dudes with headbands on motorcycles

We Support #KennerandIvy – VIDEO

No music today, but it’s for a good reason.

Kenner is a friend of the family. Kenner is an exceptionally bright young man, and very well spoken too. It’s not easy though. Kenner has autism, and his service dog Ivy has completely changed his world from night to day. A Human Rights Tribunal is currently deciding whether Kenner should be allowed to have his service dog in school. I know, right? If you have ever been around a service dog, you know they are unobtrusive, however the Waterloo Region Catholic District School Board has decided that Ivy is a “distraction”.  They have ignored the professional opinions of Kenner’s doctors and of the Lions Foundation of Canada Dog Guides. So far, Kenner’s family has been fighting for three years.

Three years for the basic right to have his service dog with him in school.  Three years.

You can read all about Kenner and Ivy here, and here, and here, and just about everywhere else in the news.

A good samaritan named Jolene has taken Kenner’s plight to heart and has organized three rallies.  The last one was on June 19 2017.  The school board was assailed by cheers, honking horns, and best of all, a motorcycle “slow race”.  It turns out that Kenner has support everywhere.  We even saw people come from Kalamazoo, Michigan.  Most exciting were the bikers from several clubs in the region.  I saw Halton, Wellington, and a local club too.  We were treated to some very loud bikes and the guys were just awesome.  The kids loved the motorcycles, and Kenner got to sit on one.

I’m posting this video in support of Kenner, while the Tribunal takes its time making this decision.

REVIEW: Bret Michaels – Rock My World (2008)

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BRET MICHAELS – Rock My World (2008 VH1 Classic Records)

Every once in a while I have an urge to hear some good time Poison rock.  Since Poison don’t really release new music anymore, I thought I’d give Rock My World a try.  I haven’t kept up with Bret’s solo career but apparently he has quite a few albums.  I saw this at Future Shop for like ten bucks, so why not?  And it’s not bad.  Bret wrote or co-wrote every track.

Rock My World is a compilation of (mostly) previously released songs. To the layman, that means “best of” album, and like most “best of” albums this one has some new tracks too. I’m just guessing here, but I think this was probably released to promote Rock of Love and expose people to some songs from solo albums that most haven’t heard.

What surprised me was how strong this album is. It’s certainly much stronger than the last original Poison album, Hollyweird (which was gawd-awful), though it’s not as good as Flesh & Blood. As you’d expect, it’s a strong mix of ballads and guitar driven classic rock, with modern production. Lyrics are pretty standard. What surprised me was the pop-punk rock goodness of “Bittersweet”, for me the best song and unlike anything else on the album.  I find the lyrics hilarious too.  It reminds me of an old Canadian band called Deadline that I used to like.  Unfortunately there have been a thousand bands with sounds like this in recent years.  The song’s a guilty pleasure.

I’m usually finding that as I get older, I’m not that interested in ballads anymore.  Loved ’em when I was a heartbroken youngster, but they don’t mean much to me anymore.  Having said that, “Fallen” is a pretty good song.  It’s not unique but it’s essentially the kind of song that Poison used to have massive hits with 23 years ago.  And even though it’s followed by another ballad called “Raine”, they’re both pretty good songs and it doesn’t bore me to hear them.  “Raine” is my favourite of the ballads, it has some balls and guitars to it. “Songs of Life” is also pretty strong, even if it quotes some old Poison song titles in its lyrics.

I can’t say that this album made me hungry to pick up the albums that these songs were sourced from (Freedom of Sound and Songs of Life) but with those albums so difficult to find, I think that justifies this release. I can understand why fans who already own them would be ticked that they had to buy this release to get the new songs, but let’s face it, most people don’t have those albums and are unlikely to find them at their local wax emporium.

And in my case, even if I found them, I probably wouldn’t buy them.  There are plenty of albums I don’t have that need my dollars more.

For your reference, the new songs are:  “Go That Far”, “Fallen”, “Start Again”.  There’s also a new 2008 remix of “It’s My Party”.  Whoopee!

Go for it if you like Poison, or classic rock with a good mix of ballads and rockers. Avoid if you hate dudes with headbands on motorcycles.

3.5/5 stars