Max the Axe is back with possibly his most potent lineup yet. Led by Max and his thrilling axe, the band now boasts Dr. David Haslam on drums, Mike Mitchell on bass, and powerhouse lead vocalist Eric “Uncle Meat” Litwiller.
Full disclosure: I know these guys. I love these guys. But I also just love hard rock and heavy metal. So, out of integrity, I swear that if I did not like their new album, Status Electric, I would be straight up and tell you. But I do like it. A lot. How much of that is due to friendship? I don’t know. Read the review and decide for yourself. This is a good album. I have bought way worse albums, for way more money.
I’ll give you some honesty right from the start. “River Grand” is a good song, but not for an opener. I rarely like when an album opens on a slow grind like this. It’s enough to throw some people, but the song kicks by chorus time. Eric Litwiller pours it all on, his lead vocal being the highlight of the track. What’s he sound like? He’s like an amalgam of many. You can hear some Tenacious D, some Anvil, some Maiden.
As for Max, his solos are simple, memorable and to the point. Pure rock and roll with a side of Ace Frehley. His lyrics almost steal the spotlight though, as many are clever for the genre, and catchy as fuck. “Next Plane to Vegas” is one such example, a pure blast…win place or show.
Who is “Randy”? What’s your real name, Randy? One of the weirdest choruses you’ll ever hear also happens to be one of the catchiest. I can’t help it though. I was sitting at my desk going, “Randy! Randy! What’s your name, Randy?” Musically, we’re at debut-album Maiden, or reasonably close to it. This is one of two semi-epic tracks on the album.
Max the Axe goes pop metal on “Call of the Wild”, nothing but a Motley Rokken good time. The decent chorus is mashed up with a verse that doesn’t quite mesh. But then things go full-on metal with “Sick of Living”. This fuel-injected track has Eric singing at his most Bayley with a dash of Dickinson. Litwiller’s roots include thrash metal, and there are healthy doses of that along with his best David St. Hubbins screams. “Sick of Living” smokes the competition, besting several tracks on the great new Judas Priest album! More great metal: “The Other Side”. The lead riff sounds as if bequeathed by Lord Iommi himself, with a modern slice. And like any good Iommi track, it boasts two solid riffs, and a smokingly Sabbath solo.
Sometimes you hear an album and know right away which song should be the single. That is “Gods on the Radio”. Punctuation error aside, this track is winning 110%. It shall henceforth be known as “You Gotta”, since that is the vocal hook that will be rattling inside your head for days. The lyrics (Litwiller’s first writing credit) are borderline genius for being so goddamn memorable.
God’s on the radio, With the world in his video, Phil Collins in the studio, Phil Collins in the Su-su-su-su-sudio.
The song itself is punky Queens of the Stone Age, with vintage 1977 Ace Frehley lead guitar and maybe a hint of Mike Patton. Yes, this is the single, absolutely. I’ll say it’s one of the best songs to come out this year. At least, if the amount it’s stuck in my head is anything to judge by. In fact I’m gonna go back and play it again. “You gotta,” as the man says.
Yeah, even on repeat listens, it remains as fun as the first. I only wish for a better sounding recording; it would be brilliant with full-on studio fidelity. “You gotta turn it up louder,” says the man, so that helps.
Garage rock is embodied with the sloppy “Uptite Friday Nite”. Stupidly catchy, it’s not one of the best tracks but it’s the noisiest. This is the kind of jam you’d put on before going out for the night. It sounds like the guys shoutin’ out the chorus are already halfway there.
The second, and superior album epic is “Scales of Justice”, Litwiller’s other co-write. Vintage 1976-era Judas Priest (circa Sad Wings) meets a slick Zeppelin groove. Jimmy Page definitely sounds like an influence in parts, while others are jagged riffs of metal. Max uses his Axe to carve music from pure granite, and it’s all very satisfying. The song snakes in and out with different sections and grooves. As a closer it is suitably climactic and leaves you wanting more.
I played some tracks for some friends. One disagreed with my praise of “You Gotta” and thought “Scales of Justice” was far better. Another commented, “You know what this sounds like? A bunch of 40 year olds in a basement.” And I responded, “What’s wrong with that?” Here are some guys in their 40s that are still passionate about rock, and after many years, have written a collection of nine good songs. With regular-Joe money, they made an album. And it’s a good album. I hear things on this album that keep me coming back. I ask myself, “am I biased”? Of course I am. But I wouldn’t have to listen to it if I didn’t want to. I’ve lost track of how many times I’ve played this album in totality. It’s a lot. You don’t do that unless you like it. Whatever it is that I am hearing on Status Electric by Max the Axe, I can only hope that you can hear it too.
Locals! We have two gigs/CD release parties to alert you to.
Both gigs are at the Boathouse in Kitchener, in Victoria Park. It’s a fantastic, much-loved local venue right on the water. (57 Jubilee Drive, Kitchener, Ontario.)
Hello Hopeless are a great new punk band from the local scene. They are releasing their second EP Dark Pasts, Brighter Futures and I promise you, it’s a gooder. I had the chance to sit down and interview the band recently, and that will be out soon. I learned that they put a lot of time and effort into the mix to get it sounding just how they wanted. And don’t let the punk tag fool you. These guys aren’t afraid of guitar solos. I look forward to sharing the video interview — you are going to like Hello Hopeless! The EP will be released digitally on November 23 if you wanna spin it in advance. Check yer Spotify!
Max the Axe
December 8: MAX THE AXE CD release / with the Hellen Keller Band
“You Gotta” check out the new album by Max the Axe called Status Electric. According to Max, it’s his “3rd LP and 6th record.” Max has put everything into this one. On lead vocals: Uncle Meat. If you follow this site regularly I guarantee that you will see some familiar faces at the Boathouse on December 8. Various flavours of hard rock from old men — it fucking rips! And you’ll hear it live at the Boathouse.
GETTING MORE TALE #576: “Why’d You Lick My Pee-noose?” The Sausagefest 2017 Countdown
By the time it was all over I fairly surmised that, personally speaking, Sausagefest 2017 (the 16th annual) was the best one yet.
There are many reasons for this. One happened by pure change.
The weather reports for the weekend were changing daily. I contacted Uncle Meat on Wednesday to tell him they were calling for rain all weekend. He responded, “No they’re not, are you new?” But they were! And the next day, the forecasts had changed again.
By our Friday departure the skies were partly cloudy, but we’ve seen worse. After we arrived and set up our tents it started pouring for a short while. The old fire pit was flooded. When the rain stopped the decision was made to move the location for the Countdown, uphill on dry land. This was the first time the actual location had ever been changed after 15 years down by the river. It turned out that this was the best possible decision. The new location was wide open, more conductive to mingling and conversation, and as you have seen, provided some beautiful photographs. The new location will be permanent from now on.
I felt one of the reasons things went so well for me was good preparation, but that may not be the case. Uncle Meat also had a great time, and was so ill-prepared that he only arranged a tent to sleep in when we were halfway there! Way to be ready, Uncle Meat!
The vibe was right from the get-go and the Countdown began on time.
Highlights from the first night included some lesser-heard tracks:
Queen – “We Will Rock You” – the “fast” version
Deep Purple – “Vavoom: Ted the Mechanic”
Kiss – “Shock Me” – live version from Alive II with solo
The Beatles – “Helter Skelter” – mono version
Queen – “My Fairie King”
Mercyful Fate – “Into the Coven”
There were lots of cool tunes this year: 87 in total including tributes (more on those later). “Indians” by Anthrax was a perfectly appropriate song this year too, since I pulled a large chunk of my own recorded bits from the Brocket 99 CD, a spoof of reservation radio stations. (I voted for “Indians” as #22 on my list.)
And plenty more! You can check out the Countdown list yourself. It was also a treat hearing Ray Charles’ “Mess Around”, which you probably know from John Candy in Planes Trains and Automobiles. Rainbow’s “Light in the Black” was a personal favourite for my air guitar workout.
The comedy sketches were on-point, and I had tears streaming down my face laughing so hard. The Lord of Lamb, Zach Britton, wrote a sketch regarding my insistence that a Bacon Big Mac is not the same thing as a Big Mac. Bacon is not in the Big Mac song, therefore a Bacon Big Mac is not the same thing. Britton rebutted me successfully, and hilariously. “Loosey Goosey” is now a catch-phrase. As a peace offering, he gifted me a bottle of Big Mac sauce.
The first night it rained, but it mattered not as we huddled in our waterproof tents. We were up by the crack of 10:00 to grab breakfast at the Spatula – not the “Flying” Spatula anymore, please note. They have officially changed the name of the place, but still offer the “Flesherton Fill-up” for breakfast. Not as large, nor as good as it was in the past. On the way up, Uncle Meat yelled “Loosey Goosey!” at anyone we passed on the road.
You have to give credit to our Spatula server Heather. I sat with Max “I’m kind of a big deal” the Axe, and I got to witness him working his magic on Heather the server. He promised her the last CD copy in existence of one of his albums. What a deal! Max told me I had a good singing voice. Was he hitting on me, too? Wayne also had a golden line at the store Top of the Rock, with the girl who was distributing bags of ice. “Are you the ice lady? Ice to meet you!”
There was a new exciting twist this year at the 16th Sausagefest. Submitting lists (aka “paying your rock and roll taxes”) has long been a problem. Some people are always prompt. Those people were rewarded with an extra song, a “tribute” this year. Mine was The Police – “Next to You”. That was a blast for air guitar. You can see by the list at bottom, only eight people got tributes. That means only eight people got their lists in on time without nagging! Due to the amount of time it takes to compile the votes and actually record the Countdown, it was decided that this time, you must vote for 2018’s songs by the end of the weekend. And so Saturday afternoon was spent socially compiling lists. It was weird seeing a bunch of guys at Sausagefest with clipboards and pens, furiously writing, colluding and discussing. It was also successful. All lists are in. There will be a whole year to compile and record for 2018!
The second evening had more great rock. Ghost, Dunsmuir, The Sword, Iron Maiden, CCR, Floyd, Purple, Tenacious D, Sabbath and Zeppelin…all building up to the top ten. Not only building up to the top ten, but also setting up the very first Sausagefest live theater….
There were plenty of fake-out tracks in the top ten, as they pretended they couldn’t read the songs written on Uncle Meat’s upper thigh. Sabbath, Rush and Metallica were played eventually. After the #2 track “The Immigrant Song” (Zeppelin), there was an announcement made.
Tom, father of four, the co-founder, the Captain himself, wanted to take a step back. Recording the Countdown was no longer possible for him, due to family demands at home. This made sense, since the guy does have four rugrats and was absent from some of the top ten due to a supposed argument with his wife about it. They saved the announcement for the #1 spot. Only one person was told in advance, and that was the immortal Lord of Lamb himself, Zach Britton. As the song lyrics state, “He is the reason we still do this shit.” He was given a 20 minute heads-up to collect his emotions.
As the announcement was made, they said there would be no #1 song this year. They’d play it first in 2018. Instead, they played the traditional “Happy Trails” by Van Halen as Tom clinked glasses and shook hands with attendees. And then Zach got up to make a speech. He was obviously still shocked and upset by this sad turn of events.
His speech began as expected: melodramatic, sad, and stirring…until it was interrupted.
There was a 4 minute 30 second gap built into the Countdown…specifically timed for Zach to start his speech but not finish. All part of the pre-planned “live theater”. Then….
“ZACH BRITTON!” boomed the speakers.
Suddenly the Countdown recording continued, as a pre-recorded Bucky urged Zach to shut the fuck up and sit back down because he had just been pranked! Tom wasn’t retiring. Zach didn’t have a clue, nor did any of the rest of us! We all bought it, hook line and sinker, even though Tom has 12 months to record for 2018. It seemed so believable especially with that supposed “argument” with his wife built into the recordings. So I raised my goblet of Romulan Ale to Zach “the Lord of Lamb” Britton for being a great sport and a diamond geezer! The “live theater”, the first ever attempted at Sausagefest, was a tremendous success. As Uncle Meat said afterwards, “They will never ever trust us again.” It easily could have gone sideways, if Zach didn’t stand up to make his speech. They were counting on him and he fell right into it. Brilliant live theater!
The actual #1 song, played after the live theater, was “Cygnus X-1” by Rush, a fantastic song on which to close.
The following morning, we packed up to go home. As per usual, Uncle Meat kept singing and repeating one sentence. This year, it was a ditty called “Why’d You Lick My Penis (Rectum)”.*
“Why’d you lick my pee-noose…why’d you lick my pee-noose, rectum…” Over and over again. You can hear this on the Sausagefest video.
We made our way home, but for many of the guys, it was time to rock again. Five Alarm Funk played a free show in London on Sunday night, and a few tired ‘Festers trekked out to party some more. Totally fitting, since Five Alarm Funk had three songs on this year’s Countdown.
What a Sausagefest! Best one ever? Until next year, maybe….
We only get to do it once a year, so you gotta make it count!
Readers here have been treated to many tales from Sausagefest every year, the annual music countdown that occurs every July at a top secret outdoor location. The parties are epic and the music is never disappointing. You’ve read all about the countdown and activities many times here and even been treated to a few videos. Sausagefest is such a blast every year that even the trip up is worth hearing about.
My two passengers this year were Uncle Meat, and Chris the Lamb Lad. We had to pack a lot of stuff into my little Pontiac G5 including three coolers. The Lamb Lad had packed his cooler full of freshly made pulled pork for everyone. Perhaps even more important than the succulent and delicious pulled pork was the music selection. Uncle Meat commandeers the stereo, but I brought four flash drives loaded to the brim with tunes. I had spent several hours curating the music on these flash drives, much longer than we would actually spend listening to them.
Instead, we spent most of the time listening to the CDs that Uncle Meat brought. As many music fans in Ontario now know, recording artist Paul MacLeod passed away a couple months ago. Paul and Uncle Meat were very close friends, and Paul had set aside a couple CDs of his for me to review. Meat gave them to me, and we listened to Paul in the car, with Meat remembering the good times. I now own his albums Close and Play, and Tell the Band to Go Home. Both are incredible, but we’ll save that for the eventual reviews.
Also given to me were two studio CDs by recording artist and Sausagefester Max the Axe: self-titled, and Overload. There was some pretty heavy metal on those two CDs. Thanks to Uncle Meat, I now own three Max the Axe albums in total. Needless to say, there was plenty of rocking in the car.
“Livin’ the Country” from Overload (2008)
Meat was on his best behaviour. No backseat driving at all this year, which was an awesome change of pace. He also didn’t piss in the middle of the road this time. Up through Salem and into Arthur, we made our first stop at Tim Horton’s for some ice capps. Usually I was the most prepared of us, but this year I neglected to eat a good lunch before we departed. I was starving and ordered a steak wrap. Unfortunately the place was really busy, as it always is, and I should have known it was going to take 20 minutes. While I waited inside for my wrap, Meat and the Lamb Lad went outside for a smoke.
Moments later, Meat came back into the store.
“Kayys?” he said to me.
“Kiss?” I responded. I had a flash drive with every single Kiss album. Gotcha covered.
“Kayys?” he repeated, hand outstretched. People looking at him now. Lots of people waiting in line.
“I don’t know what you’re asking me,” I said uselessly.
“Kayss?” again.
I stood there like a doorknob; lots of people there looking at us trying to see what this weirdo was doing. “Kayss?” he kept repeating. It was clear I had no idea what he was asking, so he finally broke character.
“Keys? Can I get your car keys? I left my smokes in the car.”
“Why didn’t you just say that, you friggin’ goof?” I said as I dug for my keys.
“I did!” he retorted. “Kayss?”
OK, I heard it now. In the meantime, me and everybody else in Tim Horton’s in Arthur assumed he wanted a kiss.
We made our way up the windy country roads, listening to more Paul, more Max, but no Kiss. Next stop was Flesherton. There used to be a killer chip wagon there, but it has been gone for the last two years. Instead, Lamb Lad went into a sandwich place and ordered what looked to be some pretty amazing food. Outside, an elderly couple in the late 70’s or early 80’s seemed to be having an argument.
We waited for Lamb Lad to order, and then stepped outside again so the guys could smoke. As we walked out, a cop car pulled up and blocked in the elderly couple! It seems somebody had taken notice of their discussion and called the cops. The couple looked like they had figured out whatever it was just as the cops arrived. It was weird to see this happening in Flesherton Ontario with a couple who looked older than Moses. We shook our heads and marvelled at how weird the day was getting before we even arrived at Sausagefest.
But the farm wasn’t far, and before we knew it, our destination was at hand. Familiar faces were greeted, and help was offered in setting up tents. It’s a magical place. There are friends here that we only see once a year, but have bonded with like brothers. It’s a remarkable experience to have. And the music ain’t bad either.
MAX THE AXE – Status Electric (2018 Mutant Music)
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