Without further adieu, I present to you the Top 75 songs from this year’s Countdown. Only a handful of my songs made the Countdown this year: Sound City Players‘ “Your Wife is Calling”, Black Sabbath‘s “Damaged Soul”, “Hush” by Deep Purple, Dio‘s “Rainbow in the Dark”, and “Stonehenge” by Spinal Tap.
I love this album. Nightflight sounds like the kind of music I was exposed to, when I was growing in Kitchener, Ontario in the early 80’s. I was surrounded by new and exciting music, thanks to stations like MuchMusic, and friends who would let me tape their records. If I had been aware of Budgie in the 80’s, I absolutely would have been a fan.
In their early days, similarly to Thin Lizzy, Budgie started out with a prototypical sound and eventually evolved into a more metallic beast. Nightflight is Budgie’s Thunder and Lightning, perhaps. It has that vibe, and it’s awesome. Of the records I own, this is my favourite Budgie album. Burke’s voice is as nasal as ever, in the best possible way. The band has metamorphosed into something more mainstream metal, which still sounding like classic Budgie. That anchoring bass, the unstoppable grooves, and the simple and smoking solos: it’s still there.
The opening track “I Turned To Stone” is a major highlight. It takes balls to open an album with a song this soft, but eventually the ballad-like tune transforms into an Iron Maiden-gallup with this killer off-kilter guitar solo. “Keeping a Rendezvous” is more accessible; Budgie plundering hard rock with equal success. The organ-infested “Reaper of the Glory” is a brief step back in quality. It lacks the memorable melodies of the first two songs.
“She Used Me Up” kicks ass with a steady AC/DC beat and a choppy Priest-ly riff (circa Point of Entry). “Don’t Lay Down and Die” continues this overall direction. You can hear the organ once again, and the guitar solo is catchy as hell. It is very much in an 80’s metal mold.
My favourite track is “Apparatus”. The lyrics are pretty strange, but this ballad is irresistible. Burke’s earnest lead vocal is high pitched nasal perfection. But if you didn’t like “Apparatus”, that’s OK because “Superstar” is likely to blow you away. Budgie again stray into AC/DC territory. This song anticipates Blow Up Your Video by several years. Steve Williams keeps it simple on the drums and that’s what makes it cool.
The mid-tempo and melodic “Change Your Ways” is just as likable. You’ll dig the gang-of-Burke lead vocal technique on the verses. You have to admire a singer who has his own voice, and doesn’t resemble anyone else. It’s easy to compare Burke to Geddy Lee, but that’s really not doing it justice. Both singers have their own techniques. Burke is more soulful.
“Untitled Lullaby” is pretty much what it sounds like it would be. It’s one of Burke’s acoustic ditties, only 1:16 so really it’s just a coda. It’s lovely and it ends the album on an upbeat note. Nightflight is a short but enjoyable ride.
Upon review, I found seven of Nightflight‘s nine tracks to be indispensable to me. Based on that math and rounding up:
W.A.S.P. singer, founder and leader Blackie Lawless is known among fandom for his raging douchebaggery. Witness a recent event in Russia, where Blackie ignored the one and only fan at the train station asking for his autograph. Everybody should understand a human being’s need for privacy when they live in the limelight, but asking for an autograph at a train station is hardly imposing, especially when they’re the only fan in the place.
Blackie don’t sign nothin’!
Even back in the Record Store days, I was hearing stories about Blackie being an asshole to fans. Witness the evidence below, an interaction I had with a customer in the late 1990’s:
Customer: Hey, do you have any W.A.S.P. albums?
Me: We might…are you looking for a specific one?
Customer: No. Just one that has a picture of the singer. Blackie’s his name right?
Me: Yup, Blackie Lawless.
Customer: Here’s the thing. I just want to see what he looks like. I was in Toronto a couple months ago, and I swear I saw this guy. I asked him, “Hey, are you in a rock band called W.A.S.P.?” The guy said no, but I was sure it was him. I said, “Come on, you’re him. You look exactly like him.” He had the long black hair, and he was really tall, man.
Me: Well, Blackie’s definitely known for his hair and his height. Sounds like him. Hey, I have a CD called Headless Children here and there’s a picture inside. Let’s take a look.
So we grabbed the W.A.S.P. CD and opened up the booklet.
Customer: That’s him! That’s the fucking guy! I knew he was lying to me! What an asshole.
Jesus Christ were formerly a glam band; a really decent glam band called Attitude. You may recall their video on Much for “Tear The Walls Down”. I still have their indi cassette, and some of the songs on it were pretty good. Grunge then came and went, and Attitude decided to toughen up, and go full-on metal. They changed their name to Jesus Christ for attention, which didn’t really work.
You can find this CD in just about every clearance bin in the province. I paid $24.99 at HMV in 1994 without hearing a note; a decade later I was clearing these out of my bargain bin for 99 cents.
Musically this is really heavy, poorly produced detuned sludge-thrash metal circa 1994 when you weren’t allowed to have catchy riffs or solos anymore. Lots of screaming vocals, not a lot of catchy parts or memorable songs. Downtuned guitars and pseudo-metal grooves are the norm here. It kind of reminds me of an early 90’s version of St. Anger. Headache inducing, harsh, not a lot of melody or songcraft.
Best tunes:
“Peace By Piece” (angry song…rahr!)
“I Hate” (another angry one, rahr rahr! but with some dynamics)
“Ace of Spades” (yes, a Motorhead cover)
And that’s pretty much it. The rest is one chugging detuned song into the other.
A Touch of Evil is, depending on how you count, either Priest’s 5th or 7th live album. Regardless, it’s their first official live album since the Rob Halford reunion. The goal here was to give fans versions of songs never before released live on CD. However, when Priest claim that, they’re not counting the live albums they did with “Ripper” Owens on vocals, or the live songs released on remasters and box sets.
This is a great CD, and it’s very well recorded and mixed. Tom Allom came back to the mixing board after a 21 year break from the Priest. The guitars are driving, the drums are loud & clear but not overwhelming. Allom has done a great job. You can’t hear any obvious tampering or overdubbing (even though, let’s be honest, you know on every live album released today there must be some).
Rob Halford’s voice really struggles on “Painkiller” but absolutely shreds on “Hellrider”. “Hellrider”, in fact, is even better than its 2005 studio version. Halford is now singing in a lower register and saving his screams for special moments in the songs. Don’t forget, he has been screaming for 35 years by this album. He tends to be stronger on more recent material. The rest of the band show no signs of slowing down at all, especially Scott Travis on the drums.
It is absolutely great to hear two songs from the Nostradamus CD recorded live. “Prophecy” is one of my favourites from that album and I hope the band get to play the whole album live one day. It is also fantastic to hear “Dissident Aggressor” which was originally released on Sin After Sin in 1977. It is still heavy and powerful, although Rob has changed the vocal melodies a bit, out of necessity. “Beyond The Realms Of Death” is another great one to have with Rob singing, from 1978’s Stained Class. For a while in 1990 I thought they’d never play it live again, after the band’s “suicide trial”, even though they emerged victorious.
Japanese bonus tracks are “Worth Fighting For” and “Deal With The Devil” both from 2005’s Angel Of Retribution. I think these (and “Hellrider) are the same versions as the Rising In The East DVD. “Worth Fighting For” is one of my favourite recent Priest tunes. It’s a great mid-tempo burner. The iTunes bonus track is “Breaking The Law”, the only song absolutely positively undeniably released before on an official Priest-with-Rob live CD (Priest…Live!). This version of “Breaking” is faster than the studio version, and very enjoyable for the sheer glee that emanates from it.
The artwork for this CD, sadly, sucks. Mark Wilkinson has done some great covers for Priest (see: Painkiller), Iron Maiden, and Marillion. Here there’s a picture of the world on fire, or something. A comment on global warming? You decide. The liner notes also, sadly, suck. There are no indications as to which shows these songs were taken from, or even which tour (the CD culls from 2005 and 2008 tours). There is a brief note from the band about how awesome they are, as they have done on previous live albums. There are some cool pictures, but little else (the Japanese version has lyrics).
I don’t think this CD is essential to anybody but Priest fans. Newcomers would be wiser to buy Unleashed In The East first, and maybe even Priest…Live! before buying this. Priest fans will enjoy hearing live versions of these songs, because they already own “Another Thing Coming” and “Living After Midnight” elsewhere. So, if you are a Priest fan, pick it up and enjoy the sonic blast of metal fury as only Priest can deliver!
4/5 stars
*Note: There is supposedly a Russian version with another bonus track, also taken from the Rising in the East DVD: “Angel”. I question whether this is an official release or not.
I’m not a guitar player so my review of this box set will be limited to non-player knowledge. Steve Vai designed this set for guitar players to improvise over. He removed the lead guitar from selected tracks from the following albums:
Passion & Warfare
Sex & Religion
Alien Love Secrets
Fire Garden
Alive in an Ultra World
The Ultra Zone
Real Illusions: Reflections
He encourages the players to improvise rather than learn the original solos, and make loops of songs in order to play away as long as they want.
As I said I’m not a real guitar player, just a wanna-be, but I love Steve’s music and I enjoyed hearing his songs deconstructed. You can hear a lot of keyboards and backing guitars that you can’t hear with the lead guitar mixed in up front. Some songs, as a listener, don’t work at all like this such as “The Audience Is Listening” as there’s not much backing music. Again though, this wasn’t really designed for listeners like me.
I had fun playing a few simple melodies over some of Steve’s slower songs. Some of these stripped-down tracks will also make good beds for voiceover recordings.
At this price, guitar players are getting a lot of music for their dollar. They might never play or use some of these tracks but you can’t argue with the value (about $20 Canadian).
For players, you’re going to get a lot of use from these CDs especially when you download the sheet music from Vai’s site. Vai writes arrangements that will give you a lot of challenges and fun options to play over. For the average listener such as myself, you will only play this occassionally. It will definitey give you insight to the songwriting and recording talents of Steve Vai, and maybe you can use the tunes to just chill out as background music at home. At this price maybe that is enough reason for non-players to buy it. Only a guitar player will truly get maximum use for this box set, and I think they will use it a lot.
3.5/5 stars
Note: Steve has available on iTunes two more discs from this series:
MOTLEY CRUE – New Tattoo (2000 Motley records, EU edition with bonus track and 2 CD edition)
The worst Crue album? Could be Theater of Pain, Generation Swine, or 2000’s New Tattoo. I don’t like speaking ill of the dead, but Randy Castillo was not a suitable replacement for Tommy Lee. Tommy Lee isn’t a great technical drummer by any stretch, but he has bombast and his songwriting is crucial to the Motley sound. Here, the songwriting void is filled by future Sixx A.M. collaborator James Michael.
The drum sound is flat and lifeless, the guitar is dry, and there is simply no fire here. The songs drone from soundalike to soundalike, and you will forget which is which. This is the Crue on cruise control if not pure autopilot. Of course, the band hyped this as a “return to the roots” album, which it is not. The Crue’s roots are bombastic loud chrome plated sleezy metal with loads of attitude and aggression. This is dull, pointless, meandering rock that goes nowhere. Without Tommy, I am inclined to say there is no Crue. Compare this to the Vince-less self titled 1994 album, a 5/5 star release all the way. Who is more crucial to the band’s energy?
Not one, I repeat, not one great song here, but plenty of mediocre ones. “Hell On High Heels” isn’t too bad, but it’s certainly not up to the standards of Motley Crue singles past. Also half decent is “Punched In the Teeth By Love”, a title which dates back to 1991’s Decade of Decadence. Unfortunately the majority of New Tattoo is clogged up with dreck like “She Needs Rock N’ Roll”, “Hollywood Ending” and the title track. Nothing stands out after numerous listens.
MVP: Mick Mars, who always seems to nail a tasty solo when needed.
The saving grace to this particular release is the live disc with Samantha Maloney (ex-Hole) on drums. It is more fun and entertaining than the album itself, but maybe that’s because the live disc is 66.6% oldies. The two demos included are no better than the album versions, but collectors should be aware that Europe got a version with a different bonus track called “Time Bomb”. On top of that, Japan got an exclusive song called “American Zero”. It’s too bad it was relegated to Japan alone, because it might be the only track that actually hearkens back to the good old days.
Avoid. A bore and a chore to listen to. Pick up 1994’s self-titled release instead.
RAINBOW – Finyl Vinyl (1986, 2 CD Rainbow Remasters edition)
Finyl Vinyl was the third Rainbow album I bought, right after Rising and Straight Between the Eyes. The year was ’96, and the place was Dr. Disc. I bought it on vinyl initially, because the original CD edition omitted two tracks for space limits (a major flaw with double albums issued in the early CD age). However what I did not know until recently was that the vinyl also omitted a song: “Street Of Dreams” which was only available on cassette!
This complete 2 CD remaster contains all the songs from all the versions. For sheer portability reasons, it made sense for me to own this. I have filed my vinyl copy away, and I now rely entirely on this new Universal CD version.
I love Finyl Vinyl and even though it was issued posthumously and consists mostly of unreleased live songs, I think it’s one of the most enjoyable Rainbow albums to listen to. It contains music from all three of the original Rainbow eras: Dio, Bonnett, and Turner. It leans most heavily on the Joe Lynn Turner era, with only a couple songs from the Ronnie James Dio era. Graham Bonnett also appears on two songs, and there is an instrumental B-side from his Down To Earth era as well. It is worth noting that the B-sides contained herein have been issued on other albums since.
Finyl Vinyl contains a lot of my favourites, and in great versions too: “I Surrender” and “Miss Mistreated” sound great live. Pop rock goodness, made classy as only Blackmore/Turner can do it. “Jealous Lover” is a standout midtempo burner from the Joe Lynn era. Blackmore’s picking is resplendent. Unfortunately the two Dio-era songs don’t have the fidelity of the later Turner recordings, but you can’t have a Rainbow collection without representing Ronnie James. That is done via unreleased 1978 live versions of “Man on the Silver Mountain” and “Long Live Rock ‘N’ Roll”.
My only complaint: The photos inside are too damn small and blurry. One of my favourite things about the vinyl release was that there were pictures of almost every incarnation of Rainbow, but here you can barely tell who’s who. Too small, too blurry like a bad scan; the booklet should have been expanded. Also, the credits still contain some errors that were never corrected from the original vinyl issue (see Wikipedia).
QUEENSRYCHE – Promised Land (1994 EMI, Japanese import)
I’m sure the pressure was on to top Empire, so what did Queensryche do? They retreated to an isolated but luxurious cabin on an island, and wrote & recorded an introspective atmospheric masterpiece of a record. Far from record companies and hangers-on, the band focused on the art. By their own admission, the isolation (plus smoking pot and drinking wine) were catalysts for this great album.
I spoke to bassist Eddie Jackson about 13 years ago regarding this album, and I told him I thought it had a lot in common with Rage For Order. He didn’t see it at first, but both albums feature loads of sound effects and atmospherics. Neither album is a true concept album, but both have recurring themes and ideas that run the course of the CD. Promised Land is a deeply personal CD, mostly slower-paced, and one that must be listened to with headphones on.
Drummer Scott Rockenfield came up with the opening piece, “9:28 a.m.”, which is a collage of tones and sounds, ending with some shattering chimes and a baby’s birth. This melds into the first song, “I Am I”, not a typical Queensryche rocker by any stretch but certainly one of the most brilliant things they’ve ever composed. Tate’s lyrics begin the introspective theme of the album, backed by odd percussion instruments, voices, sitar, cello (by guitarist Chris DeGarmo) and droning power chords. There is so much going on beneath the surface of this song; that is why I say that headphones are required.
A skipping CD sound leads straight into the next song, the heavy and dark “Damaged”. “Damaged” is about psychological damage, the effect that bad relationships and experiences have on the self. At various times, Tate’s voice doubles and triples and quadruples, seemingly indicating multiple personalities, or perhaps voices in head. At one point it sounds like his voice has short circuited. Eddie Jackson told me that effect was a total accident in the studio that they couldn’t duplicate.
DeGarmo’s “Out Of Mind” follows, an acoustic piece regarding mental illness. It is a nice quiet composition with spare drumming and a beautiful DeGarmo guitar solo. This break in the pace continues with the next acoustic song, “Bridge”. DeGarmo’s shattered relationship with his father is the theme here. He has hinted before at issues with his father, (“Are you my father? The one that was promised?” from “Screaming In Digital”) but here we get more of the story. His father wishes to mend bridges, but DeGarmo tells him, “You never built it, dad.” A sad tale, and an odd choice for a single, but a single it was.
Side one ended with the powerful epic title track which is nearly 9 minutes long. Anchored by Eddie Jackson’s rumbling bass and Geoff Tate’s atmospheric sax, this is a mindblowing song. The lyrics deal with the fact that as youths, we are told that the world is our oyster, and a promised land is waiting for us. But it doesn’t pan out that way for everybody. There are many voices and sound effects in the background of this song, and Tate’s vocal is wracked with feeling. You can hear that this is taking place in a bar (“Drinks for all my friends!) Again, use headphones!
You hear a person leaving the bar, walking across a gravel lot. This melds into industrial city sounds. Soon the next track has begun, “Disconnected” (writted as “Dis con nec ted” in the lyric sheet). Tate’s vocal is spoken, to great effect. When he speaks in a staggered manner (“I must…release…my…rage…”) it is so understated; yet another mindblowing moment. Again, this song is anchored by Eddie Jackson’s deep bass lines, underscoring. Due to the odd staggered vocal, this song will not be for everybody. On the surface, it sort of resembles “Della Brown” from Empire. This song seems to be about feeling disconnected from the world around us, despite the technology that supposedly brings us together.
“Lady Jane” follows, revisting the mental illness theme. This is a dramatic piano-based song; the piano is played by Chris DeGarmo. The next track is the most straightforward song on the album, “My Global Mind”. A rocker with few frills, this is perhaps the most Empire-sounding of all the tracks. The plaintive “One More Time” comes next, with some amazing melodies and a fairly standard song structure.
All this leads into one epic final song, “Someone Else?” which is simply piano and voice. The lyrics, as with all of Promised Land, are incredible and Tate’s vocal is among the best he’s ever sung. Looking back, the person he is seems to have been someone else all along. This look back ends the album, which of course started with the birth sequence. Very nice bookends.
The Japanese got bonus tracks (of course), one of which is “Real World” from the Last Action Hero soundtrack. Strings are the main feature here, by the late Michael Kamen. The arrangement is a little too saccharine for me, but that’s Kamen for you. Then we also have the “full band” version of “Someone Else?” which adds an entire verse, but loses the piano arrangement that made the song special in the first place.
The remastered edition of Promised Land (which I don’t have and don’t need) has two additional live tracks, which were “Damaged” and “Real World” recorded in ’94. There were, of course, lots more live tracks available on singles at the time, but for those you will have to track down the actual singles. Some of them, such as “Dirty Lil’ Secret” which was issued with the Empire remaster, for whatever reason. And of course there was the ultimate rarity, an acoustic song called “Two Mile High” which was recorded specifically for the Queensryche’s Promised Land video game. This too is not included on the remastered CD, leaving the song frustratingly unavailable today.
On a final note, when I saw ‘Ryche live in Toronto on the final date of the Promised Land tour, they played the entire album live (albeit not in order), a good 10-15 years before doing so was in vogue. That’s how strong this album is, and that’s how good this band is.
Headphones are a must. Multiple listens are a must. Queensryche have never been deeper or more trippy. A masterpiece.
Yesterday we examined Judas Priest’s British Steel, the original album and first CD of this three disc set. Today we’ll look at the live stuff and packaging. If you missedyesterday’s installment, click here.
JUDAS PRIEST – British Steel (30th Anniversary Edition, 2010 Sony)
You could buy the British Steel 30th Anniversary Edition in several configurations:
A CD/DVD set with the album and a live DVD of British Steel played live in 2009,
A 2 CD/DVD set with the live 2009 concert duplicated on CD (minus one song),
iTunes download with all the music from both CDs plus the missing song (“Prophecy”).
The 2 CD/DVD edition is beautifully housed in digipack, with lots of photos in a nice booklet with essay. The photos are all from their recent tour; none are vintage, which disappointed me. I would have loved some fly-on-the-wall photos of them recording this album at Ringo Starr’s house, Tittenhurst Park. Maybe no such photos exist?
The second CD, only available in this edition, is packed to the brim. “Prophecy” wouldn’t have fit or the CD would have run over 80 minutes. Otherwise, it is a straight stereo mix of the same content on the DVD. With audio being my primary medium to enjoy, I obviously needed the version that came with the live CD. The iTunes bonus track was available for separate purchase, so that was easy to add to my files, once ripped.
The third disc of course is the DVD. Backed by a British Steel backdrop, Priest played the album in sequence remarkably well considering their ages! Only drummer Scott Travis wasn’t around for the original album, but he plays the drum parts pretty straight to the original, minus Dave Holland’s robotic coldness.
The main question people have when discussing Priest live is, “What was Halford’s voice like?” It is true that he is an older man today and has to restrain himself and change arrangements in order to sing the songs. This is no exception, but man, when he screams, he still has it! He just screams less, which makes sense. The vocal melodies of some songs have been re-arranged, which may or may not be to your taste. Surely, the vocal melody is such an important part of each song. Halford sings what sounds like harmony parts to the original melodies in order to sneak around certain high parts. It is what it is. And, as per many concerts, the audience sings some choruses on their own when it comes to the big hits.
I was pretty impressed with the live stuff after British Steel. This is surely one of the best live versions of “Victim of Changes”. Halford nails that angry end scream perfectly, I thought his head would explode. “Hell Patrol” was a nice touch. “Freewheel Burning” stumbles a bit. “Prophecy” was excellent, and I’m glad a Nostradamus track was included. Halford seems to relish spitting out the words. Satisfyingly, “Diamonds and Rust” is done in its electric version. An excellent surprise. The album ends, predictably, with Halford’s “audience participation” thing, and “Another Thing Coming” which I could probably do without at this point.
One thing I’m starting to notice, is that Priest are sort of nerdy live. From Rob’s audience participation thing (“Yeah, yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah YEAH yeah!”), to the stage moves, to Scott Travis’ weird drum stick thing on “United”, this is the concert equivalent of a Star Trek convention in some ways. But Priest have never been trendy, and they’ve always seemed oblivious to it. I guess that’s what makes them cool.
The DVD is rounded out by 30 minutes of interviews with Rob, KK, Glenn and Ian (no Scott). This is the kind of thing most people would probably only watch once, especially when the Classic Albums series already released a full DVD of the making of British Steel.
Now to the British Steel 30th Anniversary set as whole: As good a package as this is, I wish there was less emphasis on the “today” portion and more attention paid to the 30th anniversary of the original album. There is at least one unofficial full concert CD from the 1980 tour out there (live in Denver), released unofficially. Surely Priest could have included some vintage live recordings as well?.
4/5 stars. Despite my beefs, this is a great collection for your collection!
mikeladano.com 