I received my first comment on a video made almost a year ago, with over 1200 views! Please welcome @tcconnection to the show! They took offense to my looping of Sebastian Bach’s amusing laugh in the video at bottom.
The ironic thing about @tcconnection is that they have none – zero, nada – videos on their channel, but still had the balls to post this.
The other ironic thing is that I have, in fact, made videos that benefit society. Check out Adventures in Epilepsy for example.
How much do you wanna make a bet that @tcconnection never replies, and never makes a video of their own?
Readers may not be familiar with Jake Not From State Farm, so let me introduce you. If you tune in to John Clauser’s channel My Music Corner, he’s done several great videos with Jake. Additionally, Jake will be joining us later this year for some albums on 50 Years of Iron Maiden. It turns out that both Jake and Harrison love Blaze Bayley. And so, they became friends.
Jake had a batch of duplicate CDs that he donated to Harrison’s collection, two of which I want! That damn Harrison keeps ending up with more and more CDs that I want for myself.
Joining us for this unboxing episode is the man who introduced us to Jake in the first place, Mr. Johnny Clauser. Mostly, we let Harrison do the unboxing, and lots of show and tell. Enjoy this short episode.
Jen and I were B-Side Ourselves to find that James Kalyn had sent me some surprise vinyl when I was feeling down and low. It so happened James was available on Friday night for an unboxing. So that’s what we did! What did he send? Here are some clues:
I’ve never hid my disappointment that Skid Row have been unable to hang into a lead singer for long since Sebastian Bach’s 1996 ouster. Johnny Solinger was their best shot at a permanent lead singer, since replaced by a dizzying array of vocalists. Erik Grönwall, from Swedish Idol and H.E.A.T., was probably the biggest hope. Sadly, as a cancer survivor, Erik was forced to resign and focus on his health. The one album he made with Skid Row, The Gang’s All Here, received critical acclaim in 2022 and was called Album of the Year by several outlets.
Erik Grönwall brings the necessary range and power, more so than Solinger. Unfortunately, both Solinger and Bach had a lot of character in their voices. Grönwall has a more generic sound, and this robs Skid Row of some of what made them special. He almost sounds too good, too professional.
A lot of people will disagree and that’s fine. We’re all entitled to our opinions.
Only two songs here, “Time Bomb” (sort of a punky rewrite of “Piece of Me”) and “The Gang’s All Here”, made it onto the tour setlist. 80% of the album was not played live. There are shout-along choruses, Kiss-like guitar licks, and Bolan’s bass bounce…but do the songs stick to the brain like albums of yore? Some do. The best moments are the ones that recall the past, such as “Resurrected” which has a “Monkey Business” familiarity. Unfortunately, the trite lyrics are another one of those “we’re back where we belong” kind of songs.
The strongest song is the ballad “October’s Song”, which comes closest to nailing the timeless Skid Row level of quality. Grönwall’s schooled approach to singing is opposed to Bach’s desperate passion to blow down the biggest of buildings, but that was a long time ago, and Bach is never coming back. “October’s Song” has some great riffage and should have been made a permanent part of the setlist. You’ll not find a better song among the new ones. We’ll say it right here: this song stands up against the back catalogue, even the intense Slave to the Grind ballads.
Credit due: Skid Row almost go activist on the environmental message song “World On Fire”.
Much of the album was written with previous singer Z.P. Theart, of Dragonforce. Core Skid Row members “Snake” Sabo, Scotty Hill, and Rachel Bolan handle the majority of songwriting, retaining Rob Hammersmith on drums.
If you want a new Skid Row album that you can pump your fist to, stomp your feet, or bang your head, then The Gang’s All Here is a must-buy. If you were hoping for a Skid Row album that you’ll remember for years like Slave to the Grind, Subhuman Race, or even Thickskin, then the jury is still out. Thickskin had way better songs – there, I said it!
I love admitting to my past musical sins. Perhaps others will learn from my mistakes.
I was in grade 11, a mere 16 years old, when the music video for “Youth Gone Wild” hit the airwaves. Skid Row were the latest thing, a band promoted by Jon Bon Jovi himself, from his home state of New Jersey. We didn’t know yet that the lead singer, Sebastian Bach, identified as a Canadian. He grew up in Peterborough Ontario, just on the other side of Toronto. In fact, I didn’t know that I already had something of Bach in my music video collection. I had a brief clip of him, with teased up hair, in a prior band called Madame X. This band was led by Maxine Petrucci, sister of Roxy Petrucci from Vixen. They featured a young Sebastian Bach and Mark “Bam Bam” McConnell whom Bach would play with in VO5. I wasn’t into any of those bands. I was pretty hard-headed about what I liked and disliked.
In Spring 1989, I first encountered “Youth Gone Wild” on the Pepsi Power Hour. It could have been Michael Williams hosting, but whoever it was, they hyped up this new band called Skid Row. I liked getting in on new bands from the ground floor. Made them easier to collect when you started at the start. At that point, I wasn’t even sure how many albums Judas Priest actually had. I was intrigued enough to hit “record” on my VCR as the music video began. I caught the opening “Ba-boom!” of drums, and sat back to watch.
While I wasn’t blown away, I kept recording. The key was the singer. If the singer sucked, I’d usually hit “stop” and rewind back to where I was. The singer passed the test: he didn’t suck. I kept recording.
After about a minute, I pressed the “stop” button, and lamented that this new band wasn’t for me. What happened? What did Skid Row do to turn me off so quickly?
I can admit this. I’ve always been open about the fact that I was very image-driven as a teenager. We all were! With the exception of maybe George Balazs, all the neighborhood kids were into image to some degree or another. I was probably driven by image more than the average kid, consuming magazines and music videos by the metric tonne. So, what exactly was wrong with Skid Row?
I’ll tell ya, folks. It was serious.
The bass player had a chain going from his nose to his ear.
I just could not. I couldn’t put a poster on my wall with some band that had a bass player with a chain that went from his nose to his ear! No way, no f’n way.
I pressed rewind, and prepared to record the next video over Skid Row.
That summer, the glorious, legendary summer of ’89, I went with Warrant. I bought their debut album sight-unseen, based on a blurb in the Columbia House catalogue. Warrant were the selection of the month. “What the hell,” I thought, and checked the box to order it immediately.
Meanwhile, Bob Schipper and the girl I liked, named Tammy, were really into Skid Row. They knew all about my issues with the nose chain. They got under my skin about it a bit, but I wouldn’t bend on Skid Row.
“18 and Life” was the next single, a dark power ballad that was easy for me to ignore. “I Remember You” was harder to pass on. It was the perfect acoustic ballad for 1989. You had the nostalgic lyrics, which Bob and I both connected with. Somehow, we knew that 1989 was the absolute pinnacle. We knew this would be the summer to beat! Bon Jovi and Def Leppard were still on the charts. Aerosmith and Motley Crue had new singles out with albums incoming. We walked around singing “Summer of ’69” by Bryan Adams, except we changed the words to “Summer of ’89”. We just knew. “Got my first real six string…” we sang. And we both had our own fairly new guitars that we could barely play.
“I Remember You” was a massive hit, and still I resisted.
“Because of the nose chain?” Bob Schipper questioned me.
Absolutely because of the nose chain!
I stood firm for two years. Bob Schipper went to college, and Tammy was long distance and not meant to last. I felt a bit like an island by the time 1991 rolled around. I felt alone. My best friend was gone, I had no girlfriend, and most of my school friends went their own ways. I was a loner like I’d never been in my life before. Music was my companion, and my beloved rock magazines were my library.
That’s how Skid Row eventually got me. Sebastian Bach had a good friend in Drew Masters, who published the excellent M.E.A.T Magazine out of Toronto. Drew’s praise for the forthcoming second Skid Row album, Slave to the Grind, was unrelenting. He caught my ear. I was looking for heavier music in my life, not satisfied with Priest’s Painkiller as one of the heaviest albums I owned. I wanted more rock, and I wanted it heavy.
The other thing that got me was the collector’s itch. When I found out that Slave to the Grind was released in two versions with different exclusive songs, I was triggered. I had to have both.
“I’ll make a tape, and put both songs on my version!” It was a pretty cool idea.
Costco had Slave to the Grind in stock. They had the full-on version with “Get the Fuck Out”, the song that was excluded from the more store-friendly version. Columbia House stocked the tame version, which had a completely different song called “Beggars Day”. I bought the CD from Costco, the vinyl from Columbia House, and suddenly I was the only guy in town who had the full set. I made my cassette with joy, recreating the Skid Row logo on the spine, and writing the song titles in with red ink.
“Get the Fuck Out” was track 6, side one. “Beggars Day” was track 7, side one. I still have them in that order in my mp3 files today.
Sure, there was an audible change in sound when the tape source went from CD to vinyl, but I couldn’t afford two CD copies. Little did I know how cool it would be later on to have an original vinyl copy of Slave to the Grind.
I loved the album. I loved all three of the ballads. The production was sharp. There were excellent deep cuts: “The Threat”, “Livin’ on a Chain Gang”, and “Riot Act” were all as great as any of the singles. Furthermore, the singer had taken it to new heights of intensity and excellence.
I let Skid Row into my heart that day. It was a good decision. Skid Row accompanied me through times good and bad, lonely and angry. They were my companion through it all, and they’re still pretty good. It was meant to be!
It started in second grade, and for no reason that anyone knows. There was a kid in my class named Steve. My enemy. A born bully, he had his radar locked onto me the very first year we met. Because he was the classic bully, needing to project strength to the other kids, he sensed that I was the only one he could go after and wouldn’t fight back. That’s how bullies operate. Picking on me in class, in the school yard, in gym. He always had someone else nearby, and I was always alone. The teachers did not care. Catholic school was the worst, because the teachers preferred to ignore these things or blame both parties. They thought that teaming me up with Steve in gym was a way to make us get along. Teaming up the abused with abuser. Real smart. We had to do stretches together and support each other as we stretched back and forth. The thought of touching that bastard’s skin made me feel sick. Needless to say, I hated him just as much afterwards as before. Well done, Catholic school teachers!
The torment went on for a couple years until I finally had enough. In grade four he went one step too far and I fought him at recess one day — our first actual fight. I lost it and pummeled him. He later claimed that I broke his tooth, which I doubt, but I took it as bragging rights. I remember a bigger kid lifting me up off of Steve and dragging me away. “He started it!” I screamed. “He started it!” As usual, the victim got in as much shit as the perpetrator. That’s just how bullying works. We both had to go to the library for detention after school, but I don’t think either of us actually went and I don’t think any teachers noticed. I could care less — I knew I was in the right. When you push someone relentlessly eventually they push back. Half of the thrill for the bully is finding out how much they have to push to get to that breaking point. It took him two years. Shithead Steve got what he deserved that time, and there was no way I was accepting a punishment for it.
Steve wasn’t in my class for grade five which was a reprieve. It was not to last. Grade six was bad. He was back at it, but I had an idea. The Catholic and public schools had March break on different weeks, and when Shithead was going at me hard that month, I asked my friend Bob to show up at school to intimidate him. Bob was off for the break, was two years older, and towered over everyone else. He didn’t show up on the Wednesday, and the bullying intensified that afternoon. When he did come on the Thursday, I introduced him to Steve, who fell over backwards in fear. It was awesome. Bob didn’t have to do anything. He did just stood there and smiled. His imposing size did the rest and Shithead left me alone for a while again. But not forever.
Grade eight was the worst year for bullying. It was the year of the Mount Mary retreat. But it was also the year I got Steven off my back, permanently.
In September ’85 he started at me right away, and I wasn’t taking it. Bob was trying to teach me to stand up for myself. So, this was going to end. I was done taking his shit. I challenged him to fight and finish this. After he no-showed the first appointed date, I insisted — absolutely insisted — that we do this on my turf. No unfair advantages for him. So we met at the baseball diamond at Stanley Park School. He brought a bunch of his friends. All I had was Ian Johnson and Kevin Kirby, who weren’t really my friends at all. They sure didn’t seem like they were on my side. They made it clear they just there for the show. I was saddened but not surprised that my “backup” was just there to watch a fight.
We tangled. A lot of me chasing him around. I landed a punch in to the head — I’d never hit someone in the head with my fist before. I dragged him down on the ground and just beat the piss out of him. Then he got up and started running in circles. I nailed a few painful kicks on him, grabbed his shirt and got him on the ground again. I didn’t want to injure him. Just wanted him to cry. I stayed away from the head and face and laid a beating on his upper body. My watch broke, a fragile Transformers watch that I wish I still had. Steve cried and screamed. His scream was ungodly, but the truth is, like a sadist, I savoured every one. I wanted more. Heinous? Then this is my confessional. Over the last seven years, how many times did that bastard make me cry? He had this coming — and far more than I was willing to deliver. I just wanted to hear him scream again.
I let him up and then he started running around again, taunting me. This went on several times. Me getting him on the ground for a beating until he cried, then I’d let him up and he’d start running around again. He grabbed my hair a lot but I don’t remember him landing any hits.
Finally I’d had it with him. He obviously wasn’t going to concede, and I wasn’t going to damage his face. I decided to bring the evening to an close with a final humiliation. One more time, I got the little bastard on the ground and gave him a sound beating. Then I got up and gave my speech. It was a verbal tirade on the Art of Being a Loser. As he lay in the dirt, I declared Steven to be nothing more than a malodorous piece of shit, and the absolute loser of the day. It was pretty epic; I just improvised but it was Shakespearean thunder to me. I ended my little speech by proclaiming that everyone already knew that he was a loser.
“That’s all you are, and that’s all you’ll always be.”
I got on my bike and rode off alone, to the deafening silence behind me.
Home again, I went into the kitchen and told my mom I broke my watch in a fight. I burst into tears because I thought she’d be so disappointed in me.
I was also worried what the reaction would be the next day at school. After all, I declared myself the winner and departed alone on my bike. Would Shithead accept his defeat? Apparently so. He left me alone for the rest of the year. Either Kevin or Ian came up to talk to me later. “I was thinking about what you said about Steve. You were totally right. He IS a loser, and he’s always going to be one.” The validation didn’t matter as much to me as the fact that Shithead Steve was scared off. And he was. He kept his distance from then on.
At the end of the year he made some half-hearted comments about a rematch, but it was not to be. I caught Mono and was home sick for the rest of the school year. And that was the end of my enemy. He tried to make a comeback in grade nine, but his bullying powers were gone.
A loser for life. My predictions were correct. Today he is a pathetic antivaxxer, an angry drunk, and still a total piece of shit. He lived up to the full potential that we all saw that night on the baseball diamond in 1985. Well done.
Celine Dion was the host. Sebastian Bach (Skid Row) and Gil Moore (Triumph) were up to present an award.
For context:
On February 24 1993, Canadian Prime Minister Brian Mulroney, with a record low 21% approval rating, announced he was resigning. Bach and Moore were at the Junos a month later, on March 21. Watch what Sebastian does.
Power 30 host Teresa Roncon doesn’t let Baz off easy here. Yes she does bring up the “AIDS Kills Fags Dead” shirt, and Sebastian answers. It’s a fascinating interview from a different time, only a few years after “One In a Million” by Guns N’ Roses.
What do you think of Sebastian’s response on this?
And just in case you wanted to hear Sebastian’s laugh on loop again, here ya go!
This Sunday, a sneak preview of an upcoming episode of VHS Archives! Sebastian Bach of Skid Row sat down with Teresa Roncon on the Power 30 in 1992, and laughed real funny. I recorded it and 27 years later I made a clip of it. ENJOY!
Make A Difference Foundation – Stairway to Heaven/Highway to Hell (1989 Polygram)
In 1989, I proudly sported my Moscow Music Peace Festival T-shirt in the highschool halls. It was cool to see the rock bands on the forefront of heavy metal bringing music to the Soviet Union. Scorpions, Bon Jovi, Motley Crue, Cinderella, Ozzy Osbourne and Skid Row joined Russian metal band Gorky Park in the name of peace and being drug free.
Drug free? Ozzy? It’s true that this was a little strange, but Motley were at least clean for the first time in their lives. The Scorpions had played behind the Iron Curtain before, and Sabbath were huge in Russia. Meanwhile Bon Jovi were one of the few bands to legally release an album in the USSR, and in return they brought Gorky Park to the US. I was lucky enough to have a girlfriend who recorded the televised part of the concert off MTV and sent me a copy. It was a pretty mindblowing video. Those Russians were going absolutely nuts, seeing their idols on stage.
Later on, the bands each contributed a song to a compilation album called Stairway to Heaven/Highway to Hell, each covering an artist who had been touched by substance abuse. The CD was produced by the biggest name at the time, Bruce Fairbairn himself. The proceeds went to an anti-drug charity, for all the good “just saying no” does. The album itself was a pretty great compilation of mostly exclusive music. Though almost all of it is now available elsewhere, that wasn’t the case in 1989, making this a tempting buy.
Gorky Park, the up and comers, started off with “My Generation”. Some find it too putrid to stomach. It’s virtually an original song with only the lyrics recognizable. The riffs and melodies seem otherwise new. So give Gorky Park some credit for at least not attempting a carbon copy, but then you gotta take off some points for turning “My Generation” into a Bon Motley song. Unfortunately for Gorky Park, their momentum halted when singer Nikolai Noskov quit in 1990.
Skid Row surprised the hell out of everyone with the Pistols’ “Holidays in the Sun”. It was the first indication that Skid Row had punk roots. “Holidays” was very much a look ahead to where they would go on Slave to the Grind. They were on the punk bandwagon a full two years before Motley decided to cover the Sex Pistols. It’s always strange to hear flashy metal guitar solos on a Pistols song, but it’s sheer joy to hear Sebastian spitting and screaming up a storm.
Scorpions had a new compilation out called Best of Rockers ‘n’ Ballads. Another Who song, “I Can’t Explain” was taken from it to be used on this CD. It is by far the better of the Who covers, as Scorpions really made it their own. Next, Ozzy’s track is quite interesting. It’s the only studio recording of the lineup including Zakk Wylde, Randy Castillo, and Geezer Butler. Geezer quit the band shortly after, and this incredible lineup never recorded anything else. I consider it the strongest band that Ozzy had after Randy Rhoads. The quartet did a live sounding cover of “Purple Haze”, unfortunately not the greatest version. It is at least a showcase for Zakk Wylde to go nuts on the wah-wah pedal.
I will argue that the best track on this album came from the band that was riding a brand new high: Motley Crue. Clean and mean, they were incredibly strong in 1989. They the balls to choose an obscure Tommy Bolin (Deep Purple) solo tune: “Teaser”. Motley put on that Dr. Feelgood groove, and Mick Mars laid waste to the land with his slidey guitar goodness. It’s no surprise that “Teaser” has reappeared on Motley compilations several times since. It has balls as big as a bus!
Another strong contender is Bon Jovi’s take on Thin Lizzy. “The Boys are Back in Town” fits seamlessly with that small town New Jersey vibe that Bon Jovi used to have. Lynott must have had some influence on a young Jon Bon, because all his old tunes are about the boys – back in town! Dino’s bar and grill could be in Sayreville NJ. Of course, Bon Jovi are a competent enough band to be able to cover Thin Lizzy and do it well.
Another surprise: Cinderella doing Janis Joplin. Singer Tom Keifer suited Joplin, though you don’t immediately associate the two! “Move Over” takes advantage of that Keifer shriek that isn’t too far removed from Janis. From there on though, it’s filler. Jason Bonham, Tico Torres and Mickey Curry do a pretty boring “Moby Dick”. It’s funny how John Bonham sounds bigger on the original, than three drummers on this remake. Then it’s a bunch of live jams from the Moscow concert: “Hound Dog”, “Long Tall Sally”, “Blue Suede Shoes” and “Rock and Roll” (Bonham on drums again for the latter). Vince Neil is hopelessly out-screamed by Sebastian Bach on the Zep tune. All the singers participated, but Sebastian Bach and Tom Keifer blew ’em all away.
This disc has been out of print a while, but isn’t too hard to find. 80s rockers need to have it for its historical value.
mikeladano.com 