Grab A Stack of Rock

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode: The Greatest Iron Maiden Tribute Album You Never Heard – Food For Thought

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN bonus episode: The Greatest Iron Maiden Tribute Album You Never Heard – Food For Thought

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #130

This is an episode that we have been looking forward to since the very start of this series.  Tribute albums wouldn’t usually figure into our Iron Maiden story, but this is one that we felt so strongly about that there wasn’t even a question.  Check out Sweden’s Food For Thought, who did the best Iron Maiden tribute you’ve never heard.

With 19 tracks spanning the debut album all the way to Dance of Death, Now That’s What I Call ‘Kin Music / What Are We Doing This For? (2003) is the coolest tribute album you’re likely to hear.  Each track is performed in a unique style, from metal to folk to electronica, often in the style of known artists.  Therefore if you would like to hear “Sanctuary” done in the style of Deep Purple’s “Speed King”, you will hear it on this album.  What if Lemmy was in Iron Maiden?  Or Bon Scott?  All those questions will be answered tonight.

Harrison and Mike break down the album’s 19 tracks, including deep cuts, hits and a B-side. We also play song clips to illustrate our points.  It might not be an easy album to find, but our goal is to get your shopping for Food For Thought at the episode’s conclusion.

We hope you enjoy this episode and ultimately the album!  Tune into the premiere as we always like to interact in the comments.

 

Friday December 12 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T., 8:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube.

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist:

Recap: Interview With “Shandi” Bassist HARPER

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

Episode 129:  Interview with “Shandi” Bassist Harper

Last night I had the pleasure of interviewing bassist Harper on the subject of Kiss and more. Topics covered:

  1. Guitar tech for Paul on the Dynasty tour
  2. Rehearsing Shandi with Paul and Anton Fig, and recording it with Vini Poncia for the album
  3. Working with Peter Criss on his Out of Control solo band that never toured
  4. Loaning Ace the 12 string guitar he played on Fractured Too
  5. Missing the Space Ace
  6. Loaning the Shandi Thunderbird bass out to a legendary metal bassist who used it on his band’s landmark 1984 album (I love this story)!
  7. Working for LucasArts in the 1990s on a Star Wars video game for the N64
  8. Michael Bolton and his band
  9. An Oscar Award!?
  10. And so much more!

Please enjoy the show! I’ll try to get Harper back for any followup questions.

 

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Interview With “Shandi” Bassist HARPER – Wednesday live show!

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Episode

Episode 129:  Interview with “Shandi” Bassist Harper

Grab A Stack of Rock is proud to announce a special mid-week LIVE episode:  Please join Mike as he speaks to Tom Harper, professionally known as Harper, the guy who played bass on the Kiss hit “Shandi”!   And not only that, but Harper later spent time at LucasArts, helping create some of the greatest video games of all time, including Star Wars: Shadows of the Empire.  Believe us when we say that some of the stories that Harper has are not widely known, and could break the internet.

For example, did you know that the Thunderbird bass guitar that he played on “Shandi” was later loaned out to a legendary metal bassist, who played it on every song of his band’s landmark 1984 metal classic?  We’ll tell you who tonight.

Harper spent time in Peter Criss’ solo band, was friends with Ace Frehley, played with Michael Bolton, and of course played the bassline you know and love from a Kiss classic.  He has also recorded his own solo covers.  There is plenty to talk about tonight, from bass to video games.  Some of these things may blow your minds!

Since this is a special live episode, if you join us in the chat you can ask your own questions of Harper.  We already have some special guest questions to run.  Please don’t miss us tonight, this is going to be a good one!

 

 

Wednesday December 10 at 6:00 PM EST, 7:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.

🅻🅸🆅🅴 The Sound That Haunts You: A Beginner’s Companion to Fleetwood Mac with Tim Durling

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Episode

Episode 128:  The Sound That Haunts You: A Beginner’s Companion to Fleetwood Mac with Tim Durling

 

Remember last month when we said Tim Durling has been busy?  Hot on the heels of his Night Ranger book, Tim is out with a brand new Fleetwood Mac companion!  With photos and text on every Fleetwood Mac studio album, this book is essential to fans new and old who want to read about Mick and the gang, and their incredible discography going all the way back to the Peter Green years.

Harrison “The Mad Metal Man” Kopp hosts tonight as we welcome Tim back onto the show.  You can buy the book here, or at your local Amazon.

We have guest questions lined up, and Tim will have the answers!  Don’t miss this one live, as we love to interact in the comments.  We always have fun lined up, and fun will be had!

Friday December 5 at 7:00 PM EST, 8:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 26: Dance of Death with Lana Teramae

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 26:  Dance of Death

With special guest Lana Teramae

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #127

Brave New World was a new beginning for Iron Maiden, but the real test to any reunion (or new lineup, for that matter) is “can they do it twice”.  Dance of Death was Iron Maiden’s chance to repeat or exceed.  The road-seasoned lineup was hot with new ideas and got back to work with Kevin Shirley producing once again, but the new album was no re-hash.  The band pushed boldly on.

Joining us for the first time on Grab A Stack of Rock is Lana Teramae, an old friend and writer for Metal Express Radio.  Time zones once again collide in new ways, as Lana is the only guest from the state of Hawaii to ever join us!  Harrison and I have not worked with Lana since our old show (the LeBrain Train), so it is wonderful to have her on with us once again.  Her interviews with many of our heroes on Metal Express Radio might make us jealous, but when we started this series we wanted to include Lana.  She chose Dance of Death of the albums up for grabs.  In her words:

Check me out on Grab A Stack of Rock with Michael Ladano and Harrison Kopp as we discuss one of my favorite Iron Maiden albums, Dance of Death! The episode is set to premiere on YouTube on Friday, November 28, at 2:00 p.m. Hawaii Standard Time. I’m nowhere near as educated as these lovely gentlemen when it comes to Iron Maiden. I was just there for moral support!

Lana offered a new perspective that we have not often seen on the show:  that of a fan that is not a “super-fan” like Harrison and myself.  Lana may prefer Judas Priest to Iron Maiden, but she brings a new voice to the series and several insightful observations on this album that might be considered one that sometimes falls through the cracks.

After finishing an exhausting discussion on the 11 album tracks, we break down every B-side from the three singles:  “Wildest Dreams” (including DVD single), “Rainmaker” (Japanese CD single with two extra tracks), and “No More Lies” (boxed single with unlisted bonus track).  There is a lot to talk about with these B-sides as they included rare Iron Maiden jams, exclusive live versions, and unusual remixes.

As usual, Harrison takes us through the tour, though not too too much, since we will cover the live album Death on the Road in a future episode with special returning guest Jex Russell.  And, of course…we have to address the atrocious cover art.

On a personal note, this was the final episode recorded at the cottage in the 2025 season.  Will 50 Years of Iron Maiden still be going when we re-open in April 2026?  It might be possible as there is still a flurry of albums, live records, singles and compilations left to go.

Join Mike, Harrison and special guest Lana Teramae tonight.  We always try to comment along with you.

Friday November 28 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T., 2:00 PM Hawaii Standard Time.  Enjoy on YouTube.

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist:

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Solidarity Forever: Stevie Van Zandt with author Robert Lawson

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Episode

Episode 126:  Solidarity Forever: The Art and Soul of Stevie Van Zandt
With author Robert Lawson

Robert Lawson is a talented author (and music researcher) and friend, who actually appeared on our old show the LeBrain Train back in 2021.  Tonight is his Grab A Stack of Rock debut, and his first time meeting the Mad Metal Man, Harrison Kopp.

When Robert was the LeBrain Train, it was to discuss his book Still Competition:  The Listener’s Guide to Cheap Trick, a thorough and essential read.  He has also penned detailed books on Nazareth and the Guess Who.  This time, we’re talking about Stevie Van Zandt, the subject of Robert’s new book Solidarity Forever.  This is a subject about which Robert is intensely passionate for reasons musical and spiritual.  As Robert says, writing this book was “his job”.

“Little Steven” Van Zandt is a fascinating figure in rock, from his instantly recognizable stage visage, to his popular role on the Sopranos.  This book will teach you about the solo career of Little Steven, and breaks down “every album, every single” just as we collectors want.  Robert is also knowledgeable on many other artists in genres from jazz to rock, and we will doubtless stray off track spontaneously.  And that is half the fun.

Tune in tonight and ask Robert your questions live, on Grab A Stack of Rock.

 

Friday November 21 at 7:00 PM EST, 8:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Sing Me Away: The Night Ranger Album Review with Tim Durling

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Episode

Episode 125:  Sing Me Away: The Night Ranger Album Review with Tim Durling
With co-host John Snow (The Collection and 2Loud2OldMusic)

Author and Youtuber Tim Durling has been busy.  Sing Me Away: The Night Ranger Album Review isn’t even his newest book!  More on that later, because tonight we celebrate the California Quintet and Tim’s panel book on them.

Joining us tonight is fellow expert and fan John Snow, who will be prove that you can still rock in America, oh yeah!

Tim is a passionate Night Ranger fan and collector, and we will quiz him tonight on everything that went into this book.  The albums, the lineup changes, the amazing tunes, and Tim’s collection. We’ll also talk about the present and what’s happening right now in the world of Durling the author.  We’ll do an unboxing and talk about a contest where you can win yourself a Durling book!

Don’t miss this one live, as we love to interact in the comments.  We always have fun lined up, and fun will be had!

 

Friday November 14 at 7:00 PM EST, 8:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 25: Visions of the Beast featuring Bob Cesca from Camp Chaos

50 Years of IRON MAIDEN episode 25:  Visions of the Beast featuring Bob Cesca from Camp Chaos

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK #124

Back in 1999/2000, a little video called “Napster Bad!” went viral.  You know it, you shared it, you loved it.  Well, not Harrison because he was not born yet.  Bob Cesca (founder of Camp Chaos) created that video and many others, including official music videos for bands such as Motley Crue, Yes, and…Iron Maiden!

Bob is a talented jack of many trades, and also a massive Rush fan.  In this effortless interview, Bob tells us everything you wanted to know about him and Iron Maiden.  2003’s Visions of the Beast double DVD was a massive collection, and Camp Chaos did six music videos for it.  These videos mixed animation with the original familiar music video footage.  We break them all down in detail, including how to access the Easter Eggs.  How was he contacted by the Maiden camp?  How much input did Iron Maiden have on his creative process?  Why did he choose certain Eddies and settings, and how did he decide what to edit out of the originals to make way for animation?  It is a fascinating trip back in time, as current events impacted some of the videos, even though the songs themselves were oldies.  Hey…are there 10 ME-109s out of the sun…or not?

Bob also answered all our non-Maiden questions, such as why James Hetfield and Lars Ulrich have no noses in “Napster Bad”?

After Bob had answered all our questions, Harrison and Mike took a deep dive on the rest of the contents of the DVD set.  If you owned Visions of the Beast back in the day, own it now, or not yet…you will want to pop it in after this episode.

Please welcome Mr. Bob Cesca to Grab A Stack of Rock, and 50 Years of Iron Maiden!  Join us at the premiere in the comments tonight – we love interacting with you!

A big thanks to Tim Durling for introducing us to Bob!

Friday November 7 at 7:00 P.M. E.S.T.  Enjoy on YouTube.

Past episodes:

Handy YouTube Playlist:

#1223: The Creative Process and Why I Love Editing (The new and improved Grab A Stack of Rock show intro video)

RECORD STORE TALES #1223: The Creative Process and Why I Love Editing
(The new and improved Grab A Stack of Rock show intro video)

Funny thing about creativity:  Sometimes size does matter.

The size of your canvas, that is.

I love editing videos, and my pet project for three years now has been the theme video for my YouTube show, Grab A Stack of Rock.  In those three years, I have created over 100 revisions.  I have spent countless hours at my deck working on them.  My old PC’s fans used to groan in protest when loading the files.

Ever since the old LeBrain Train days, I wanted an opening theme song video that include every guest who had ever been on the show.  When we started over from scratch, that was still my goal.  Now we have had 50 guests and the old theme song video was getting cramped.  Tim Durling extended it a long time ago by looping a chorus, so I came to him for help once again.  Creatively, Tim added a guitar solo to extend the song’s length even further.  Modestly, Tim said “It should be apparent to anyone listening that a professional guitar player I am not, but it sure was fun.”  Hey man, it’s good enough for rock and roll, and it gave me a much larger canvas to play with.

When I had the much shorter video, it was always painful for me to edit when we had a new guest to add to the show.  What do I cut, in order to fit the new person in?  There were some parts of the video that were synched to the song and were set in stone – Paul Shortino’s cameo, for example, my laugh at the end, and so on.  I love editing; it is one of my favourite parts of the creative process.  I can sit and edit all day and not realize how much time has gone by.  I always pay for it later in cramps.

Thanks to Tim and this ever-expanding song I now have more canvas, and I’ve been playing with it even more.

“It needs more Dan Chartrand,” I said at first, and so I added more Dan, and just for kicks, more Jex too.  Game Show Host Jex, with the jacket.

There was also one shot in the original video that always bugged me.  It’s one of the oldest shots, but it is from a Christmas show that included Brian Richards as a guest – his only show as a guest.  But it was a static shot and always stood out for that reason.  It hasn’t looked right for a long time, so I took this opportunity to replace it with a moving shot of Brian waving.  I also wanted more Nurse Kat, since she did two episodes with us, and more Archie Gamble since he did three.  In a fun happenstance, I got one shot of Archie synched up to the chorus, so it looks like he’s singing Grab A Stack of Rock.  I also wanted more Davey Cretin, so a chose a shot from our Brave New World episode that has me holding stacks of Maiden during the chorus.

I hope this brief glimpse of a day’s work gives you an idea of why I love working on editing videos.  There is almost always something you want to fix, but the process of doing so either becomes so impossibly tedious that I say, “That’s it, this work is done.”  Not done – abandoned!

I have been working in the video medium, as an amateur, for 36 years.  I like editing to music.  I like placing my edits at key moments of songs, or at least with the beat.  It gives me a framework and enhances the visuals.   I’m obviously just a hack; this isn’t a “how-to”.  I’m just expressing what I love and why I drink my coffee until it is stone cold, sitting here trying to perfect that magical “final” edit.

And then I wait, because now I can’t wait for the next guest to arrive and be added to the showcase.*  We still have several more to come!**

One day I’d like to do some more animation, but that is mostly an outdoor summer activity for me.  For now, I will continue to enjoy doing this for myself, because at the end of the day, nobody else notices all the minute little tweaks and changes I make to my passion projects.

 

 

 

*We’ve already added Lana Teramae, and another new addition, Bob Cesca, will join us this week on 50 Years of Iron Maiden.

**Two more guests are coming on 50 Years of Iron Maiden:  Ryan Murphy from RushFans, and D’Arcy Briggs from darcyska.  We also have plans with author Robert Lawson, and an interview with a musician that I am not ready to disclose.

 

 

 

Written by Mike Ladano, Jen Ladano, and Tee Bone Erickson.  Recorded and performed by Tee Bone, guitar solo and remix by Tim Durling

  1. Blaze Bayley
  2. Harrison Kopp
  3. Mike Ladano
  4. Eric “Uncle Meat” Litwiller
  5. Aaron KMA
  6. Tim Durling
  7. Rob Daniels
  8. John T Snow
  9. Marco D’Auria
  10. Grant Arthur
  11. Brian Richards
  12. MarriedandHeels
  13. Kevin Simister
  14. Dr. Kathryn
  15. Jen Ladano
  16. Grace Scheele
  17. Jex Russell
  18. Spencer “Spenny” Rice
  19. Nurse Kat
  20. Peter Kerr
  21. John Clauser
  22. Erik Woods
  23. Jason Drury
  24. Pierre-Luc Allard
  25. Len Labelle
  26. Reed Little
  27. Metal Roger
  28. John the Music Nut
  29. Mike Slayen
  30. Pete Jones
  31. Todd Evans
  32. James Kalyn
  33. Angie Moon
  34. Ryan Gavalier
  35. Chris Preston
  36. Dan Chartrand
  37. Glen “Archie” Gamble
  38. bicyclelegs
  39. Davey Cretin
  40. Melissa Nee
  41. Sidney Cini A
  42. Ashley Geisler
  43. Martin Popoff
  44. Bert Blotto
  45. F Lee Harvey Blotto
  46. Bowtie Blotto
  47. Broadway Blotto
  48. Jake Not From State Farm
  49. Bob Cesca (Camp Chaos)
  50. Lana Teramae
  51. and (briefly) Max the Axe

Plus Daisi the Dog, Gimli the Cat (RIP) and Galadriel the Cat

 

 

🅻🅸🆅🅴 In-Costume Celebration: Top Five Band Costumes & A Tribute to Ace Frehley tonight!

GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man

🅻🅸🆅🅴 Episode

Episode 123:  Happy Halloween – Top 5 Band Costumes & A Tribute to Ace Frehley
With Mike, Harrison, Johnny Metal and Rob Daniels – IN COSTUME!

Happy 3rd birthday to Grab A Stack of Rock (Oct 28 2022)!  We have a special show tonight.  Not only do we have an excellent panel of returning guests, but we have a fun, Halloween-themed gimmick-laden episode to satisfy!  And of course, for the physical media crowd, we will have lots of CDs (rare, imports) and some music merch to look at!

The show topics tonight are three:

1. Our panel will be dressed in costumes!  Some many be dressed in two costumes!

2. Mike will run down his top Ace Frehley songs of all time, from his Kiss, Comet and Solo careers.  Knowing Mike, expect deep cuts and non-album tracks.

3. Top Five Band Costumes from the panel.  Any band, any costume qualifies.  Literally anything from the matching Beatles suits to Gwar.

Don’t miss this special episode, coming to you LIVE on YouTube.  Join us in the comments – we love to interact!  Best of all, we plan to be done in time for you to catch the World Series game tonight.

 

Friday October 31 at 7:00 PM EST, 8:00 PM Atlantic.  Enjoy on YouTube or Facebook.