Friday afternoon and we’re off to the races! The Summer 2024 season of Grab A Stack of Rock has commenced and Jex Russell was there to ring in this happy tradition. The theme(s) for this week are: Top 11 Albums & Songs to Play with the Windows Down! Summer is the time for rocking the road, and Jex and I brought the thunder with two excellent Nigel Tufnel Top Ten lists!
Highlights:
Music on four of the major physical formats: CD, vinyl, cassette and 8-track!
Lots of Canadian content: Nova Scotia, Saskatchewan, Ontario, & Quebec represented!
Stories of years gone by: 1991, 1992, 1996, 2002, 2023 and today.
There was a quick discussion of the new Motley Crue song “Dogs of War”. Who’s the weak link in Motley Crue?
The debut of the Fire Pit on Grab A Stack of Rock
This show was dedicated to my Uncle Paul, and my mother in law Debbie, who inspired some of these picks. It’s also in the spirit of friendship and good memories with Jex’s friend Lucas, and my friends Peter, Bob and Trev.
See you next week for Top 11 Marillion albums with Todd Evans and Uncle Meat!
GRAB A STACK OF ROCK With Mike and the Mad Metal Man
Episode 57: Top 11 Albums to Play with the Windows Down – with Jex Russell
Show & Tell on four formats: CD, cassette, LP and 8-track
Long we have waited, but Spring is here and the traditional outdoor afternoon Grab A Stack of Rock is back too.*Jex Russell joins for this happy cottage tradition. Last year, these afternoon outdoor shows were incredible fun! If you were there last year, you know! If you weren’t, join the rock and roll party today at 3 PM E.S.T. It’s our first live show in almost a month, after several weeks of popular re-runs!
The theme this week is a “Nigel Tufnel Top Ten” list: Our 11 favourite albums with play with the windows down! There are so many to choose from, this list is literally wide open. What are you choosing to play this spring with the windows down? Many of my picks are traditional favourites with stories attached.
Now, due to a miscommunication on my part, I will do top 11 albums, while Jex will do top 11 songs! This will give us plenty of variety in the lists. Expect plenty of show & tell.
This episode is dedicated to my late Uncle Paul, whose beloved ‘Cuda appears in the show art. He loved music and cruising, and we spent many summer hours in his car with the take deck going! Will Van Halen make these lists today, or something else? Tune in and join the fun! We always chat with the comments section, live.
What are your top 11 albums or songs to play with the windows down? Drop a comment today, on Grab A Stack of Rock.
Friday April 26 at 3:00 P.M. E.S.T. / 4:00 P.M. Atlantic. Enjoy on YouTube or onFacebook!
THE GANDHARVAS – Sold for a Smile (1997/1998 Universal US and Canadian versions)
What a band were the Gandharvas. Lead howler Paul Jago could hit those Perry Farrell highs, and they wrote some pretty fucking great songs including their major hit “The First Day of Spring”. An unappreciated gem would be their third and final album, 1997’s Sold for a Smile. Led by the anthemic single “Downtime”, this is a hard album to resist no matter which version you get. It even made our list: “88 Unrightfully Ignored Albums of the 90s“.
Versions? Yes, two: the Canadian and US have different track listings. In 1997, Canada got the basic 10 track CD. When it was released Stateside, a number of tracks including “Downtime” were remixed. The US and Canadian versions of “Downtime” have vastly different guitar solo and outro mixes, for example. The States also got two bonus tracks: a new recording of “The First Day of Spring” and a cover of Cyndi Lauper’s “Time After Time”. (The original album was a shorty at just under 40 minutes.)
The Gandharvas turned it up a notch for this album without losing sight of their more delicate tendencies. “Gonna Be So Loose” is a slamdance of squealing vocals and chords. (This song is available remixed on the US version.) But then “Shells” is a low, strummy song perfect for the headphones. It shows of the layered vocals that are a Gandharvas trademark. “Waiting for Something to Happen” then goes somewhere between Guns N’ Roses and screamy, psychedelic punk rock — an astounding song, which then defies all logic by going acoustic. And then all over the place.
Time for a little more pop in the rock, with “Hammer in a Shell”. Snarly pop, with a sour candy coating. “Watching the Girl” was another fine single, a more streamlined song for this album. It too was remixed on the US edition, putting the guitars way louder. Then strap in for “Sarsasparilla”, a boulder-heavy rocketship blast into space. “Into the Mainstream”, then, is a bit more complex, and perhaps a little bit epic.
“Milk Ocean” leads you to the end, with a healthy dose of acidy psychedelia. It’s the closer, “Diabaloney” that’s a real head scratcher. Is it a joke? I can’t tell. “I fuck it up, I got the fuck, I got the luck,” goes one set of lines. Heavy and screamy goodness, but a real headscratcher nonetheless. What the hell did I just listen to?
On the US version, the new recording of “The First Day of Spring” is placed third in the running order, after the remixes of “Downtime” and “Gonna Be So Loose”. It’s quite a bit heavier than the original, though a brilliant song it remains. Could it be actually a polished up live version? Why does Paul Jago yell out “Colorado!” in the middle? For fun? This band is from London, Ontario not Colorado! And “Time After Time”? They twist it up, give it bite, and for better or for worse make it their own. Unless you have a serious attachment to the song, the Gandharvas’ interpretation is quite cool.
As if you can’t tell, this is an album you should own. Get one or the other, or both!
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