I was honoured to be back on Geoff Stephen’s excellent show, the 1002nd album, to talk this time about a special song instead of an album. I don’t know why I’m drawn to acoustic-based music when I’m with Geoff, but I know he loves a lot of those old Blue Rodeo songs. I instinctively chose “Hasn’t Hit Me Yet” from Five Days in July, a remarkable song from a spontaneously recorded album. It captures the cold and loneliness of a Canadian winter, yet with the warmth that only acoustic guitars and electric bass can nullify. But don’t let me spoil it for you. Here’s Geoff and yours truly with our chat on “Hasn’t Hit Me Yet” by Blue Rodeo. My favourite.
A bright end to a crummy week! Jen is a trooper once again. She may have taken a spill again, but as always, she insists the show must go on. If she didn’t, then we wouldn’t have had this wonderful Friday night to remember. Thank you Jen.
I need to thank my special co-host and guests tonight. They all brought the lists, with Roger cheating a little bit (taking a bit from the Harrison playbook) and everyone adding a unique spin.
Tim Durling of Tim’s Vinyl Confessions proved to be the expert on all things Bob & Doug McKenzie, which came in handy on my #5 pick. We also took a look at Tim’s new Y&T book, Down for the Count! Please, get yourself a copy on Amazon.ca or your local version.
Peter Kerr of Rock Daydream Nation provided an Australian pick and a number of familiar favourites. Check out Peter’s channel for an interview with Mark Farner of Grand Funk Railroad, and many awesome videos. He is also one of the contributor’s to Tim’s new book.
John Clauser of My Music Corner surprised us all with some great picks, some obscure ones, and one very special #1. I did not see this one coming.
John the Music Nut, Clauser’s co-captain, also provided some brilliant and unique picks this evening. John recently contributed to Tim’s Y&T book as well.
Metal Roger went outside the box on a number of picks, and also provided comedy relief for pretty much the entire night!
Additionally, we have some excellent lists from Harrison Kopp and Uncle Meat. These provided some great discussion topics.
As far as physical product goes, we saw some mail-order-only Marillion and a very cool lenticular album cover that I must acquire somehow.
Merry Christmas one and all! This is the last show before the big day, as the 22nd is a night off for Jen’s birthday. Don’t worry though – we have a re-run scheduled, of a great show from the summer: Arkells appreciation with Aaron and Nurse Kat.
Enjoy!
A very special Christmas to my “forever” friend @manda_runs_and_swims. Write me!
GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man
Episode 44: Our Top Five Favourite Christmas Tunes
Are you ready for Christmas? If not, our cast of characters will provide for you the Top Five best Christmas songs that you need to play this year. We searched far and wide for the best of the best of the best, so please welcome our crew this week:
Special guest co-host: Tim Durling of Tim’s Vinyl Confessions! We will also be unboxing his latest book, Down For the Count, all about Y&T…who never recorded a Christmas song to my knowledge!
RECORD STORE TALES #1101: In The Mix – An Uncle Paul Story
At the dawn of the new millenium, technology was on the move! I now had a CD burner on the family PC, and had just discovered this new thing called “Limewire“! I was just starting to download all sorts of rare music, from out-of-print songs to live performances. I had burned my first mix CD and was just starting to dip my toes into this new world, when Uncle Paul and Aunt Maria came over to visit one Sunday afternoon.
I was eager to show Uncle Paul what I could now do with a computer and an internet connection. Making a custom CD was such a revelation back then. It seems mundane now, but it truly was new and exciting in the year 2000. For Uncle Paul, the wheels in his head started turning.
“Can you make me a CD?” he asked. “With anything I want on it?”
“I can try!” I responded. “What songs do you want? Make a list…”
He only wanted two songs. I wish I could remember what they were. I know they were both car songs. That’s all I can remember. Two classic car songs from the golden age of rock and roll.
I searched for the two songs on Limewire, found decent copies, and began downloading.
“You still have about 70 minutes of blank space on this CD, what do you want to fill it up with?” I asked him. I hated wasting valuable blank CD real estate. Once you burned a CD, that was it. You couldn’t go back and add to it.
“Can you repeat each song, twice?” he asked.
“Sure can. But you’ll still have over an hour of blank space on the CD.”
“That’s OK,” he said. “I just want each song, twice. That’s all I need.”
“Really? I can repeat them as many times as you want until the CD is full. If you want me to,” I said, trying to convince him.
“Twice each is fine. Can you do that?” That’s all he wanted!
One the songs were downloaded, I started up the burning software. Track 1…song 1. Track 2…song 1 again! Track 3, song 2, and track 4, song 2. That was it. It burned in no time, and we tested it.
“Thank you Michael! This is exactly what I wanted.”
You’re welcome Uncle Paul. A simple request that provided all the entertainment he needed. A happy man, and a happy nephew to have done this one small thing for him, that he appreciated far more than it warranted. He was a good uncle.
Before the Rainbow there was Elf. It was basically the same band – Ronnie James Dio on lead vocals, Mickey Lee Soule on keys, Gary Driscoll on drums, and Craig Gruber on bass. The one and only difference was Steve Edwards on guitar, who would have no place when Richie Blackmore came knocking a year later. Their second album, Carolina County Ball, was produced by Deep Purple’s Roger Glover. It’s fair to say that Dio hadn’t found his niche yet. With Mickey Lee Soule, Ronnie co-wrote every song, but was seeking a bouncier Guess Who direction at this point in time.
It sounds like Mardi Gras on the opening title track, with clarinets, trombones and trumpets accompanying the band on this “boogie-woogie Friday night”. Soule shines, ticking the keys with delicate intent. Heavy metal, this is not not! Not even close. There’s a guitar solo but it’s a secondary feature. Only at the end does the song pick up the pace. It’s actually a great tune, but anyone expecting dungeons and dragons had better head back to their gamesmaster for a new dice roll. Expect boogie.
“L.A. 59” opens like an old bar room, with a piano taking up all the space. The opening figure sounds like it’s emulating a train, which is probably a good guess. “Get me back to L.A., 59!” sings Ronnie, sounding a bit more like the mighty mite he would become. “Hello, hello sunshine!” Upbeat, with the guitar taking up more of the song this time. A great upbeat tune to start your day.
A little bit of a funky swing emerges on “Ain’t It All Amusing”, demonstrating the talents of the rhythm section in particular. Driscoll was no slouch and Gruber had no issue filling the bottom end with interesting vibes. This fun song really is about rhythm with a pinch of funk. It sounds a lot like Deep Purple Mk I, especially with the long percussion break that ends it.
“Happy”, which is ironically anything but, is a bit filler-ish. It’s Elf playing in a smokey nightclub and it’s all a bit repetitive. “Annie New Orleans” picks it up, with another Elf piano boogie-woogie. Whitesnake have also done songs of this nature in their early days. Then the awkwardly titled “Rocking Chair Rock ‘N’ Roll Blues”, which is a ballad more or less. It boasts a nice guitar solo and a laid back sound, but it’s going to have some reaching for the skip button. They shouldn’t, because three minutes in, a new riff arrives and transforms the song into another rockin’ boogie-woogie. Listen for some of Driscoll’s fun cowbell work on the back end too.
The one title that grabs everyone’s eye is “Rainbow”. Don’t get too excited. It doesn’t sound anything like Blackmore’s Rainbow; more like a a third rate tribute to The Band. The boogie-woogie is starting to wear a little thin, and same-samey now. “Do the Same Thing” is more like it. It sounds like a prototype to Rainbow’s “If You Don’t Like Rock ‘N’ Roll”. This allows the players to shine a bit more.
The album goes out on a cringey ballad called “Blanche”, with Dio singing about “Rainy days, rainy days” in a voice quite unlike the power he would later master. This is little more than a silly album outro; nothing to be taken seriously.
Every album and every band will have its defenders, but Elf was the least of Dio’s four main bands over the decades (counting Black Sabbath and Heaven and Hell as one band). Carolina County Ball lacks focus, and Glover doesn’t provide any punch in the stale production. The album rests on the songs and performances alone. Fortunately the band could play, though they seemed uncertain about who they wanted to be.
This CD, Undead or Alive, is my first exposure to Evil Elvis. I was aware of singer K.C. since the 90s, from his band Blackglama who were featured on Raw M.E.A.T Vol 1. Unsure what to expect, I was delighted to find this album is both hard to describe, and excellent! They call it psychobilly, and I get it. It has elements of that familiar rockabilly sound, but there’s way more going on here. It’s hard to distil down into words, but here we go.
Surprise #1: Lush and vibrant backing vocals. I expected something way more ragged, but these guys are all singing in complementary harmony. Really well produced too.
Surprise #2: Just how flat-out catchy each and every song is.
Surprise #3: Singer K.C. has only gotten better in the three decades since I first heard him.
Perfect example, I love when he screams “GO!” on opener “The Dead Are Walking”. This timeless ode to zombies has some nice theremin-like sounds, and a breakneck beat. Even faster, “My Evil” has tasty organ over a shuffle beat. If it had horns, it could have been the Bosstones. K.C. is a commanding singer, throttling through several voices in just the opening verse alone. Sometimes he’s like Elvis (obviously), but he seamlessly goes to a growl next, and then back again. Then he’s in a Tom Waits rasp like on “Apocalypse”, one of the catchiest songs about zombies I’ve heard to date. “Adrenaline pumping fear and lust, we’re hellbound to fight these zombie fucks!” But the chorus!…top quality. “Bodies piled to the sky, I want yours next to mine!” Love it.
Each song has a slightly different direction, but all of them contain hooks galore, fast beats, and great singing from K.C. Example: “Backseat Love” is a duet with Sarah Beth for variety. This album no shortage of variety, even within the confines of its psychobilly direction. Each song has its own flavour, sometimes drawing from the wells of other genres, such as heavy metal, on bonus track “Sick of this Shit”.
Tremendously fun album, expertly executed for high voltage kicks. Recommended.
ARKELLS – “The Last Christmas (We Ever Spend Apart)” / “Pub Crawl” (2021 single)
I usually prefer an original Christmas song to a traditional one. We’ve all heard those standards a million times. How about something new? For Christmas of ’21, the Arkells put out a single with two originals: “The Last Christmas (We Ever Spend Apart)” and fan favourite “Pub Crawl” (from 2020).
The Christmas tune doesn’t particular sound like a Christmas tune. It sounds like an Arkells song. The synth strings and Beatles-y guitar solo dominate the music. It’s upbeat with singalong qualities, but the lyrics kind of nail the Christmas vibe of the last few years. Reflecting on the pandemic and the holidays we didn’t spend together: “Last Christmas, I didn’t get to hug you, last Christmas, it almost broke my heart.” I really like this verse: “Are we Catholic, are we Protestant? Jewish somewhere down the line? Got a cousin who’s Republican, I promise I won’t pick a fight.” Once again, the Arkells tap into those real feelings. It’s a good song, though it probably won’t usurp anything from your favourite seasonal playlist.
“Pub Crawl” sounds a lot more Christmas-y though the lyrics are only vaguely so. “Maria’s dancin’ around, and she’s singing Mariah,” is a reference to Mariah Carey’s ever-popular Christmas album. Instead of 12 days of Christmas, they have 12 pubs to crawl through. It starts as a piano ballad, and then kicks up into a rocker complete with guitar solo and handclaps. Max even references himself in the lyrics by name: “And Max is about to cry (I’m about to cry)”.
Welcome to Homework From My Therapist! I have a new therapist; she’s nice, and fresh ideas are always helpful as I make the transition from Summer to Fall to Winter. She asked me about happy winter stories; I said I had several. She suggested I write them down somewhere I could easily find them, any time I needed a pick-me-up in the winter. Of course, for me, that means the easiest location is right here. I am putting on my Empire Strikes Back soundtrack as I type, and I am in the zone. Let’s do this!
Join me won’t you, for this walk through the winter snow of 1981?
RECORD STORE TALES #1100: Happy Winter Stories Vol. 1 – The Empire Strikes Back
Even as a child I never liked winter, always looking forward to the warmth and freedom of the summer sun. The winter of 1981, however, offered a new opportunity. The Empire Strikes Back was the latest thing. We were collecting all the toys, all the figures, everything we could. With winter here, we now had the opportunity to dress up as the characters for outside role play!
The snow was deep on our tiny frames that winter. You truly could imagine you were on the ice planet of Hoth, if not for all the trees. Winter trips to the cottage offered the more bleak landscape of a completely frozen lake as far as the eye could see, but we didn’t dress in our Star Wars outfits when we made those winter visits. That was a home activity for the winter weekends!
My sister dressed as Luke Skywalker. I let her use my glow-in-the-dark “laser sword” for that purpose. I wanted to be Han.
My dad had made us wooden guns and pistols by cutting shapes out of playwood offcuts and painting rough details. Perfect for a Solo blaster! I used my dad’s real leather holster, which even at its tightest was always so loose. Every good Canadian kid has a pair of snow pants; mine were blue or brown. I grabbed a pair of goggles from a snorkel set. To top it off came my pride and joy: a blue winter coat, with a big furry hood…just like Han Solo’s. I’d strap on my laser pistol on top of that and trudge out into snow for an hour or two.
Other kids from the neighbourhood would drop in and play other roles. Someone would have to roar like Chewbacca as I pretended to trade blasts with an Imperial probe droid.
When it was time to board the Millenium Falcon, we’d jump into my dad’s car in the garage. He didn’t like that part too much, as we fiddled with buttons in a vain attempt to get the Falcon into hyperspace.
When it came time to come in and get warm, we always had the original John Williams soundtrack to keep us entertained with our Kenner action figures. Even so, the importance of the role play can’t be left out of the story. It allowed the kids to go out, run around, burn off energy, and be social with other kids as we all re-enacted our favourite Star Wars movies. We couldn’t just go and pop a video tape into our VCRs. Few of us had a VCR yet.
The Empire Strikes Back was the newest of the Star Wars movies, and was completely new and exciting to all of us, boys and girls alike. We’d all seen it. It was a family thing. Anyone could jump in and play the role of Chewie, 3P0, Princess Leia, or Darth Vader. But I was Han Solo. That was a constant, as non-negotiable as a deal with Jabba the Hutt himself.
We did it all over again in 1982, and 1983. I think I may have commandeered my mom’s ski goggles at that point, refining my costume.
After Return of the Jedi came out in May of ’83, my focused changed to Luke Skywalker. Not only was he suddenly badass instead of this whiny disrespectful little shit, but he looked really cool in his new black outfit. Our role play changed to summer, and I donned a black glove while reclaiming the glow-in-the-dark laser sword as my own. My sister could be Han Solo this time, but that meant she had to pretend to be blind before I saved her!
Star Wars died down pretty quickly after 1983, and as kids we moved on to other interests as well. It must be remembered, the length of time we lived with Empire as “current” Star Wars movie. It came out in spring of 1980, so we were playing Empire and getting Empire toys for Christmas for 1980, ’81, and 1982! For me, that was age 8 to age 10, the most important span of years in a kid’s childhood! For my sister, it was ages 4 to 7, almost as important! That chunk of our lives coincided with a cool “sweet spot” of Star Wars. Not only did we get the best movie of the series, with some of the best toys and figures of the line, but also got three years of yearning anticipation and fear! Was Darth Vader really Luke’s father? How would they save Han Solo from Jabba the Hutt? What was Jabba the Hutt? We had to use our imaginations and we imagined every scenario we could in our games.
Those were good times in some cold, wet winters. Let’s not forget them, nor the warmth of a hot chocolate after we kicked the snow off our boots and hung our snow pants up to dry. That would have been a good winter Saturday in 1981.
THE FORREST WILLIAMS DEMOCRACY – “The Optimyst” (2023 single)
Forrest Williams, Scott Maybee, and Matt DeMatteo are back with their third single (check out the firsttwo if you missed ’em), and this is the best one yet. The Democracy play a hard-to-pigeonhole mixture of 90s and classic rock with a dose of progressive, among other elements. When these elements fuse, the molecules of music produced have been radiant. With three songs released to date, we can now track a trend: each song is better than the last, therefore the future is looking bright for The Democracy!
Fellow reviewer Jex Russell noted that “The Optimyst” reminded him of “Solsbury Hill” by Peter Gabriel, and I hear what he’s getting at. There’s something in that bright rhythm of the guitar part, and the uplifting vocal melody (verses by DeMatteo and choruses by Maybee, if the music video is to go by). But there’s so much more to this track than just the melodic. Listen to the drums! Williams makes creative use of toms and cymbals to form an integral part of the song’s landscape. The drums don’t distract, but they add a hell of a lot of depth and hookiness. They carve hills and valleys in the music.
The lyrics are uplifting and the message is universal. “‘Cause bad times will get better!” Don’t give up hope! “You feel hopeless, got to pay the Monday dues.” That’s pretty accurate! “I’m all fired up by Wednesday, it’s Friday soon…” Amen, brothers! I think most people will be able to relate to this song, and I hope they can feel its sunny vibes, to feel better about whatever is getting them down.
Everyone needs to hear “The Optimyst”, no matter what mood they’re in. It’s that good and it deserves to be heard far and wide. Positivity is often in short supply these days, so thank you to The Forrest Williams Democracy for bringing some sun in December.
No show tonight – working on a taping with Peter Kerr from Rock Daydream Nation. Enjoy this video instead!
Tim Durling is one of the most generous souls I know. I’m sure 3/4 of my collection of 8-track tapes have come as gifts from Tim. This time, he outdid himself. Watch the video and see what he sent this time. One of these tapes is in my Top 3 Albums of All Time (often finding itself in the #1 spot) and the other is another beloved, timeless favourite.
We also got a sneak peak at some pages of Down For the Count: The Y&T Album Review by Tim Durling and a few special guests!
Check out the video below, and see if you can guess what Tim sent this time. I am truly blown away. Thank you Tim Durling.
mikeladano.com 