COMIC REVIEW: Transformers #14 w/ Bruce Springsteen / “Brick Springstern”

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I’d like to dedicate this unusual review to Aaron who is the biggest Boss fan I know.

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THE TRANSFORMERS – “Rock and Roll-Out!”  (Marvel comics, issue #14, March 1986)

Written by Bob Budianski

Remember that one outdoor Bruce Springsteen concert back in March of ’86, when the Autobots saved the day?…No?

Well, clearly you weren’t reading Marvel’s original Transformers comic series back then.  Issue #14, March 1986, featured just such a mash-up, only with a slightly different twist.  While some real-life people, most notably Richard Branson, had appeared on the pages as themselves, Bruce appeared as the similar-monikered Brick Springstern (also spelled “Springhorn” on one page!), with his Tenth Avenue Band.  The band came complete with an afro-sporting Max Weinberg, and Clarence Clemons himself, going by his nickname the Big Man.

Brick’s songs included the smash hits:

  • “Dancing in the Night”
  • “Born in America”
  • Something referencing Margarita

…and presumably many more familiar sounding tunes!

In this issue’s tale, the Autobots are replenishing their ranks after the devastating events of issue #12.  Optimus Prime has revived “memory engrams” of five Autobots:  Hoist, Tracks, Skids, Smokescreen, and Grapple, and puts them in new bodies.  Optimus sends four of the five (holding Grapple behind, in order to build Omega Supreme, who appears in issue #19) out with Bumblebee on a training mission.

It is while getting gas on this mission that Skids discovers that he loves the music of Brick Springstern/Bruce Springsteen!  “This Springstern produces a most intriguing sound,” says Skids, as he sets his radio to the correct “coordinates”.  Soon, however, the Autobots discover that Decepticon commander Shockwave plans on harvesting the sound energy from that night’s Springsteen…err, Springstern concert for his own evil uses!  This unlikely plot serves to bring the Autobots closer to Springstern, by attending the concert themselves, in the parking lot!

Shockwave’s “energy siphon” actually removes the sound from the concert, converting it into “energon cubes”!  The audience isn’t happy!  Hoist disconnects the siphon, triggering a Decepticon attack!

The autobots transform into robot mode to protect the audience from Decepticons Starscream, Skywarp and Thundercracker.  Luckily the audience (improbably) thinks it’s all part of the show.  Hoist instructs Bruce…err, Brick, to keep playing music to keep the audience from panicking!  Brick and the Big Man launch into the next song, and the ploy works to keep the crowd enthralled and distracted from the missiles exploding over their heads.  Even the arrival of Shockwave, in the form of a friggin’ 40 foot long laser gun, doesn’t seem to alarm the crowd.  The Autobots defeat the bad ‘bots, and leave Brick to finish the concert.  The show must go on…

The plot is loaded with massive holes.  Earlier in the story, Autobot medic Ratchet is complaining that he doesn’t have enough spare parts, even gaskets, to keep the wounded ‘Bots from leaking to death.  Then, a page or two later, there’s five brand new bodies built for the new Autobots, aka new toys that Hasbro had to sell.  Then there’s the siphoning of the music from the concert to create energon, when the Decepticons could have just stolen the electricity itself.

Not a great issue, but since it introduced five new toys, as a kid I was happy with it.

2.5/5 stars

The comic has been reissued several times, notably by IDW As Transformers Generations #3, and again in the collection Transformers Classics #2.

REVIEW: Sex Pistols – “God Save The Queen” (3″ single)

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SEX PISTOLS – “God Save The Queen” (3″ single)

I’m going to be covering more of my rarities in 2013.  Here’s a neat little item that I picked up back in 1996 for the princely sum of $4.  A guy called me up and said he was bringing in some discs  including a Sex Pistols 3″ single.  I’d never owned a 3″ single before, so I knew right away that I would want it for myself.  He came in right at the end of my shift and we did the deal.

This 3″ single contains 3 tracks, all of them available on Pistols albums:

  1.  “God Save the Queen” (from Never Mind the Bollocks)
  2. “Did You No Wrong” (from Flogging a Dead Horse, which collected this B-side)
  3. “Don’t Give Me No Lip Child” (from some versions of The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle)

I only own one Pistols album, a 2 CD edition of Never Mind the Bollocks, including a bonus disc called Spunk and Spedding Demos.  That one album is more than enough Pistols for me (although I do still want to pick up Filthy Lucre Live) and I really never liked the bonus disc too much.  The album itself is the meat and potatoes.

Having said that, this single was a great way for me to pick up two more Pistols songs that I liked, without having to get more albums that would probably sit collecting dust on my shelves.  And I do like these two tunes.  “Did You Know Wrong” is a particular favourite, “Don’t Give Me No Lip” sounds like it was probably recorded live in the studio.  It’s muddy and you can barely hear Rotten.  You certainly can’t really make out the words!  You can hear tape drop out at 1:47, don’t know if that’s on the album or not.

3/5 stars

Part 160/REVIEW: Harem Scarem – Acoustic Sessions (Limited Edition)

I’m going to try and cover more rarities from my collection in 2013.  Here’s a very rare one indeed!  First, the story of how I acquired it, then the review.

RECORD STORE TALES Part 160:  Harem Scarem Acoustic Sessions

Everybody at the store knew I was a big Harem Scarem fan.  A bunch of Japanese imports found their way into the store, and I bought them all.  I also played their music frequently in-store, as it was melodic and radio-friendly.  Their stuff ranged from early Jovi-goodness to mid-period progressive pop rock sounds, to later pop punk.  I liked pretty much everything they did, until they changed their name to Rubber and drifted too far into the pop direction for my tastes.

At one point in the early 2000’s, we had a large warehouse in the back of one of our stores.  The idea was, we’d warehouse stock for opening future stores.   There was a warehouse manager, and he would inventory everything in there.  We’d send him anything decent that we had too many copies of.  He’d also have stock from liquidations, or estate sales.

A lot of the time, the stuff from liquidations would include promo CD singles.  I have dozens of promo discs from him, that we couldn’t sell in store.  Usually these promo discs would have edit versions of album tracks.  I have stuff from him including promos from Metallica, David Lee Roth, Motley Crue, and King’s X.  Some of them, like the King’s X (which we’ll talk about in the future), had rare non-album tracks too.

He also ran our eBay store, and eBay have strict rules about selling promo discs.  So basically, anything that was obviously promo sat in boxes gathering dust in our warehouse.  On occasion, when it was a band like Harem Scarem that he knew I liked, he’d let me have it.  Otherwise it would have sat there for years, probably just to be thrown in the garbage at some point.

One of the discs that he sent my way was a Harem Scarem EP called Acoustic Sessions.  Subtitltled Limited Edition, there were only 500 copies made (see footnote for confirmation of this number.)

Most commercial retail releases have barcodes, and this one does not, indicating it probably was not a commercial release.   Yet it also doesn’t say, “Not For Sale: Property of Warner Music Canada Ltd.” like a promo should, so who knows?  It doesn’t even have a year printed on the case, only the CD itself (1991).  The spine of the CD doesn’t even have a serial number.  Maybe it was given to fanclub members or contest winners?

Either way:  Never seen it before, never seen it since.  I don’t truthfully know how it ended up in our possession, whether it was a liquidation, or just something we purchased off a regular customer somewhere.   The details are now lost to the sands of time, but either way it ended up in our warehouse and consequently my collection.  I also don’t recall what I paid for the disc.  Probably $3.  That would have been typical, with my staff discount, for something like this.  With hindsight, we probably could have sold it for much more than that, but the folks in charge always underestimated the selling power of bands like Harem Scarem.

If it’s true that there’s only 500 copies out there, then I’m thrilled.

Oh, who am I kidding?  It’s a rarity no matter what!  I’m still thrilled!

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HAREM SCAREM – Acoustic Sessions Limited Edition (1991 Warner Music)

The EP starts with a 3:16 edit version of their single “Something To Say”, the fifth single from Harem Scarem’s self-titled debut album.  It’s a ballad, pleasant enough, acoustic.  It has a really nice acoustic guitar solo courtesy of virtuoso player Pete Lesperance.  Otherwise I’ve never considered it a standout.  If you like “To Be With You” by Mr. Big or “More Than Words” by Extreme, this is another ballad for your collection.  This same version was later released on another EP called Live & Acoustic.

Onto the exclusive acoustic tracks.  These three songs were only available here, or the 1994 Japanese import version of the debut album.  Good luck finding that today at a decent price!

The debut single “Slowly Slipping Away” (co-written by songsmith Marc Ribler) is rendered in acoustic form first.  These acoustic sessions were recorded at Cabin Fever studios and self-produced by Lesperance and singer Harry Hess.  As great a song as “Slowly Slipping Away” surely is, I think it does miss something in its acoustic form.  That really nice electric guitar hook that precedes the verses, I miss it!  I also miss that throbbing bassline.  Yet the band’s incredible harmony vocals are just as powerful as ever.

“How Long” is next, a great album track in acoustic form.   The chorus is just as big and dramatic as the album version, thanks to the band’s trademark harmonies.  In my opinion, the band’s strength here was the original drummer, Darren Smith.  What a voice.  (The quartet were rounded out by original bassist Mike Gionet who stayed for three studio albums and a couple live releases.)

“Hard To Love” was not a single, but it works really well acoustically and maybe should have been a single after all.   Once again the harmonies soar, with Smith in particularly standing out.  I’ve always felt that the band really lost something when he left in the early 2000’s.  This is a great track, radio ready and full of hooks.

The fifth and final track is just the regular album version of “Something To Say”, at 4:41, with the full (intricate) acoustic intro.

For a five song EP, this one is a winner.  Just wish I knew more about its history!

4/5 stars

ADDED NOTE:  Reader Danny has emailed the haremscarem.net site, and heard back from somebody regarding there being only 500 copies of this CD:

yes it’s true. Very rare now, because it was released in this very limited quantity.
Take care,
Dan

Thanks for sharing!

REVIEW: Cinderella – Long Cold Winter (1988)

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CINDERELLA  – Long Cold Winter (1988 Polygram Records)

I remember how excited I was upon hearing the first single, “Gypsy Road”, in the summer of ’88.  Cinderella had managed a bluesier, more “authentic” hard rock sound for their critical second LP.  Night Songs was OK, but Long Cold Winter was better in every way.  The cheese factor had been replaced by pedal steel guitars, pianos, and Hammond B3 organs.

Drummer Fred Coury was touring with Guns N’ Roses (Steven Adler had broken his hand punching a wall) during much of the making of Long Cold Winter.  It’s not clear how much of Long Cold Winter he played on, as the band pulled in two incredible session drummers for the project:  Denny Carmassi (of Heart and later Coverdale – Page), and the late great Cozy Powell!

From the bluesy opening of “Bad Seamstress Blues”, it was clear that the AC/DC clone Cinderella that featured Bon Jovi cameos in its videos had evolved.  Two incredible, throat wrenching rockers follow this:  “Fallin’ Apart at the Seams” and “Gypsy Road”.  Both songs easily stand up today as forgotten classics of the “hair metal” era.  But truthfully, Cinderella only made one “hair metal” album.  Long Cold Winter doesn’t really fit in with that scene, and their next album Heartbreak Station would leave it behind completely.

“Don’t Know What You Got (Till It’s Gone)”, the epic power ballad, is more Aerosmith than Poison, and still features a great guitar solo straight out of the Iommi blues notebook.  I’m not too keen on “The Last Mile”, a straightforward rocker, but it was still chosen as a single from this album.  Much better is the side-closing “Second Wind”, amped up and stuttering.

Side two opened with Cinderella’s “serious” blues, the title track.  It’s a bit too contrived for me, it has a vibe of, “Hey, let’s write our ‘Since I’ve Been Loving You’!”.  Lots of repeated “baby baby baby” Plant-isms.  At the time it was released, this song was seen as a serious departure for the band, but in hindsight it’s really just a first step into a larger world.  It’s somewhat reminiscent of the rare occasions that Black Sabbath has attempted a slow blues (I’m thinking “Feels Good To Me”, also featuring Cozy Powell) mixed with Zeppelin.

“If You Don’t Like It” is another standard rocker, nothing special, but this is followed by no less than three great songs in a row.  First is the single “Coming Home”, not really a ballad, but a hybrid.  This was one of the most immediate songs that I fell for when I picked up the album.  You can tell that Cinderella wrote a lot of this album on the road, by the lyrics.  “Coming Home” is one such road song.

“Fire and Ice” is heavy, sort of a revisited “Second Wind”, another standout!  Then the album closes with the slide-laden “Take Me Back”, which strikes me as another road song.  Just as good as “Coming Home”, but heavier, it was a great album closer.  Personally if this album had spawned a fifth single, “Take Me Back” would have been my pick, hands down.  And I think this album could have justified five singles.

The band evolved further with album #3 (which featured strings by John Paul Jones!), but I think Long Cold Winter strikes the perfect balance between screeching rock and bitter blues.  From the classy album cover on down to the perfect production, I don’t think they’ve ever made a better album.

4.5/5 stars

REVIEW: Iron Maiden – From Fear To Eternity (2011)

Part 44 of my series of Iron Maiden reviews!

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IRON MAIDEN – From Fear To Eternity (2011 EMI)

One thing that you need to be aware of:  If you’re a Maiden die-hard, From Fear To Eternity was not designed for you. This, much like Somewhere Back In Time, is for new fans only. (Although a bone was thrown to us die-hards, more on that later.)

This is a decent compilation.  The reason I bought it was to “complete the collection”, and of course the great cover art (by Melvyn Grant once again). The cover pays homage to Maiden album and single covers of the past 20 years. The only one I didn’t see represented in some way was The X Factor, but see if you can spot a clue.

This collection is a joy to listen to from start to finish. I won’t go over the details with a fine-toothed comb, but there are plenty of fan favourites here: “Passchendale”, “Benjamin Breeg”, “The Clansman”…and these are not short songs, folks! Of course there were the hits, all big in Europe if not here in North America: “Bring Your Daughter”, “Wicker Man”, “Different World”, “Man On The Edge”, “Afraid To Shoot Strangers”, “Tailgunner”. There are also a slew of personal favourites such as “Be Quick or Be Dead”, “For The Greater Good of God”, and “Where The Wild Wind Blows”. Really it is very hard to find fault with this collection, or the running order.

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In fact my only beef is the lack of inclusion of the ballad “Wasting Love” which I still have a soft spot for. Also I was surprised that “From Here To Eternity” is not on here, not a personal favourite song, but it did lend its title to this album!

Finally, one touch that I enjoyed was substituting the Blaze Bayley era songs for live versions with Bruce singing. After all, Maiden are out there touring now, and new fans don’t need to be confused by a different singer. This means that you’ll get the live version of “Sign of The Cross” from the Rock In Rio album. But what’s really cool is that the live “Man On The Edge” was only released as a B-side to “The Wicker Man” single, so this is its first album release. A little extra bonus for the Maiden die-hard who may have missed that single a decade or so ago.

I strongly recommend this collection to new Maiden fans, as there is really not a bad song in the bunch, and it’s a great listen from front to back. For die-hards, you already have (most of) these songs, so if you feel like picking it up for the cover art like I did, it’s still an enjoyable listen.

3.5/5 stars.

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GALLERY: Record Store Excursion 2012 Supplimental

Aaron sent me these photos too late to include in my video report.  These were taken at Sonic Boom Music, and Pauper’s Pub.

Mmm, beer.

I’ve also compiled some of the photos of discs that I scored that day, from some of my review blogs.

And lastly, the video is below, in case you missed it!

Part 159: The Return of Dandydouche – Dandy Deuce!

One of the most popular stories of 2012 was the tale of  “Aerodouche Dandy”.  So, in light of that, how about a sequel?

RECORD STORE TALES Part 159:  Dandydouche 2 – Dandy Deuce!

We had several CD players in our store that allowed our customers to listen to anything they wanted, before buying.  It was a pretty cool innovation by the chain owner.  Other stores had “listening posts” where you could listen to one of a select few new releases, but at the time nobody else would let you listen to anything you wanted in the store.  As cool and helpeful as that sounds, it was also an invitation for abuse.

Many times, I’d put up to 50 discs on for somebody who purchased nothing, but we couldn’t cut them off.  We couldn’t say no.  You could spend over an hour serving a customer, retrieving discs and filing them when they were done, all for naught.

Record store guys have a sixth sense though.  We’d pick up the signals.  For example, when Kid Rock had a huge hit with “Picture” (a duet with Sheryl Crow), a lot of older people used to come in and listen to it, to see if they would like the rest of the Kid Rock CD.  Predictably they didn’t, and it wasn’t out on Sheryl’s album yet.  I knew they weren’t going to buy the Kid Rock CD, and most didn’t.  That’s one example.

One thing Douchebag Dandy would do is purposely put the wrong CD in the player.  I know of one instance where he substituted a lady’s chosen disc with Iron Bitchface.  Iron Bitchface was a local “outsider music” project that Dandy hung out with.  He had been known to jump onstage with them, and was always seen in public as a lookalike pairing with their singer, K-Rot.

Iron Bitchface was, by their own admission, people who could not play music.  They created a lot of noise and recorded it, and split it up into tracks.  I grabbed a T-shirt because I liked their logo, but it was completely unlistenable.  In fact our store-play copy had a massive skip in it that nobody even noticed.  That’s how bad it was.

Anyway, this time Dandy was working, a lady was in listening to every Harry Connick Jr. album we had, and not buying anything.  After a dozen or so listens, Dandy swapped out her last CD for Iron Bitchface.  She immediately took off her headphones.  “I think the CD player is broken,” I’m told she said.

Dandy sauntered over to check.  “Nope.  It’s working fine.”

“Really?  Whatever I’m hearing isn’t music!”

Dandy opened up the player.  “Nope.  This is the disc you picked out.”

“Well you can take it off, that’s nothing but garbage!  Who could listen to that?” she said.

Dandy found this tremendously funny, and laughed and boasted about it after.  Even though she wasn’t buying anything, that’s still just a douchebag move!  Apropos for a Douchebag Dandy!

New DEEP PURPLE album teaser 2013!

Enjoy.  April 2013.

Thoughts?  Sounds different, but still like Deep Purple.  Lots of Don Airey in this clip.

REVIEW: Def Leppard – “Acoustic Medley 2012” (iTunes single)

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DEF LEPPARD – “Acoustic Medley 2012” (iTunes single)

Def Leppard have released the second in their series of iTunes re-recordings.  The first, a double single of “Pour Some Sugar”/”Rock of Ages”, was a pretty straight “forgery” (to use Joe Elliot’s phrase).  The second, entitled “Acoustic Medley 2012” is exactly what it sounds like it would be.  Apparently, Leppard were playing this medley live, and decided to commit a studio version to tape.

The songs in the medley are: “Where Does Love Go When It Dies”, “Now”, “When Love and Hate Collide”, “Have You Ever Needed Someone So Bad”, and “Two Steps Behind”.  Total time:  7:32.  The first two songs in the medley, I give Def Lep full points for.  I’ve always been a sucker for the Slang album, so to hear something from Slang again, is just…wow.  Maybe this is being done to pre-hype the Slang deluxe edition due 2013, eh?

“Now”, and the X album in general I’ve never been a huge fan of, as I made clear in my review.  I give the band credit for putting “Now” back out there, since they rarely touch that album anymore.   I’m all for obscure material being resurrected.

The other three tunes in the medley are a bit ho-hum, but taken as a whole it’s incredible how well they all work together.  “Two Steps Behind” gets the majority of time in the medley, a song that I really never need to hear again.  It’s pretty much identical to the standard version from the Retro-Active CD.

As mentioned, this is an iTunes-only release, but I’d love to see a physical product.  Limited edition vinyl?  I would buy that.  Are you listening, Joe?

4/5 stars

REVIEW: George Carlin – Parental Advisory: Explicit Lyrics (1990)

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GEORGE CARLIN – Parental Advisory: Explicit Lyrics (1990)

This isn’t a music review, but who is more rock n’ roll than George Carlin?  This is one of my favourite albums of all time.

George Carlin’s acerbic humour has been classic, relevant and awesome since the 1960’s.  I think he got better with age, and regardless of the fact that it’s 22 years old, Parental Advisory: Explicit Lyrics is just as relevant today as it was in 1990.

Politically correct, this isn’t.  In fact the big thing Carlin rants against on this disc is political correctness!

I think spokesman ought to be spokesperson. I think chairman ought to be chairperson. I think mankind ought to be human kind, but they take it too far, they take themselves too seriously, they exaggerate! They want me to call that thing in the street a personholecover. I think that’s taking it a little bit too far. What would you call a lady’s man, a person’s person? That would make a He-man an It-person. Little kids would be afraid of the boogieperson! They’d look up in the sky and see the person in the moon! Guys would say come back here and fight like a person! And we’d all sing “for it’s a jolly good person!” That’s the kind of thing you would hear on Late Night With David Letterperson!

Carlin remains funny, even while being preachy.  For example, “Life’s Little Moments”:

You and your fiancé have been invited to your mom and dad’s house for dinner for the first time. Half way through dinner, your fiancé stands up and says, “I’ll be right back, I gotta take a dump.” There seems to be no really genteel way of announcing publicly a dump. And frankly, I’m not impressed with people who tell me what they’re going to do when they go to the bathroom in the first place. Doesn’t that bother you? People who announce it. “I’ll be right back, I’m going to take a shit!” “Nevermind! Do what you have to do and leave me out of it. And don’t describe it when you come back.” “Boy, you should have seen…” “Nevermind!” “It set off the smoke alarm!” “Nevermind!”

This CD is taken from an old HBO special.  Personally, I’ve always kind of preferred an audio version of a comedy show.  Sometimes you miss the visuals, but this is how I grew up experiencing comedy. My buddy Peter and I would drive to the cottage with two hours of comedy tapes in the deck.  It’s a great way to experience stand up comedy.  George Carlin’s well-written and composed comedy is 99% verbal, so it really works perfectly on CD.

And that’s the best way I can describe this disc:  Well-written and composed.  While it still sounds live and spontaneous as stand up comedy should, it’s obvious that George laboured over his words, language and his messages.  Language is a big part of this show.  Carlin laments the watering down of modern language.  When you water down the words we use, you water down the thinking as well.  For example, “shell shock”.  They used to call it “shell shock” in the First World War.  Now, they call it “post-traumatic stress disorder”.  More words, but softer, sucking the humanity out of the phrase.  Think about.  It doesn’t seem to hurt as much, does it?  It doesn’t seem as descriptive either.  This is one of Carlin’s messages on Parental Advisory.

And his messages are pretty simple:  Fuck the establishment!  Fuck political correctness!  Tell it like it is, stop beating around the bush, and the world would be a better place!  All with a wink and a smile.  David Lee Roth used to say, “If you wanna send a message, use Western Union.”  Well, if a message can be delivered in an entertaining way, I say go for it!

I miss George Carlin.  I think the world is a darker place without his humour and his insight.

5/5 stars