Rest in peace Riley B. King (September 16, 1925 – May 14, 2015).
Yesterday, blues legend B.B. King passed away at age 89, leaving a vacuum in the blues that can never be filled. I’m not very good at writing these tributes, although my soul aches too. Rather than write something about B.B., I thought instead I would share some of the memories from the WordPress community. Please click the links below to see the tributes and memories of B.B. King. If we try to remember, then the thrill will never be gone.
Aaron at Keeps Me Alive: “I was fortunate to see B.B. in concert four times, over the years.”
Derek Kortepeter at MixolydianBlog: “As a guitarist, I reflect on how he, along with many others like Muddy Waters and Robert Johnson, made my guitar style a possibility.”
This series is “twice as hard”! Aaron at the KMA and myself are both taking a look at an old CD-R of Black Crowes B-sides, that he made for me umpteen years ago. Enjoy!
RECORD STORE TALES MkII: Getting More Tale #379: Aaron’s Black Crowes B-sides
Aaron has been a generous doner of Black Crowes music to Chez LeBrain for a long time now. Witness, Record Store Tales Parts 260 and 262, in which he provided copies of the Crowes’ Sho’ Nuff box set, and the CD single for “Kicking My Heart Around”. One of the most thoughtful items he ever gave me was a custom Crowes B-side CD, culled from his own library of tunes. The Crowes have a lot of singles and rare tracks, and my collection is still to this day woefully incomplete. The disc he made me covers a ton of songs that aren’t on albums.
There were quite a few tracks on this CD that I didn’t know the origin of. I found out that the first three tracks are from the “By Your Side” CD single, which I still don’t own physically. The opener, an acoustic version of “Horsehead” with a distorted lead vocal, is killer. It sounds live in the studio, which to me is proof that you don’t have to spend weeks and months and years in the studio to make music. “Horsehead” don’t need no frills. “Grows A Rose” and “Peace Anyway” are from the same CD single, but sound more like the By Your Side album. These are streamlined blues/rock tracks, but man “Grows A Rose” sure does smoke! “Peace Anyway” is a soulful Crowes also-ran that could have been on the album as well.
“It Must Be Over” is from the “Kicking My Heart Around” single that Aaron gave me. It’s a midtempo track much in the vein of the By Your Side album but not quite as catchy. It’s a fine B-side though. “You Don’t Have to Go” is really strong, but it could use more of that organ from Eddie Harsch.
Back to the olden days, “Don’t Wake Me” is an ass-kicker with plenty of that juicy slide guitar. This track was later reissued on the remastered Shake Your Money Maker album; I don’t know where it was originally from. For fans of that old Crowes sound before they really started to experiment, this is for you. The acoustic version of “She Talks to Angels” is available on the same remaster. It sounds like an old Stones ballad and it’s flawless in this incarnation.
“99 lbs” and the slow version of “Sting Me” are also available today on the Crowes remasters. I can’t believe how much “99 lbs.” kick ass for a B-side. I know it’s a blues cover, but that’s about all I know about this amazing steady rocking tune. Steady until the end that is, where it speeds up to a breakneck pace. “Sting Me” is one of those tracks that caused a huge battle between the brothers. One of them liked the slow version as heard on my Aaron Mix, and one preferred the fast album version. This resulted in one of those physical confrontations that involved a mike stand being used as a projectile. (I prefer the fast.)
As a B-side from Three Snakes and One Charm, “Just Say You’re Sorry” is surprisingly catchy and straitghforward. I love Rich’s watery sounding guitar tone. “Mellow Down Easy” is from the same period, this being a Willie Dixon classic. I don’t think the Crowes really did anything for it. Either way, it’s on the remastered Three Snakes, although “Just Say You’re Sorry” is not.
“Rainy Day Woman #12 & #35” is a bit of a gimmicky joke cover as far as I’m concerned. It comes from a pot compilation of some kind. “Pimper’s Paradise”, a Bob Marley cover, is a more successful experiment.
Aaron closed his CD with four live tracks in a row: all four are from Air studios in London, circa 1994. The four tracks sample the first three Crowes albums quite splendidly. “Remedy” in particular strikes me as awesome. The vocal is completely different from the album version which was only two years old. You can’t say the Crowes are content to leave things be.
Man, you just gotta give Aaron a 5/5 for making this CD. What a guy!
Here’s a Kim Mitchell two-fer for ya! Once again it’s Epic Review Time!
KIM MITCHELL – “Sudbury Saturday Night” (from Summer Dock Party, 1998 EMI)
‘Twas Thomas who alerted me to the existence of Kim Mitchell’s cover of “Sudbury Satuday Night”. He had heard about it from one of his customers, when Tom owned his own record store. Somebody came in and said to him, “I heard a new Kim Mitchell song on the radio. I don’t know what it’s called or where it’s from, all I remember are the opening words. ‘The girls are out to Bingo, and the boys are gettin’ stinko,'” he recited.
Tom immediately recognized that as the opening line to Stompin’ Tom Connors‘ classic song, “Sudbury Saturday Night”. He called me at my store to ask what Kim album it was on. I didn’t have a clue. I didn’t know he had recorded anything since 1994’s Itch.
He had. This cover appeared on the Canadian compilation CD Summer Dock Party. And what of it? How does one cover Stompin’ Tom? Well, for Kim Mitchell, it’s a harder rockin’ version of the song, complete with accordion and an electric guitar solo. I’ve grown to like it more over the years. It’s hard to overlook the sheer joy in Kim’s vocal. No matter how you feel about the sanctity of covering Stompin’ Tom, I think Kim’s version has plenty of merit.
Great cover…not-so-great CD cover though! What would Irish Jim O’Connel and Scotty Jack Macdonald say about that front cover? That sure doesn’t depict gettin’ stinko, or represent “Cause everything is wonderful, tonight we had a good fight,” to me!
3.5/5 stars
*I was surprised to find a completely different studio recording of this same song on Youtube. Further investigation is required.
KIM MITCHELL – Kimosabe(1999 Chinook)
I think Kimosabe is about separation. I read that Kim was going through a divorce around this time, and perhaps the lyrics reflect that. Additionally, there was another separation, as once again Kim parted with his long time writing partner Pye Dubois. The two had a falling out after 1989’s Rockland, due to Kim’s decision to record in Los Angeles, without Pye present, as he had been for all of Kim’s previous albums. The two reconciled for 1994’s Itch, but appear to have separated once again, because Kimosabe was written with Andy Curran (Coney Hatch) handling the lyrics rather than Pye. I don’t know what happened.
Nothing against Andy Curran, but without Pye Dubois, lyrics lose some of their poetry. That’s Pye, that’s what he brings to the table. Having said that, I think by now, most Kim Mitchell fans are looking for a catchy song to sing along to. Curran does fine. Kim himself wrote two of the lyrics himself (“Cold Reality” and “Over Me”, two of the best songs).
The opening duo, “Monkey Shine” and “Stickin’ My Heart” are both rockers. “Monkey Shine” is très bien; they’re not trying to re-invent the wheel on any of these songs. They’re just doing what they do well, and that’s providing some good Canadian party rock. These are “stock” kind of songs. Reliable, not particularly possessing personality, but getting the job done. TCB, baby.
“Cellophane” is a funky blues. At this point I’ll point out the groove of drummer Randy Cooke, one of my Canadian favourites. You may have heard him with Rik Emmett or the Four Horsemen among others. Kim’s very slick and lyrical guitar playing is in the spotlight of this outstanding track.
Things start to cloudy with “Two Steps Home”. Not that it’s a bad song, quite the contrary. But this is where the party stops. There’s a lot of feeling in this quiet ballad. As far as sheer songwriting goes, Kim should be proud of this one. Still, I feel the playing really shines brightly, guitar and drums both.
After a tune like that, I need a rocker, and Kim delivers with the title track, “Kimosabe”, a pun on the phrase “ke-mo sah-bee”, popularized in the 1930’s by The Lone Ranger. Strangely enough the lyrics also contain the German phrase “auf Wiedersehen”, proving Andy Curran doesn’t mind putting three languages together in one song.
My favourite song is “Blow Me A Kiss”. This outstanding track begins as a melancholy piano ballad, but transforms by the chorus into a bright, light rocker. I would rank this track among Kim Mitchell’s best solo songs, without a doubt. Randy Cooke really kicks this one in the ass.
“Cold Reality” also has a melancholy character to it. This one starts a ballad and stays a ballad, and speaks of getting over the end of a relationship. “Halleluiah baby, I am healing. This pain and rage I felt for years is finally leaving.” This is one that Kim wrote the lyrics for himself, and as I said earlier, it’s not poetry, but when he sings it, I can feel something, you know?
Back to something a little more upbeat, “Over Me” has a modern funky vibe to it, of the light-rock variety. Divorce seems to be the theme again, so we’re not hanging out in party rock land, but it’s musically upbeat and catchy. By the chorus, Kim’s singing, “One thing’s for sure, I’m going to get over you, just like you got over me,” and who can’t relate to that?
My least favourite song is the slinky blues, “Get Back What’s Gone”, featuring the great Canadian singer Lisa DalBello. In think this is a case of, “It’s not you, it’s me.” There’s nothing wrong with this well-executed blues, it’s just not clicking with me. It may with you, especially if you want to hear DalBello just sing some blues.
Album close “Skinny Buddah” is one of those lyrics where I just shrug and say, “OK, guys, whatever!” I have no idea what it’s about, but it’s a good solid rock song on which to close an album that I would consider to be a bit of a comeback.
Except it wasn’t. Kimosabe didn’t sell, and it would be eight whole years before Kim would release another album (2007’s Ain’t Life Amazing). That’s too bad. Given the chance, I think that this album could have introduced a new, “more mature” Kim, still fun, but now with a more serious side. The album could have delivered a couple of hits. Too bad that isn’t the way it turned out. Bummer.
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.”
One can indeed judge a book by its cover. David Lee Roth is hands-on with every aspect of his product, be it a photo shoot, a recording session, or an interview. He must have known his Diamond Dave album was crap, so he made a terrible cover to match it. Check out the tan, that wig and them pants! (Also notice: furry walls!)
This album, following up another aborted Van Halen reunion and the surprisingly powerful album DLR Band, switches gears and shows Dave’s “multi-faceted side”. Sure, we all know Dave likes disco, jazz, blues, showtunes, and standards. It’s Dave doing what he did very successfully on Crazy From the Heat, and trying to do so again. To make an album of this stuff would be fine, but Diamond Dave lacks any sort of zap. At all. It’s just one “who cares” cover after another, a couple crappy originals, and a Van Halen tune.
Dave’s voice just doesn’t generate the heat it once did, and all of Diamond Dave suffers for it. The way Van Halen did A Different Kind of Truth used a lot of production on Dave. Here, Roth is a whimper, a wheeze, a breathless gasp at the greatness that once was. To listen to this album in one sitting is an exersize in stamina. I know because I’ve done it.
Positives: Instrumental moments on the Steve Miller cover “Shoo Bop”. The ace rhythm section of LoMenzo and Luzier are complimented by a guitarist named Brian Young who is shit-hot on this. Then Dave goes all dance-y on it…ugh. “She’s Looking Good” is old-school and well done.
The indigestible: The Doors’ “Soul Kitchen”. Nobody needs to cover the Doors; Dave makes them sound like Smash Mouth. Hendrix’ “If 6 Was 9” has too much of Dave’s boring talking voice, but not enough crooning. His cover of the otherwise excellent Beatles number “Tomorrow Never Knows” (which he actually had the audicity to rename “That Beatles Tune”!?) sucks all the life and innovation out of a great song, as he wheezes to the finish line. This is by far the worst song, even though he also covers “Let It All Hang Out”.
There is only one number here worth owning, which is his Las Vegas version of “Ice Cream Man”. He did this shortly after Your Filthy Little Mouth with Edgar Winter, Omar Hakim, Greg Phillinganes, and Nile Rodgers! According to Dave’s autobiography Crazy From the Heat, this was recorded in a live in a video shoot. The video was never released, but the audio finally was. It lives up to the hype if not the wait.
Decide what you are willing to pay for one or two songs, and buy accordingly.
Take a trip back to September, 1993. Led Zeppelin had no greatest hits albums available and just three years previous, the monstrous Led Zeppelin box set was a smash hit. I believe it was the most successful box set ever at the time!
It was, however, just a sampling of Zeppelin’s catalogue. A generous sampling, but a sampling nevertheless. 31 album tracks were missing, as it was just a four disc set. The missing tracks are not throwaways though. How could you say that about “Good Times, Bad Times”, “Living Loving Maid”, “Out On The Tiles”, “The Rover”?
So, predictably, three years later came Box Set 2 with all those tracks plus the recently discovered “Baby Come On Home”. The result is a complementary set; you really can’t have one without the other. Having both sets is how I originally heard the Zeppelin catalogue, and I do have a certain nostalgia for these sets.
Much like the first box, this set was lovingly sequenced and remastered by Jimmy Page himself. As such, the track order takes you on a journey of sorts. Unfortunately it’s just not as epic a journey as the first box. How can there be? With no “Kashmir” or “Stairway” available, it could never be as monumental. Still, it’s a pretty cool trip. Starting you off on disc one with “Good Times, Bad Times” and closing disc 2 with the melancholy “Tea For One”, this tracklist does what it was meant to do. Sandwiched between there are some of the best Zeppelin album cuts of all time.
I don’t think I need to go over highlights. I do? Alright. “Down By the Seaside” is simply gorgeous, one of my personal favourite Zeppelin songs. It’s in my top five for sure. Although it’s a bit silly, I dig the country hoe-down of “Hot Dog”. It’s certainly the heaviest country music I ever heard. With John Bonham on drums, how could it not be? “That’s the Way” is another beauty, acoustic and pretty. It’s “Carouselambra” that throws me the most, a complex swirl of synthesizers and howling Plant vocals.
The sound quality was great for its time, but technology, tastes and standards change. The songs have been remastered since, and will be again. Personally I have no qualms with the sound and I still enjoy this box to this day, even though I own the massive 10-disc Complete Studio Recordings as well. Really, my only issue was the inclusion of just one previously unreleased song. “Baby Come On Home” is a wonderful slice of soul, a young Plant belting about a cheating woman while Pagey plays some elegant notes behind him. Yet, as we saw later with the release of the BBC Sessions, there was more in the vaults. Why couldn’t “The Girl I Love She Got Long Black Wavy Hair” or “Something Else” be included here much like “Traveling Riverside Blues” was included on the first box set? We know Jimmy has dug up more rarities since.
It is what it is. Maybe it was a bit shameful to bait die-hard fans with one new song, but the remastering of the set was also considered a major selling feature. The set, being only a 2 disc set, is physically much smaller than the original, and contains one new essay, by David Fricke. The packaging is quite beautiful, and everything from the cover art to the layout echoes the first box. Clearly, you are meant to have both.
Aaron says this is the first cassette he ever bought! He picked a good ‘un.
ZZ TOP – Eliminator (2008 CD+DVD Collector’s Edition, Warner)
Consider all earlier CD releases “eliminated”!
Say what you will about ZZ Top’s foray into 80’s music. Using sequencers and compression on the drums wasn’t everybody’s cup ‘o java, but it sure made ZZ Top millionaires. I like this album. Reverend Billy Gibbons’ guitar tone was so sweet on this album. It’s so smooth and creamy, I just love the tone. This might be my favourite album of his, purely for guitar tone. Just listen to that sweet picking on the album version of “Legs”. Man, how does he get that sound?
The original album has been lovingly remastered, with the original album version of “Legs” restored. However, fear not, the single version is still here as a bonus track. Other bonus tracks include live versions, the most exciting of which is a fiery “I Got The Six”. And hey, if you don’t like the techno sounds of the album, the live tunes give you an idea of what they’re like stripped down to the bone…like a juicy rack of ribs, meat falling right off. It’s cool how Frank Beard is just as metronomic on the live versions. He’s not a flamboyant drummer, but he’s definitely solid. Just like the Beatles wouldn’t have sounded the same without Ringo, or the Stones without Charlie, Frank is essential to that whole ZZ “Je ne sais quoi?”
I like the whole album, with only a few songs I call filler, such as “Thug”. I always enjoy hearing “Sharp Dressed Man”. I don’t know how all these years later I’m not sick of it, but I’m not. “TV Dinners” always makes me smile. Really, will these guys write about anything?
“I Need You Tonight” is one of those smooth ZZ Top blues. It’s slick, but unquestionably still blues. “If I Could Only Flag Her Down” is another blues based standout. This one’s a bit more of a boogie. Finally, “Bad Girl” (sung by Dusty Hill) is pure rock and roll.
The DVD is cool. You get the original music videos and some live TV performances. If you’re a ZZ Top fan (and for your own happiness, I hope that you are) I think you will enjoy the video stuff. Liner notes are also ample.
5/5 stars. It’s never too late to pick it up!
Click the pic of the Ford to see yesterday’s gallery of the Monogram ZZ Top Eliminator model kit!
This time last year, I dug up my old 1933 Ford ZZ Top deco “Eliminator” Monogram model kit. I would have assembled this when I was 13 or 14 years old. It’s been collecting dust for a long time, but I posted some pics with a crappy Nokia cell phone anyway, just because it was a cool find.
This year, I took some new pics, with my new BlackBerry Z10! I also took the liberty of cleaning it (as much as I dared to). In the process I snapped off one headlight (an easy fix) and detached part of the body from the chassis, a trickier fix. Unfortunately some of the chrome pieces did not age too well and show a lot of chrome wear, (on the headlights).
There were some pretty awesome picks this year. I have to give Scottie props for “Coming Home” by Iron Maiden, from the excellent Final Frontier album. I found some things a bit surprising, such as the overplayed-on-radio “Black Betty” by Ram Jam, placing so high.
“Thick As A Brick” was the live version, so just over 10 minutes. Other long bombers included all of “Supper’s Ready” by Genesis, which resulted in a tirade by Phil for just as long, about how much he thinks it sucks! (And he’s an old-school Marillion fan…surprising.) And of course there were several Maiden tunes that clock in well over 5 minutes.
For your edification, here is the official Sausagefest XII Countdown: 75 tracks, plus 35 tributes. One tribute for each person that submitted a list! 110 songs over one weekend! Awesome.
mikeladano.com 