Alone Again

#1055: Alone Again

RECORD STORE TALES #1055: Alone Again

I think I’ve felt alone most of my life.  Alone inside my head.  Sometimes creating worlds of imagination, sometimes overthinking the world around me.  I guess not much has changed in that regard.

Eventually you come to crave that alone feeling, even when you would be better off out with friends.  Just because that alone feeling is what is safe and comfortable to you.  It’s a situation you can control.

I suppose this lonely feeling began in grade school, where I did not fit in and had few kids that I would consider truly friends.  We were not “friends” because we liked one another, we were “friends” because we were in the same grade at school.  It was a case of proximity and temporal coincidence and nothing more.  Those kids — Kevin Kirby, Ian Johnson, Kenny Lawrence — they were not my friends.  We might have spent time together, but by the end of the 8th grade they had sided with the bullies and expelled from my life.

My friends from my neighbourhood were the real deal.  But we weren’t in school together.  We were separated most of the time.  And so for just about all of grade school, I felt alone.  Hearing conversations I was not a part of, wishing I was in on others’ jokes, or longing to be picked first for something.  Anything.  It was not meant to be for me.

As I got older and friends moved on with work, school, and families, I spent a lot of time in my room listening to music.  Though it is not something I do anymore, and kind of wish I did, I used to lay on the bed, playing an album for the first time, and reading the lyrics along line by line.  Studying them, trying to penetrate the meaning.  Squinting the eyes to read the tiny print on the inside of a cassette J-card.

Though I’m not alone today, and have not been for 17 years, it’s startling sometimes how easily I can slip back into that mindset.  It can happen in the car or on the couch.  I retreat into my head, and those feelings of isolation creep back like the tide.  I remember loving and hating the Rush song “Subdivisions”.  A great song, with a phat synth riff that echoes in the head for days.  But the lyrics hit a little too close to him.  “Be cool or be cast out.”  Was that my fate, to be cast out every time I tried?  Only when it stopped mattering if people were cool or not did I finally feel like I was no longer alone.

Sometimes retreating into those lonely spaces one more time can result in helpful introspection.  Other times, it just brings me down.  The constant has always been the music.  Music has always been there.  If it’s not in my ears, it’s always in my head.  I can hear songs in my mind when I need them.  The songs of my life’s soundtrack will always be there to accompany my smiles and tears.

REVIEW: Dokken – Tooth and Nail (1984)

DOKKEN – Tooth and Nail (1984 Elektra)

Dokken always served up large helpings of cheese. Within the framework of 80s hard rock, their second album Tooth and Nail has been elevated to the status of classic.  Produced by Tom Werman and armed with nine great songs, Dokken were poised to move on to the big leagues.

The brief instrumental opener “Without Warning” leads directly into the full speed chug of “Tooth and Nail”.  George Lynch was the obvious star on guitar, but “Wild” Mick Brown certainly blows the doors off with his high speed drum work.  Don Dokken could hit the high notes when required, aided and abetted by bassist Jeff Pilson.  The quartet could go hard or soft, or right down the middle.  “Just Got Lucky” is perfect in the centre.  Not too heavy, boasting a chorus that sticks, and a fiery hot guitar solo.

The lesser known “Heartless Heart” gets by for its Lynch chugging, though its chorus is left wanting.  Even chuggier:  “Don’t Close Your Eyes”, which Lynch leaves a smoking ruin:  Don screaming over the wastes left behind by the incessant rocking.  And that’s side one.

Dokken were especially good at slower, heavy songs.  “When Heaven Comes Down” is one of those.  Lynch’s riff holds the fort while Don conjures apocalyptic imagery.  Then a classic:  “Into the Fire”.  This song has it all.  The chorus and riff are topped only by a killer middle eight and a flammable solo.  You can pass on the cliche “Bullets to Spare” which sounds like a Quiet Riot B-side.  But don’t miss “Alone Again”, one of the best ballads from the entire decade.  It defines the term “power ballad” all by itself.  From the words, to the melody, to the legendary Lynch solo, “Alone Again” sounds as good today as it did then.

Finishing it off you’ll get the incendiary “Turn On The Action”, a cross between Van Halen, Motley Crue, and 2/3rds of the Sunset Strip.  It’s a good closer, but derivative and absolutely a product of its time and place.

Tooth and Nail is two or three songs shy of 5/5 rating.  Though you may debate it among yourselves, Back For the Attack and Dysfunctional are superior albums.  Tooth and Nail, however, has something they don’t have, and that is a high percentage of Dokken concert classics.  “Alone Again”, “Just Got Lucky”, “Into the Fire” and “Tooth and Nail” are all cornerstones of a Dokken collection.

4/5 stars