another standout song. Any one of these songs could have been singles.
A massive single, “I’ll Be There For You”, slows the side down a bit by being so soft. I’m sure there are those out there who don’t hate this song. Musically it’s fine, but the lyrics…I just can’t handle the lyrics. “When you breathe, I wanna be the air for you.” What does that even mean?
“99 In the Shade” contains the lyric that almost named the album: “I see those Sons of Beaches out there living it up, in the surf and the sand, yeah that life ain’t so tough.” This would be the weakest song on the album. It’s a standard Bon Jovi boogie, nothing wrong with it, but it pales compared to the rest of the songs on the record. Having said that if it were on Bon Jovi’s latest, it would be one of the best songs…
A personal favourite is last: “Love For Sale”, recorded live “during one hell of a party”. This drunken jam is among the most magical musical moments on any Bon Jovi album. Consider that it was the 1980’s, and the band just came off the ultra-sleek Slippery When Wet. They threw down a drunken, smoking acoustic blues jam to close the album? Yeah, man – cool! I’m down. It’s hilarious and fun, not to mention Richie just smokes on that six-string. Tico’s on the brushes and Jon sounds blasted.
And that’s New Jersey, an album the band had to be proud of. It went #1 all over the place, and multi-platinum in the US. It’s a curious mix of rootsy hard rock quality, and pop melody. It’s certainly among the best examples of such a mixture.
4.5/5 stars
BONUS GALLERY! “Born To Be My Baby” 45 rpm single!
I believe this baby was about $2.99 at Zellers in 1988. It came with postcards which I obviously kept.
RECORD STORE TALES Part 276: Character Study – HH and Rasputin
HH (aka “Hobbit”) and Rasputin were regulars. They came to T-Rev’s store first, always selling, never buying. HH was known for her outrageous makeup. Usually the lipstick started somewhere below the nose and went down to the chin. Trevor used to say, “She looks like that woman from David Lee Roth’s ‘Just A Gigolo’ video! Remember her?”
“DAVID! DAVID! MY KIDS WILL DEFINITELY KILL ME IF YOU DON’T SIGN THESE PICTURES FOR THEM!”
That’s kind of how she looked. Very close. In the summer, HH wore these short skirts that were just way too little clothing. T-Rev had to deal with her more often than I did. I don’t know how he didn’t claw his own eyes out. T-Rev tells me that once, HH pulled up to his store riding a little banana seat bike, wearing that short skirt. He remembers her so clearly. “Yeah! The ‘hobbit’, the ripped nylons and the short skirt with her ass hanging out…yuck. She looked like she had a Botox stroke in her face!” he says.
Rasputin, unsurprisingly, looked a lot like Grigori Rasputin, the famous “mad monk” of Russian history. All he lacked was the long hair. His long trench coat even remotely resembled Rasputin’s long monk robes. T-Rev nicknamed him Rasputin, or Razzy for short. He had a lazy eye.
They would come in, selling crappy scratched used CDs. HH would often say she was selling them for her son. That meant she had procreated, a scary thought in itself. She never specifically identified Razzy as the father, but that certainly could have been the case. Razzy never spoke. When we would make an offer on the CDs, HH would turn to Razzy. Razzy would either nod yes, or shake his head no. Then they’d try to haggle. Their CDs were rarely worth haggling over. But haggle they did. According to Trevor, “I remember her always haggling for a better price out of me…like ‘this CD is really popular right now with the kids’. Fuck you!”
Those summers of HH and Razzy are long gone, now. I wonder if Razzy ever shaved off that black beard. I wonder if she’s still riding that bike in her skirt. I may never know…I don’t really want to know.
BON JOVI – Greatest Hits: The Ultimate Collection (2 CD)
I guess Bon Jovi were due for a new “hits” CD. Crossroads, after all, was 16 years old at that time, and Tokyo Road was only made available in Japan. Ultimate Collection isn’t the ultimate collection that I would have put out. If you’re going to do two CDs, you have room for great also-rans like “Last Cigarette” and “Something For The Pain”. Still, it’s not a bad Bon Jovi collection. Listening to it front-to-back, I was pleasantly reminded of all these hits, and man, Bon Jovi had a lot of hits. From early stuff like “Runaway” to the New Jersey classics such as “Born To Be My Baby”, to the newbies like “Have A Nice Day”, this has pretty much all the key Bon Jovi radio hits. Unfortunatly, you’re going to miss out on second-rung hits like “Dry County” and “Joey” but for the uninitiated, or those who just want a good sized Bon Jovi collection, this is the place to go. I think it’s important to explore albums such as New Jersey (the review of which is Part 2 in this series) and Keep the Faith, as well as hits.
Almost every Bon Jovi album has hits included here, right up to The Circle. The song flow is excellent, hitting you with hit after hit after hit, landmark ballads sprinkled in between. And I give credit for the inclusion of “Blood On Blood”, a song that was never a single but has been a huge concert favourite due to its real life story of JBJ’s childhood. Not to mention it’s just a great song.
The four new songs create feelings of moderate indifference to great dislike. “What Do You Got?” is another trademark Bon Jovi ballad, certainly nothing special, outshined to a great degree by all the other tunes here. It’s easily forgettable and feels tacked-on as an afterthought. But two of these new songs — “No Apologies” and “The More Things Change” are just awful songs. Cheesy, contrived, choose whatever words you like, they’re juvenile and awful and really don’t fit in among the classier hits. To me these are B-sides and perhaps should have been held back as B-sides. Or just deleted completely.
Packaging is not the greatest. There are full songwriting and production credits, but they are arranged in such a way as to make finding information difficult. Performance credits are even harder to find — I couldn’t find bassists Hugh McDonald or Alec John Such’s names anywhere in the credits, and their pictures are also not included. There are a few more recent photos of the main four guys. No liner notes.
On the whole, despite the fact that I don’t really like the four new songs, I don’t regret this purchase. It’s going to be a great road CD. It is a good way to hear tunes like “We Weren’t Born To Follow” without listening to the album it came from, which I wasn’t too keen on. So, no regrets. I think most fans will like the album, they might even like the new songs. Mrs. LeBrain’s Mom enjoyed it in the car and commented that she knew many of the songs. Newcomers would be wise to pick this up as it has a great hit-per disc ratio!
10. 
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