rarities

Part 160/REVIEW: Harem Scarem – Acoustic Sessions (Limited Edition)

I’m going to try and cover more rarities from my collection in 2013.  Here’s a very rare one indeed!  First, the story of how I acquired it, then the review.

RECORD STORE TALES Part 160:  Harem Scarem Acoustic Sessions

Everybody at the store knew I was a big Harem Scarem fan.  A bunch of Japanese imports found their way into the store, and I bought them all.  I also played their music frequently in-store, as it was melodic and radio-friendly.  Their stuff ranged from early Jovi-goodness to mid-period progressive pop rock sounds, to later pop punk.  I liked pretty much everything they did, until they changed their name to Rubber and drifted too far into the pop direction for my tastes.

At one point in the early 2000’s, we had a large warehouse in the back of one of our stores.  The idea was, we’d warehouse stock for opening future stores.   There was a warehouse manager, and he would inventory everything in there.  We’d send him anything decent that we had too many copies of.  He’d also have stock from liquidations, or estate sales.

A lot of the time, the stuff from liquidations would include promo CD singles.  I have dozens of promo discs from him, that we couldn’t sell in store.  Usually these promo discs would have edit versions of album tracks.  I have stuff from him including promos from Metallica, David Lee Roth, Motley Crue, and King’s X.  Some of them, like the King’s X (which we’ll talk about in the future), had rare non-album tracks too.

He also ran our eBay store, and eBay have strict rules about selling promo discs.  So basically, anything that was obviously promo sat in boxes gathering dust in our warehouse.  On occasion, when it was a band like Harem Scarem that he knew I liked, he’d let me have it.  Otherwise it would have sat there for years, probably just to be thrown in the garbage at some point.

One of the discs that he sent my way was a Harem Scarem EP called Acoustic Sessions.  Subtitltled Limited Edition, there were only 500 copies made (see footnote for confirmation of this number.)

Most commercial retail releases have barcodes, and this one does not, indicating it probably was not a commercial release.   Yet it also doesn’t say, “Not For Sale: Property of Warner Music Canada Ltd.” like a promo should, so who knows?  It doesn’t even have a year printed on the case, only the CD itself (1991).  The spine of the CD doesn’t even have a serial number.  Maybe it was given to fanclub members or contest winners?

Either way:  Never seen it before, never seen it since.  I don’t truthfully know how it ended up in our possession, whether it was a liquidation, or just something we purchased off a regular customer somewhere.   The details are now lost to the sands of time, but either way it ended up in our warehouse and consequently my collection.  I also don’t recall what I paid for the disc.  Probably $3.  That would have been typical, with my staff discount, for something like this.  With hindsight, we probably could have sold it for much more than that, but the folks in charge always underestimated the selling power of bands like Harem Scarem.

If it’s true that there’s only 500 copies out there, then I’m thrilled.

Oh, who am I kidding?  It’s a rarity no matter what!  I’m still thrilled!

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HAREM SCAREM – Acoustic Sessions Limited Edition (1991 Warner Music)

The EP starts with a 3:16 edit version of their single “Something To Say”, the fifth single from Harem Scarem’s self-titled debut album.  It’s a ballad, pleasant enough, acoustic.  It has a really nice acoustic guitar solo courtesy of virtuoso player Pete Lesperance.  Otherwise I’ve never considered it a standout.  If you like “To Be With You” by Mr. Big or “More Than Words” by Extreme, this is another ballad for your collection.  This same version was later released on another EP called Live & Acoustic.

Onto the exclusive acoustic tracks.  These three songs were only available here, or the 1994 Japanese import version of the debut album.  Good luck finding that today at a decent price!

The debut single “Slowly Slipping Away” (co-written by songsmith Marc Ribler) is rendered in acoustic form first.  These acoustic sessions were recorded at Cabin Fever studios and self-produced by Lesperance and singer Harry Hess.  As great a song as “Slowly Slipping Away” surely is, I think it does miss something in its acoustic form.  That really nice electric guitar hook that precedes the verses, I miss it!  I also miss that throbbing bassline.  Yet the band’s incredible harmony vocals are just as powerful as ever.

“How Long” is next, a great album track in acoustic form.   The chorus is just as big and dramatic as the album version, thanks to the band’s trademark harmonies.  In my opinion, the band’s strength here was the original drummer, Darren Smith.  What a voice.  (The quartet were rounded out by original bassist Mike Gionet who stayed for three studio albums and a couple live releases.)

“Hard To Love” was not a single, but it works really well acoustically and maybe should have been a single after all.   Once again the harmonies soar, with Smith in particularly standing out.  I’ve always felt that the band really lost something when he left in the early 2000’s.  This is a great track, radio ready and full of hooks.

The fifth and final track is just the regular album version of “Something To Say”, at 4:41, with the full (intricate) acoustic intro.

For a five song EP, this one is a winner.  Just wish I knew more about its history!

4/5 stars

ADDED NOTE:  Reader Danny has emailed the haremscarem.net site, and heard back from somebody regarding there being only 500 copies of this CD:

yes it’s true. Very rare now, because it was released in this very limited quantity.
Take care,
Dan

Thanks for sharing!

REVIEW: Def Leppard – “Acoustic Medley 2012” (iTunes single)

Acoustic Medley

DEF LEPPARD – “Acoustic Medley 2012” (iTunes single)

Def Leppard have released the second in their series of iTunes re-recordings.  The first, a double single of “Pour Some Sugar”/”Rock of Ages”, was a pretty straight “forgery” (to use Joe Elliot’s phrase).  The second, entitled “Acoustic Medley 2012” is exactly what it sounds like it would be.  Apparently, Leppard were playing this medley live, and decided to commit a studio version to tape.

The songs in the medley are: “Where Does Love Go When It Dies”, “Now”, “When Love and Hate Collide”, “Have You Ever Needed Someone So Bad”, and “Two Steps Behind”.  Total time:  7:32.  The first two songs in the medley, I give Def Lep full points for.  I’ve always been a sucker for the Slang album, so to hear something from Slang again, is just…wow.  Maybe this is being done to pre-hype the Slang deluxe edition due 2013, eh?

“Now”, and the X album in general I’ve never been a huge fan of, as I made clear in my review.  I give the band credit for putting “Now” back out there, since they rarely touch that album anymore.   I’m all for obscure material being resurrected.

The other three tunes in the medley are a bit ho-hum, but taken as a whole it’s incredible how well they all work together.  “Two Steps Behind” gets the majority of time in the medley, a song that I really never need to hear again.  It’s pretty much identical to the standard version from the Retro-Active CD.

As mentioned, this is an iTunes-only release, but I’d love to see a physical product.  Limited edition vinyl?  I would buy that.  Are you listening, Joe?

4/5 stars

REVIEW: Foo Fighters – Live In Rio 2001

Next in line of my reviews from Record Store Excursion 2012!  Check out the video below if you missed it.  This one bought at Sonic Boom Music at Bloor and Bathurst.

MIKE AND AARON GO TO TORONTO

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FOO FIGHTERS  – Live In Rio 2001 (2012 IMC Music Ltd.)

This is sort of an oddball release, fully 11 years after the concert itself, on some weird label called Immortal.  This is probably taken from the Rock In Rio 2001 broadcast.  Bootlegs from that show are pretty common.  I have a Guns N’ Roses bootleg from the same concerts.  I believe they were on pay-per-view.

I’ve heard some people complain that Dave Grohl screams too much live, and he certainly does scream a lot in this show.  If you’re not into it, I get it.  It doesn’t bother me personally.  His vocals are a bit shaky, as it sounds like he’s doing a lot of jumping around.

Sound quality is decent.  I look at these as really well made bootlegs.  Don’t expect anything that sounds like a flawless modern live album.  It’s perfectly listenable though.  You can hear all the instruments clearly enough (although bass is a bit muddy) and Dave’s vocal/screaming is up front and loud.

The setlist is jam packed full of early Foo classics.   13 songs, plus a little bit of “Happy Birthday” as the following day (Jan 14th 2001) was Dave’s birthday!

Amusingly, Dave dedicates “Monkey Wrench” to Guns N’ Roses who were playing the following day.  Dave says he’s never really seen Guns N’ Roses before.  Well, isn’t that Kurt’s fault, Dave?  You could have opened for them on the 1992 tour with Metallica!

There’s one weird flaw with the CD.  At the beginning at track 14, “Everlong” (not even listed on the CD), the wrong song begins.  Instead, it’s “Stacked Actors” which is also track 6.  This goes on for over two minutes, and finally it fades into a truncated “Everlong”.  I have no explanation.

3/5 stars

Part 153: Russian Imports

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RECORD STORE TALES Part 153:  Russian Imports

One of the weirder items that we used to see regularly were these Russian import discs.  Their status as official releases was very questionable, the quality was cheap at best, and the guy that sold them wanted top dollar for them all.

His name was Serge, and he was a Russian model.  Seriously.  He gave me his business card one time.  He was a model, and he had the perfect Fabio hair and everything.  On the side, he’d bring CD’s over to Canada from Russia. They would usually come without jewel cases, just the CD and the paper cover art, so he could transport more of them.  The discs often ended up terribly scratched because of this.  He’d bring over “greatest hits” releases from everybody.  Springsteen, Abba, Bon Jovi, even bands that didn’t have greatest hits releases like AC/DC.  Often the Russians would throw on “bonus tracks” from live or solo albums.

The guy was a real pain to deal with, and most of the stuff he brought over was obscure European dance, trance, techno stuff that nobody had heard of over here.  He’d assume he was going to get a lot of money for them, because they were big in Europe.  But if nobody had heard of them in Canada, and they sat on my shelf for a year, no, I’m not paying top dollar for it.   So, eventually Serge stopped coming in.

I bought two albums from him that I’ve never played, but bought just “for the collection”.  One is a Kiss disc called Hit Collection 2000, the other by Europe, called Best Ballads.

Hit Collection 2000 is on a label called “DJ’s Club”.  It does not have the official Kiss logo, just a poor attempt to copy it.  There are some spelling errors on the back — I don’t know where “Detrot Rock City”  is.  The tracklist itself is pretty weird, containing newer songs like “Psycho Circus” and “I Finally Found My Way”, along with one track from each of the four Kiss solo albums.  There are three songs from Dynasty, and three rare live cuts from the Psycho Circus Live Australian disc.  This one came sealed but I didn’t even bother to open it.  Even Serge’s sealed discs often ended up scratched to pieces, I don’t know how that happens because these are clearly factory sealed.

The Europe album, Best Ballads, is notable for not depicting keyboardist Mic Michaeli on the front cover, even though he plays on the majority of songs.  The album contains ballads from Europe’s first monumental self-titled disc through to 1991’s Prisoners In Paradise.  The Russians picked some cool songs this time:  “Words of Wisdom” and “The King Will Return”, from the first album, “Dreamer” from Wings of Tomorrow, and “Coast To Coast” from Out of This World.  As usual there are three “bonus tracks”; “Under the Influence”, “Lord of the Manor”, and “Elsewhere” from Joey Tempest’s 1995 solo album A Place to Call Home.   Not that you would know this from the liner notes, since there are none.  Just a paper sleeve.

In the end I don’t think we missed Serge when he decided not to deal with us anymore.  A lot of his product sat on the shelves.  In fact I tried selling my Kiss Hit Collection CD back to the store last year, and they refused to take it.  Lesson learned!

REVIEW: Foo Fighters – Wasting Light (2011 CD, iTunes edition)

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FOO FIGHTERS – Wasting Light (2011 Roswell Records)

The much anticipated new Foo Fighters album was a big deal to us fans — for the first time, a five-man lineup, three guitar players, and the return of Pat Smear. In other words this album has the same lineup as the glorious Colour and the Shape era of the band, plus Chris Shifflet. Add on expert production by Butch Vig, mixing by Alan Moulder. It sounds glorious! What it lacks in the diversity from the previous two albums, it makes up with the sheer youthful energy from the first two.

Wasting Light hits you right away with the one-two punch of “Bridge Burning” and “Rope”, fast jagged hard rock songs with riffs and Grohl screams. Not totally immediate, but they set the stage for some of the best tunage the Foos have ever laid to wax.

The dark and powerful “Dear Rosemary” is the first bonafide classic on this album, and you can definitely hear the benefit of the three guitars as rhythm & catchy licks merge into one moving whole.  “Dear Rosemary”, features Bob Mould (Husker Du) sharing lead vocal duties.  What an incredible song.  It was a bit of genius inspiration, working with Mould on it.  The result is an instant classic, one of the best Foo tunes in the canon.  (A Foo-Du tune?)

“White Limo” starts with a brutally heavy metal riff, something that harkens back to Voivod, with Grohl doing his best distorted metal screams overtop. This is primo thrash metal, a total surprise for me. I always knew Grohl was a metalhead, but I didn’t expect anything this overtly metal to appear on a Foo Fighters album. But it’s a welcome change, and my current favourite song for pure adrenaline pumping energy.

“Arlandria” starts slower, but builds to a melodic, dramatic chorus with crashing chords and cymbals. By this time the album has begun to take shape: It has melody but the foundation is the guitar riffage. “These Days” is a total change of pace, a much softer song, but still propelled forward by the beats of Taylor Hawkins, and of course the guitars still crash come chorus time.

“Back and Forth” has a pretty crummy snare drum sound, but Nate Mendel’s bass rings clear and true underneath. It takes a while to get going, but the chorus is still solid. “A Matter of Time” is the weakest song so far, an awkward, jagged non-standout rocker.

“Miss the Misery” is a return to form, starting with a brief “Nobody’s Fault But Mine” drone before settling into an i irresistible set of melodies, punctuated by catchy guitar licks buzzing in and out of the mix. Again, you can hear where three guitar players is coming in handy, as there is a lot going on here guitar-wise. Fee Waybill on guest vocals! Next, Nirvana fans will be excited by an appearance by Krist Novoselic on “I Should Have Known”. Including Pat Smear, this is a reunion of the three surviving members of the final Nirvana lineup, a little mini-historic event in the annals of rock. It is a slow mournful song, with Grohl’s voice back in the mix, singing “I cannot forgive you yet”. It is a beautiful song, and a welcome change of pace. Novoselic’s bass, when it kicks in about halfway, just rumbles. It ends as dramatically as anything else on the album.

The standard edition of the album closes with a song called “Walk”. This is a brighter song, guitars chiming and ringing, and exactly the way an album like this needs to end. But suddenly the pace picks up, and the guitars cascade like the greatest Foo songs of old. This one reminds me, for a number of reasons including riffs, melody and pacing, of “New Way Home”, the awesome closer from Colour and the Shape.

The Foos have created another fine album, not an easy thing to do when you have albums like Colour and the Shape and In Your Honor under your collective belts. They certainly have lost nothing to age, and they have not exhausted their energies. I also think that, after two very diverse albums, it was exactly the right move to return to a predominantly rock direction for this album. It re-grounds the bands back to their roots.

It’s not over yet though, as the iTunes and Japanese editions of the album have bonus tracks. iTunes have an absolutely useless remix of “Rope” by Deadmau5. I guess people who like this kind of music will appreciate it, but it has no place on an album like this. It is monotonous and boring, a waste of five minutes of my time. Much more appropriate is another song called “Better Off”. “Better Off” is almost Beatles-y in melody, but with heavy layered guitars pummeling your ears. I love the lyrics as well — “You know you’re better off, you bastard!”

Wasting Light has been a great and pleasant surprise to me. I wasn’t sure what direction the Foo Fighters were going to take with this record, but I’m pleased that they took a step back to guitar-based basics, yet still retained all the lessons they learned about melody, songwriting and arranging.

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BONUS! Just to do something special and unique, and to make a point about recording this album straight to analog tape (no computers!), Dave Grohl has sliced up his original master tape for Wasting Light, and included a piece inside the first run of the CD. Cool, man.  Worth hunting down a first pressing for, if you care about such things!

5/5 stars!

REVIEW: Miscellaneous Maiden – Maiden Heaven / “Space Truckin'”

Part 41 of my series of Iron Maiden reviews!  This time, we’ll talk about the Kerrang! exclusive tribute album Maiden Heaven, and a cover tune that didn’t make it onto the B-sides for A Matter of Life and Death.

This will be the last Maiden review of this series before Christmas.  After the holiday we’ll reconvene so be sure to check back!  

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TRIBUTE TO IRON MAIDEN – Maiden Heaven (2008)

A little bit out of continuity, I wanted to get this release out of the way before we get into the next Maiden studio album.  Maiden Heaven was a Kerrang! exclusive tribute album, probably out of print.  I received this from my bud Dan Slessor who writes for the mag.  It was especially interesting to me for the exclusive Metallica and Dream Theater tracks!  Thus far, neither of these tracks have been reissued on releases by either band!

“Remember Tomorrow” by Metallica is friggin’ amazing.  It sounds exactly as you would expect, retaining the hard/soft vibe of the original, but with Kirk’s slippery soloing and Lars’ machine gun snare fills.  James nails the vocal with his trademark growl.  I would consider this among the very best covers that Metallica have recorded.  As James says, “Yeeeahh-yah!”  Unfortunately, there are no producer credits.

Dream Theater had the guts to cover “To Tame A Land”, one of my personal favourite tracks from Piece of Mind.  Dream Theater have been nothing but courageous their entire career, so it is only suitable that they would tackle one of the lesser-appreciated Maiden epics, and one of the rhythmically most challenging.  Mike Portnoy was still the drummer at this time.  It’s interesting to hear the song performed with keyboards since the original was so sparse and dry (reflecting the planet Dune itself).  But the keyboards lend a more exotic middle-eastern flavour.  It is also interesting hearing anyone but Steve Harris playing the bass line since it is such an integral part of the song.  Nothing against James Myung, the man is an absolute master of his instrument, but any time anybody covers Maiden, the bass always sticks out like a sore thumb because nobody sounds like Steve.  James LaBrie has no problem tackling the challenging vocal, high notes and all.

Other bands that appear on the disc include Coheed and Cambria (“The Trooper”), Avenged Sevenfold (“Flash of the Blade”…woo!), Trivium (“Iron Maiden”) and Machine Head (“Hallowed Be Thy Name”).  Most of the rest of the bands I have never heard of, but I also liked this soft acoustic n’ keys version of “Brave New World” by a band called Ghostline.   One that I definitely hated was “Run To The Hills” by some band called Sign.  It’s just…weird.  Unique, but just wrong.

Overall, an interesting listen but I really only need it for Metallica and Dream Theater.

3/5 stars

And second, from the brand new Deep Purple tribute album…

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IRON MAIDEN – “Space Truckin'” from the Deep Purple tribute album Re-Machined (2012)

Although this came out in 2012, the Maiden track “Space Truckin'” was recorded during the A Matter of Life and Death sessions for use as a B-side. Last time, I talked about the other cover they recorded, “Hocus Pocus” (by Focus!) which made it to the “Different World” single.  “Space Truckin'” went unreleased, until now.

Sonically, it is very raw, sounding live off the floor.  Some fans were underwhelmed by the track.  I think it’s obvious that Bruce is thrilled to be covering his idol, Ian Gillan.  He throws in lots of those little Gillan idiosyncrasies.  “Eee-hoo-hoo!”  While I think Maiden did a fine job on the track (especially considering they don’t have a keyboard player), this is not one of the great Maiden covers.  It’s no “I’ve Got The Fire” or “Massacre”.  It’s still a total treat to hear Maiden gleefully ripping through this classic.  If this was actually live in front of an audience, I think it would have been better received.

3/5 stars

Part 152: Carnival of Lost Souls

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RECORD STORE TALES Part 152:  Carnival of Lost Souls

The Year:  1996

The Place:  Dr. Disc, Hamilton Ontario

The Guilty Party:  Me

Remember when the original Kiss reunited back in ’96?  It was a huge deal.  Everybody was talking about it.  What very few people were talking about was the studio album that the previous Kiss lineup (with Eric Singer and Bruce Kulick) had completed prior to the reunion.  That album, Carnival of Souls, was shelved to avoid confusion.

It was, however, leaked.  Or, at least most of it was.  It revealed a new, grungier Kiss ready to take on the likes of Alice in Chains and Soundgarden.  Not a bad album in fact, and some songs such as “Hate” and “In My Head” were downright vicious.  A buddy of mine, Len Labelle, hooked me up with a poor-sounding cassette.  It was better than nothing.

Both Gene and Paul pooh-poohed the idea of a release.  You’d read things like, “We don’t know when it’s coming out,” or “We have no plans to release it right now.”  But I was digging that tape and I wanted a CD, dammit!

T-Rev, Tom and myself were at a record show in Hamilton, and we stopped at a local Dr. Disc.  I went over to the Kiss section.  I saw two discs, both at $30 staring me in the face:  the ultra rare Japanese import Chikara, a greatest hits album, and a bootleg copy of Carnival of Souls…

I had a limited budget and could only buy one.  I chose Carnival of Souls.  I’ve never seen a copy of Chikara again.  And Kiss officially issued Carnival 9 months later, rendering my bootleg obselete.  I can’t give it away, today.

It was a bad call, Ripley!  Bad call!

So what about this bootleg that I bought?  Well, it has a few notable features.

  1. The title is wrong.  The title on the bootleg is Carnival of Lost Souls.
  2. The wrong lineup is on the front and back covers.  They show the original Kiss, in makeup.
  3. Even though it says it’s “the complete 11 track version” on the front cover, Carnival of Souls has 12 tracks.  Missing is “I Walk Alone”, the lone Bruce Kulick lead vocal.
  4. The songs are in the wrong order, and most have the wrong titles.

For example:

  • “Hate” = “Hate (Is What I Am)”
  • “Master & Slave” = “Tell Me”
  • “Rain” = “I Think It’s Gonna Rain (Down On Me)”
  • “It Never Goes Away” = “It Never Ends”
  • “In the Mirror” = “(Take A Look) In the Mirror”
  • “I Confess” = “You Confess”

At best, this is now just a weird oddity that sits in my closet, unlistened to, unwanted, unloved, for the rest of eternity.  There’s $30 I’ll never get back again.  Yeah, like I said, it was a bad call!

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REVIEW: Iron Maiden – “The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg” / “Different World” singles

Part 40 of my series of Iron Maiden reviews!

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IRON MAIDEN – “The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg” / “Different World” (CD, vinyl, DVD, download singles)

There were a lot of B-sides made available for A Matter of Life and Death, so let’s talk about ’em all, shall we?  It’s the last time we’ll have a chance to do so, as since this time Maiden haven’t released any B-sides at all.

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“The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg” (CD, 10″ vinyl)

This awesome song was made available in two formats.  Both had BBC Legends sessions.  The CD has a great version of “Hallowed By That Name”, which is also the iTunes bonus track.  If you’re like me, no doubt you prefer a physical format to a bunch of 1’s and 0’s floating invisibly on your hard drive, yes?   If that is indeed the case, then the CD single is where it’s at, and it’s a corker.  I love the sound of the three guitars on this one.  Not one, but two playing the melody, with one playing the rhythm.

There’s also a beautiful 10″ vinyl, with a sticker.  Clear 10″ vinyl, very cool.  The vinyl had two more songs from this session:  “The Trooper” and “Run to the Hills”.  Now, if you’ve been following along, then you’re already aware there are plenty of live versions of all three of these tracks on the various Maiden live albums, not to mention previous B-sides, and the Eddie’s Archive box.  What’s the difference?  Well, if you want all the power and breakneck energy of a Maiden live performance without crowd noise, this is the way to hear it.  It’s live in the studio.

CD

  1. “The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg”
  2. “Hallowed Be That Name” (Radio 1 ‘Legends’ Session)

10″ vinyl

A. “The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg”
B1. “The Trooper” (Radio 1 ‘Legends’ Session)
B2. “Run to the Hills” (Radio 1 ‘Legends’ Session)

5/5 stars

“Different World” (US CD single, UK CD single, DVD single, 7″ single, download)

This is where things start getting a little crazy.  Yes, you had to buy five different formats to get all the tracks.  Incredible.  It’s stuff like this that makes me miss the simpler old days of collecting!  Let’s go through these, one by one.

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US CD

This one was redundant if you already own the “Benjamin Breeg” singles.  This one repeats “The Trooper” and “Hallowed” from that single, leaving “Run To The Hills” as a vinyl exlusive.

  1. “Different World”
  2. “Hallowed Be That Name” (Radio 1 ‘Legends’ Session)
  3. “The Trooper” (Radio 1 ‘Legends’ Session)

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UK CD

Europe had their own exclusive CD B-side, however.

  1. “Different World”
  2. “Iron Maiden” (Live in Copenhagen on the A Matter of Life and Death tour)

So, yes, I shelled out for a live version of a song that I already have numerous live versions of!  (4 versions on the BBC Archives album alone!)  Life of a collector.  How does it differ from other live versions?  Shit, I don’t know.

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DVD single

DVD singles seemed to be a passing fad, somewhat.  I hope so anyway.  I don’t like ’em.  I don’t see the point of 1) putting out a single that you can’t play in some countries due to region codes, and 2) putting out an audio track on a video format.  This being Maiden though, I made sure I bought this, from the UK Amazon site.

  1. “Different World”
  2. “The Reincarnation of Benjamin Breeg” (Live in Copenhagen on the A Matter of Life and Death tour)
  3. “Hocus Pocus”

At least the music has some value to it!  A live version of “Benjamin Breeg”, the first and thus far only live release of that song.  And as per Maiden’s usual high standards, it’s freaking great.

But the real cool thing is “Hocus Pocus”, a cover of, yes, the song by Focus!  Lead vocals…sort of…are by Nicko.  No yodeling though.  Just Nicko’s usual nonsensical ramblings in the background! Worth having for sure, but as a cover…what’s the point without the yodeling?  As a cover version, it’s disappointing.  Nicko yodeling?  That would have been awesome.

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7″ single

A picture disc, and a sweet looking one at that, this one has a live version of “Fear of the Dark”.

A. “Different World”
B. “Fear of the Dark” (Live in Copenhagen on the A Matter of Life and Death tour)

Once again, it’s a B-side that we already have lots of live versions of, nothing wrong with it, but nothing especially different either.

different world mp3

mp3 download single

  1.  “Different World” (Live in Aalborg on the A Matter of Life and Death tour)
  2. “Interview with Steve Harris on A Matter of Life and Death”

And another brand new live track!  Once again, this one has yet to be released on any live albums, so it truly is an exclusive.  It was available via the official Maiden site.  It’s cool to hear Steve and Adrian joining Bruce on the chorus, it sounds great.

The interview with Steve, 10 minutes long, I do not have.  Interviews are not high on my priority list for collecting, and it is no longer available.  It was only made available to those who pre-ordered the mp3 single, which I did not do.  There was also an interview disc made available with the Eddie’s Head box set, which I do not have.  Not a big deal to me, the music has always been what I’ve aimed to collect.

4.5/5 stars

REVIEW: The Hellacopters – Disappointment Blues (EP)

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THE HELLACOPTERS – Disappointment Blues (1998 EP, Augogo)

I don’t know too much about this EP, but when I found it at my local record slinger for $6.99 (plus 20% off, sweet!) I had to snap it up.  I only have three other Hellacopters albums: on vinyl, Grande Rock and Payin’ the Dues.  On CD, the more polished and streamlined By the Grace of God.  Finding a Hellacopters EP for under $6 was a no-brainer.

Disappointment Blues seems to compile a five rare non-album singles and compilation tracks, with two new songs (“Ferrytale” and “455 SD”).  It seems to be designed for the Australian market as it advertises several 1998 Aussie tour dates inside.

It’s another raw, high-energy rock n’ roll batch of songs, not too different from Grande Rock or Payin’ the Dues.   In the liner notes, the band refers to their sound as “hot action rock”.  Sounds good to me!  The tempos are fast and falling apart at the seams.  The riffs are early Kiss on speed, the solos pure rock n’ roll.  The songs meld together in the memory like one marathon tune with a little breathing space between sections.  Again, much like Grande Rock or Payin’ the Dues.  The bassline on “Speedfreak” is taken from the Lemmy Kilmister book of licks, the song itself could have been on any Motorhead disc.

Best song:  the title track, which has a little more emphasis on melody and is totally memorable.

Best band member:  the piano player because he goes by the name of Boba Fett!

4/5 stars

Part 151: 24kt KISS…cheap at twice the price

RECORD STORE TALES Part 151:

24kt KISS…cheap at twice the price

Spring, 1998.  Saturday.  A rare day off.

I was out with a friend named Shannon.  Me being the geek that I am, I thought it would be a good idea to take Shannon to a comic book store.  So I did.  Off we went to uptown Waterloo, to my favourite comic book store in the whole universe, Carry On Books.

The owner, Andy, warmly welcomed us and immediately started trying to sell me some Star Trek goods.  I said, “Not today, Andy.  Do you have anything Kiss?”

He did.  He had this Kiss 24kt gold-plated framed Destroyer CD.  It was $250.  But he was willing to sell it to me for $200 if I paid cash.

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Sure, why not.  Sold.

Shannon and I ran down to the cash machine, and I eagerly inserted my card.  Selected the dollar amount.  Waited.  And waited.  And waited.  The machine spat out my card, and a statement saying I’d taken the money out.  But no money emerged from the machine!

I stood there for a moment before saying, “Shannon, is it just me, or did no money come out?”

I was ripped off by a cash machine!

I repeated the transaction, this time getting the money, but my bank account was lighter by twice the amount!

Shit!

I went back to Andy’s store, told him the tale, bought the Kiss plaque, and went into the bank to get my missing money back.  Turns out I would have to wait for them to cash out that night and see if they balanced.  And I wasn’t going to be in town!  I was headed to the cottage later that day.  I had to wait the weekend through before finding out the fate of my hard-earned dollars.

Thankfully, when I called the bank on the Monday, they had found an overage and refunded my money.  But for that entire weekend, I had worried that I paid $400 for this Kiss plaque!

CODA:  And today, the plaque is still worth…just $200 on eBay.  Oh well.  An investment, it wasn’t.  But it does look cool on my wall.  Thankfully I also kept the box, these things are often only worth their full value with the box intact.