Ignored Albums of the 1990’s: I liked ’em them…LeBrain’s List Part 6

Thanks for checking out my 88 underrated albums from the 1990’s that I believe deserved a second look.  There were a few albums that, had I written that series of articles in the 1990’s, would have made the list.  Today, they just don’t cut it.

Here’s a selection of albums that I felt were under-appreciated at that time.   Today, these very rarely get any play in my house.  The shine obviously wore off the apple.

Once again, this is alphabetical.

BIG WRECK – In Loving Memory Of…  (T-Rev teased me about it…it’s half decent, but only half)
BUSH – The Science of Things (good song: “The Chemicals Between Us”)
JERRY CANTRELL – Boggy Depot (Alice In Lite Chains)
CINDERELLA – Still Climbing (Never even upgraded to CD from cassette)
ALICE COOPER – A Fistful of Alice (Dunno…never play this anymore!  Good song: “Is Anyone Home?”)
EDWIN – Another Spin Around The Sun (Good song:  “Alive”. The rest? Suckiness.)
GEEZER – Black Science (only decent, certainly not great)
IOMMI – Iommi (too modern sounding, has some great tracks, but not enough)
MEGADETH – Cryptic Writings (T-Rev and I were into this big time! I can’t play it anymore)
METHODS OF MAYHEM – Methods of Mayhem (I fucking bought this one!)

MR. BIG – Hey Man (“Take Cover” is a good song…the rest I can barely remember)
ALDO NOVA – Blood On The Bricks (I’ll review this at a later date, just doesn’t cut it anymore)
NUNO (Bettencourt) – Schizophonic (One customer will never forgive me for recommending this)
SCORPIONS – Pure Instinct (pure lite-rock)
TWO – Voyeurs (sorry Rob, this just wasn’t a good idea)
STEVE VAI – Fire Garden (perhaps it’s just too dense for me)
VAN HALEN – 3 (no comment…)
VARGA – Prototype (I was trying to get into industrial metal. I grew out of it!)
VICTOR – Victor (Bought because it was Alex Lifeson, therefore my civic duty)

MOVEMBER: Top Five Canadian moustaches of Rock!

Idea stolen from Every Record, with a Canadian twist:

For MOVEMBER, the top five Canadian moustaches of rock!  (I didn’t use John Albini from Lee Aaron’s band since Every Record did.)

5. Neil Peart (Rush)

4. Gordon Lightfoot

3. Dave Myles & Pye Dubois (Max Webster)

2. Burton Cummings

1. Pretty much all of Helix

(moustaches l-r: Mike Uzelac, Brian Vollmer, Paul Hackman)

Sh*t Uncle Peter Says

Jen’s Uncle Peter is nothing if not opinionated about music.  Tonight, however, deserved its own blog entry.

Straight from the horse’s mouth, here’s Uncle Peter:

“Jazz music is all crap…no rhythm at all.  Just a jumble of noise with no beat!  It’s just two brushes and a snare drum!  That’s all jazz is.  If they could sing, it would be a miracle.

“I could walk into a jazz club and play drums as good as any jazz guy.  They play any random rhythm and they call it jazz!”

Love ya Uncle Pete…but I take no responsibility for any comments that may follow!

Forgotten Treasures – Ignored Albums of the 1990s – LeBrain’s List Part 5

Whoops!  I forgot these.  Thanks to the Heavy Metal OverloRd for pointing at least one of these out.

I really should have included these in my list of 88 albums that went under-appreciated in the 1990’s.  I loved these, still do, and my life wouldn’t be the same without them.

In alphabetical order:

BLUE RODEO – Just Like A Vacation (up there with Sloan as one of my fave live albums of all time)
FISH – Kettle of Fish 88-98 (my introduction to his solo music, a great set!)
HELIX – B-Sides (a misnomer: no B-sides included, but all great tracks that didn’t make albums)
GEORGE LYNCH – Sacred Groove (pure smoke!)
SANDBOX – Bionic (I guess Mike Smith makes significantly more money playing Bubbles on Trailer Park Boys)
SANDBOX – A Murder In The Glee Club (brilliant, brilliant concept album on insanity. Genius!)
REEF – Glow (I think these guys were pretty big in the UK but unknown here)
ROCKHEAD – Rockhead (see my review for all the details)
SLOAN – Between The Bridges (can’t believe I forgot my fave Sloan studio record!)

THIN LIZZY – Dedication: The Very Best Of (the song “Dedication” was my intro to Lizzy!)
BILL WARD – Ward One: Along The Way (I have a review forthcoming, one of the best solo Sabs ever)
THE WHITLAMS – Eternal Nightcap (Aussie band, saw them open for Blue Rodeo, blew me away)
ZAKK WYLDE – Book of Shadows (thanks HMO! Liked it so much I bought it twice)

I really hope I didn’t forget any more.  Embarrassing.  Check these out…all great albums front to back!

Part 141: When We Rock, We Rock, and When We Roll, We Roll

RECORD STORE TALES Part 141:  When We Rock, We Rock, and When We Roll, We Roll

I’d always liked Deep Purple, since I first heard the song “Knockin’ On Your Back Door”.  But I wasn’t a Deep Purple collector until 1996.  Until then I only owned three:  Deepest Purple, Perfect Strangers, and Knockin’ On Your Back Door.

In 1996 two critical events occurred:  Deep Purple released the incredible comeback record, Purpendicular, with Steve Morse.  I was also dumped by a girl who went and married the next guy, a few months later.  That kind of took the wind out of my sails.  And what’s better for putting the wind back in, than some new music?

I had T-Trev order Purpendicular for me.  I hadn’t even heard a note, or seen a review.  It was an import.  Wasn’t even released in this country yet. Yet, new music was what the doctor ordered.

The CD arrived open, as did almost all discs imported from England.  (Do you not seal your discs in England?)  T-Rev gave it a test spin before I arrived.  The track was called “Vavoom: Ted the Mechanic”.

“There’s some crazy stuff on here.  Hope you like it”.

In three listens, I loved it.

The quest was on to get more.  I taped some rare stuff off my buddy Vuckovich:  Anthology (the vinyl, not the CD version) , and Power House.  Both contained rare tracks that were not available on CD at the time.  We had copies of Shades Of and Book of Taliesyn, and I bought those as well.   Book Of was a cheap reproduction, unfortunately I paid $16 for it without realizing.  You could hear that it was taken from a vinyl copy.  We also had a used copy of When We Rock, We Rock, so I grabbed that too.  It had some live stuff from Made In Japan on it.

The local library had a copy of Deep Purple, the final Rod Evans album, which I recorded.  It quickly became a favourite.

At Sam the Record Man downtown, I found both Concerto For Group and Orchestra and King Biscuit Flower Hour.  I fell in love with the Concerto big time.  Unfortunately, it didn’t work well for store play.  The quiet parts were inaudible.

Later that summer, Tom directed me to a copy of The House of Blue Light, used with some water damage on the cover, at a Christian record store in Waterloo.  I took it because it was impossible to find on CD.   And finally, T-Rev and I hit HMV in Toronto, where I acquired a beautiful 25th Anniversary edition of In Rock, and the accompanying “Black Night” limited edition single.

Don’t break the case, the autographs are etched into the plastic!

That was just 1996, and I hadn’t even scratched the surface yet.  I didn’t even have Fireball, Machine Head, Made in Japan, or Who Do We Think We Are yet!  It would take time.  Back then you didn’t necessarily buy in order of preference, you bought in order of opportunity.

It was a lot of Deep Purple to absorb in a short period of time, but that’s how Purple became one of my top five favourite bands today.  Sometimes you just need to dive in…and sometimes you just need a little push to do so.  Thanks for dumping me, chickie!

REVIEW: Iron Maiden – Ed Hunter / “Wrathchild 1999”

Here we go again!  Let’s continue.  Part 28 of my series of Iron Maiden reviews!

IRON MAIDEN – Ed Hunter / “Wrathchild 1999” (1999 video game/compilation)

Blaze Bayley was done. Maybe it was the performances. Maybe it was time for a change. Whatever had happened, Steve Harris decided it was time for Iron Maiden to get a new singer.  Manager Rod Smallwood told him to meet with Bruce Dickinson, who wanted to make a return to Maiden and finish his career properly.  Harris was skeptical.  If Bruce quit once before, why would he want to come back?

After meeting with Bruce, Steve decided it was the right move.  But it wasn’t as simple as that.  Adrian Smith was in Bruce’s solo band, and Steve wanted him, too.

“Does that mean Janick goes?” asked Adrian, who was very much against the idea of forcing Janick Gers out of the band that he had spent the last decade in.

“No,” said Steve.  “I want a three-guitar lineup.”

And thus was formed the guitar trio known to metal fans worldwide as The Three Amigos.

Iron Maiden, with Bayley, had already been working on the Ed Hunter video game.  It was Maiden’s second attempt since the aborted Melt game was announced.  In fact, in the game, it is Blaze’s head that you must find, not Bruce Dickinson’s.  This hardly mattered in light of the massive news of a highly anticipated reunion tour featuring Bruce, Adrian, Steve, Dave Murray, Janick Gers, and Nicko McBrain.  This was not a one-off, Steve Harris made it clear that if you’re back in Maiden, you’re back for good.  This was timed to coincide with the release of the game which also doubled as a Maiden compilation album — their second, since Best of the Beast.

This time it was a little different.  To make it special, fans were permitted to vote for which songs were to appear on the disc, 20 tracks total over two discs.   Since the 20 Maiden classics here were voted for online by the hard core fans, there is a fantastic balance of Maiden tunes from every era. There are no other Maiden compilations that feature such a heady brew of Paul Di’Anno, Bruce Dickinson, and Blaze Bayley era material.

It’s nice to hear such underrated classics as “Phantom Of The Opera” alongside semi-forgotten later material like “Tailgunner”. So many personal favourites are on here, including “Stranger In A Strange Land”, that I almost feel as if I put this disc together myself!  They kick it off with the immortal Live After Death version of “Iron Maiden”; appropriate given that this compilation supported a greatest hits tour.

But that’s not all folks.  Now that Bruce was back, it would be nice to promote that with a single.  So, Maiden remixed “Wrathchild” with a brand new Bruce Dickinson lead vocal on it.  The remix was done by Kevin Shirley, Maiden’s new producer and the man behind the boards of Journey’s Trial By Fire album.   Since the original version of “Wrathchild” is already on the disc, this is a true bonus track, a little extra for the fans dying to get a preview of the reunited Maiden.

But it was a bonus only included on the US version of Ed Hunter, a version that was priced well over $40 in Canada.  I found a “Wrathchild 1999” promo CD on eBay as well.

But how’s the game? Well, keep in mind it’s well over a decade old now.  I don’t even know if it will run on a modern computer.  It’s a first person shooter, with Maiden music in the background. You get to do combat in the environments of Maiden’s formative years in London, within their album covers, and if you’re lucky you might even run into Eddie. Personally, I never got that far. It’s a pretty challenging game and I’ve never made it very far. I enjoy it though, something about plowing through a bunch of monsters while “Phantom Of The Opera” is playing in the background is real fun.

Ed Hunter is not a “Doom” style first person shooter. I do not know the term for this type of game, but you do not have freedom of movement in the environments. It’s like a shooting gallery game.

I personally enjoyed Ed Hunter quite a bit. I used to take the game out to have a go every once in a while, and I still dust off the CDs for a rocking good time in the car.  These discs make an excellent road compilation.  I remember driving a bunch of people to a Record Store party (I was always the D.D.) with this on, and it went over very well!  Overall I think it’s definitely a worthwhile purchase, if you can track one down at a reasonable price.

In the meantime, Maiden had to prove their mettle by making a new studio album…

4/5 stars

GEOFF TATE – Yup…still a douche

This is news to me.    “Queen of the Reich” isn’t a popular Queensryche song?

“Actually, it’s not very popular at all. It’s funny actually a lot of people don’t know about that song. A lot of people don’t care about that song. It’s an early song that was written and it shows. It’s funny the reaction you get because it’s a lot of blank stares. In fact it’s the same stare you get when you play a new song that nobody’s heard before. People just aren’t that familiar with it. Given there are a few hardcore fans that might know that song or like that song and know what it is but the majority of the people there don’t. So it’s not really a song that I enjoy singing strictly because lyrically its pretty adolescent.”

I wish Geoff would just shut up.

This crowd didn’t seem to mind the song (that Geoff didn’t write):

More Queensryche:

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part I

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part II

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part III

Mike Ladano: Exclusive EDDIE JACKSON interview, part IV

REVIEW: KISS – Double Platinum (foil embossed CD reissue)

Next in line of my reviews from Record Store Excursion 2012!  Check out the video below if you missed it.  This one bought at HMV, in their 2 for $25 sale.  What I came for was Japanese imports, which they apparently don’t carry anymore.  Why?  

MIKE AND AARON GO TO TORONTO

KISS – Double Platinum (1978, 1997 foil embossed reissue)

For the record, until Record Store Excursion 2012, I’d never seen this before.  It’s a pretty cool, pretty accurate CD reproduction of the original foil embossed LP.  As far as appearances go, it’s superior to the usual jewel case version, and it’s even superior to the 1997 Japanese edition, which I also have.  The cover is fragile, prone to scuffs and fingerprinting, so I’ve kept mine nice and safe in a sandwich bag.

I like that its embossed, not just flat cardboard.  I like that the faces inside the cover are also embossed, just like the original LP.  The photos don’t really do it justice.  I wish I knew the story behind this.  In all my years at the record store I never saw one, even though the year on the back clearly states 1997 (the same year as the other Kiss remasters).  It even still has the same crappy 1997 liner notes by Robert V. Conte (who?).

I first heard this album back in 1985 or 1986, and it was my first exposure to songs like “Hard Luck Woman” and “Makin’ Love”. For years I would often recommend this album as one of the first Kiss albums for people to get. It is still an excellent introduction despite the fact that the market has been flooded with approximately 15 different compilations (rough guess) since then.  It’s also still an excellent introduction even though most of the material has been remixed.  (A lot of people can’t tell the difference anyway.)  There’s also one “new” song, a disco-ish remake of “Strutter” called “Strutter ’78”.  For me, these were the original versions that I heard!

The technical reasoning for the remixing was to make the band’s uneven catalogue sound more alike, when presented together in this fashion. The material produced by Bob Ezrin (Destroyer) sounded leaps and bounds different than the other stuff, so it was remixed to bring it to Ezrin’s level.

“Strutter ’78” was re-recorded with more compression on the drums. I still think it’s a great track, but it lacks the fire of the Kiss original. It’s more sleek. “Hard Luck Woman” has been remixed to highlight the acoustic guitars, leaving the band out until later in the song. “Rock Bottom’s” intro is presented here without the song itself, and it does work in that form, serving now as an intro to “She”. “Black Diamond” lacks the slow-down ending, and I kind of prefer this version: Instead, at the end, the song starts all over again and goes into a fade.

My only complaint about Double Platinum was always in regards to the CD version. Since the original pressing of the LP had the Kiss logo embossed on silver foil, I felt the CD reissues were cheap and didn’t do it justice, even the Japanese, which just has a dull paper cover. The domestic jewel case CD is just printed in silver ink.

Where did this come from?  What’s the story?  No idea.  Comment below!

5/5 stars

Most Unrightfully Ignored Albums of the 1990s – LeBrain’s List Part 4

This is it!  The end!  In alphabetical order, here’s Part 4 of 4:  88 albums that meant the world to me in the 1990′s but never got the respect I felt they deserved.   Thanks for joining in!

Savatage – Streets:  A Rock Opera (sheer brilliance, their first and best rock opera)
Savatage – Edge of Thorns (an album to give Queensryche a run for their money)
Savatage – Handful of Rain (recovering from tragedy to create a triumph)
Savatage – The Wake of Magellan (how did this band just keep getting more brilliant?)
Scorpions – Face the Heat (had a couple good heavy rockers on there like “Alien Nation”)
Shaw/Blades – Hallucination (Tommy Shaw, Jack Blades, campfire goodness)
Skid Row – Subhuman Race (when you’re pissed off and you know it, bang thy head)

Sloan – 4 Nights at the Palais Royale (one of the best live albums of all time – ignored internationally)
Dee Snider’s SMF’s – Live / Forever Twisted (fuck, I missed Dee in the 90’s!)
Spinal Tap – Break Like the Wind 
Stryper – Can’t Stop the Rock (a compilation with two great new tunes)
Sultans of Ping F.C. – Casual Sex in the Cineplex (see here)
Talas – If We Only Knew Then What We Know Now… (Billy Sheehan and the boys reunited for one night, and has the wisdom to record it)
Tesla – Bust A Nut (in some ways it’s better than their prior records)
Testament – The Ritual (really heavily slagged at the time as a sellout)
Tonic – Sugar (much better than the first record, you know, the one that was a hit)
Devin Townsend / Ocean Machine – Biomech (one of his more accessible albums)
Union – Union (Bruce Kulick + John Corabi = better than what the Crue or Kiss was releasing)
Steve Vai – Sex and Religion (Devin Townsend — lead throat)
Veruca Salt – Eight Arms To Hold You (their best album, better than the big hit one)
White Lion – Mane Attraction (it was a little mushy, but brilliant guitars by Vito Bratta)
Whitesnake – Restless Heart (back to his blues rock roots, it wasn’t even released here)

We’re done!  88 albums that meant a lot to me in the 1990’s, but in some cases were criminally ignored.  Check them out.

KOBRA AND THE LOTUS cover IRON MAIDEN’s “The Wicker Man”

I’m not sure where I stand on this band.  Brittany Paige’s vocals are hit or miss for me.  I realize she’s classically trained and all that.  Doesn’t mean I have to automatically like it.

Regardless, I think it’s cool that they chose “The Wicker Man” to cover.  Check it out below, starting at the 9 minute mark.  It’s not a bad cover, but nobody can touch Bruce Dickinson.