Friday New Releases – July 7th

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Happy Friday!  For those of us in the States, we celebrated our Independence Day on July 4th and now it is time to celebrate Friday New Releases.  Go grab a new album and let me know what you get.  This Friday, there are not a ton of releases and only a couple I want to check out…they are highlighted in Blue. I hope you find something you like.

  • 170x170bb-69  Riverdogs – California – (Frontiers Records Srl):  Def Leppard’s own Vivian Campbell and the other Riverdogs bring us their first new album in 6 years.  They are blues based, hard rock band and they never disappoint.  This will be the one I run to first and give it a listen.

  • 170x170bb  All 41 – World’s Best Hope – (Frontiers Records Srl): Frontiers Records is a great record company and they are known for bringing great artist together for a special project and this is no exception.  The band has Terry Brock from Giant & Strangeways on lead vocals: Robert Berry from Three & Alliance on bass and lead vocals; Gary Pihl from Boston, Sammy Hagar & also Alliance on guitar; and lastly, Matt Starr from Ace Frehley’s band and Mr. Big on drums.  I will give it a listen.

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Bob & Doug McKenzie – Great White North – Album Spotlight

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Bob & Doug McKenzie are a pair of Canadian Brothers who do nothing but drink, say Eh! and Hoser! constantly and are the epitome of every Canadian Stereotype.  The comedy duo is played by Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas.  They were able to take these two dumbass characters and turn them into comedy gold.

Both Rick Moranis and Dave Thomas went on to great success, but might always be remembered for these characters.  Rick Moranis is known for his comedic acting in such great films as Ghostbusters, Little Shop of Horrors, Spaceballs, and Honey, I Shrunk the Kids.  Dave Thomas had a long life on SCTV and mostly stayed in television.  Recently has has a recurring role in Blacklist.

The album was included in a box of vinyl I received from my brother-in-law.  I was curious as to why the hell he had this album and then I saw the little sticker on the front that said “featuring Geddy Lee” and then I knew.  My brother-in-law is a HUGE Rush fan so now it made sense.

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Cheap Trick – ‘We’re All Alright!’ – Album Review

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Cheap Trick is the fine wine of Rock & Roll…they keep getting better with age.  Okay, that was extremely cheesy if not entirely true!  They are now on their 18th Studio album after 44 years together.  To top it off, it has only been around 15 months since their last one, ‘Bang, Zoom, Crazy…Hello’.  The new album picks up right where that album left off.  ‘We’re All Alright!’ even takes it to the next level.

The album title, ‘We’re All Alright!’, is a line straight out of their classic song “Surrender” and the whole album is classic Cheap Trick.  The album is a fast paced, juggernaut of pure Cheap Trick rock.  The songs are generally around 3 minutes and the album flies by at only 33 minutes (45 for the deluxe edition).  The album consists of new songs and some old songs that were never recorded or released.

For a band where the members are well into their 60’s, they sound so alive and refreshing and sound better than bands that are half their age.  Robin Zander’s vocals are amazing and sound like he did when he was a kid. Rick Nielsen’s guitar work on the album is the highlight for me.  So many great riffs and solos that music today is sorely missing.  Tom Petersson’s work on the bass keeps everyone in line and adds the finishing touches to each song.  Daxx Nielsen (Rick’s son) on drums has that old Cheap Trick sound and keep the band going at a heart stopping pace.

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My Sunday Song – “The Day The Ravens Left the Tower” by the Alarm

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For My Sunday Song #46, I have chosen “The Day The Ravens Left The Tower” by The Alarm.  The song is off the album, ‘Strength’, from 1985 and is one of my all time favorite albums from the 80’s.  They were never hugely popular in the States although MTV played them a lot.  The album did reach #39 on the Billboard 200 Chart.

“The Day The Ravens Left the Tower” is a very dark song and was a real jump in their songwriting lyrically.  They have always been political with their songs, but the maturity and growth in songwriting really shined on this song for me.  I know I read this somewhere that the song was inspired by a hallucination that Eddie MacDonald had when he was sick with the flu.  I think that is cool if that is true.

What I am fascinated with about the song is actually the story of the ravens.  For those that don’t know, there are ravens that live in the Tower of London.  There have been ravens living there since as far back as 1660 or so around the time of King Charles II.  It is believed that the ravens are there to protect the Crown. If they should ever leave the tower, the Crown and Britain would fall.  I know there is a lot more to the story, but I am not a historian and the site is about music so you can look it up further if you are interested…it is fascinating stuff (also any UK readers want to add anything, please leave a comment).

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Friday New Releases – June 30th

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It is the last Friday of June and I have vacation time coming my way.  Not much coming out this week and thankfully that is the case as I won’t have time much over the next week to listen to anything.  The ones I am curious about are highlighted in Blue.  Hopefully you find something you like…if so, let me know.

  • 170x170bb-48  Stone Sour – Hydrograd – (Roadrunner Records):  Corey Taylor (from Slipnot) and crew are back with their sixth studio album.  Talk is this will be more of a straight up rock and roll record which I am not sure what that will mean, but we will see what their definition of a Rock & Roll record is.  Looking forward to giving it a spin.

  • 51u9Y6CGJ8L._AC_US218_  Don Barnes – Ride the Storm – (MelodicRock Records):  Don Barnes from .38 Special finally gets to release his solo album from 1989.  Thanks to MelodicRock Records (& Melodicrock.com).  I am eager to hear what we missed from so long ago.  Apparently the album was never released due to the label (A&M Records) being sold.  I don’t know if it got lost in the shuffle or it wasn’t good enough that the new company didn’t want to release it.  We will soon find out.

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“My First Time” with Whitesnake’s ‘Whitesnake’

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Over the past couple weeks, I have dived deeply into Whitesnake’s early albums such as ‘Lovehunter’, ‘Ready an’ Willing’, ‘Come an’ Get It’ and “Saints & Sinners’.  And I actually picked up ‘Ready an’ Willing’ and ‘Come an’ Get It’ on vinyl last week. Those albums are so good and hate that I didn’t really know about them back in the day.  It got me thinking about the first album I bought from Whitesnake which was simply ‘Whitesnake’.

The album came out in 1987, my senior year of high school.  It quickly became one of my favorite albums of that year (behind ‘Hysteria’ by Def Leppard of course).  It was pure 80’s hair metal (or whatever label you want to give it) and pure magic.  The pounding drums, the guitar solos, the thumping bass, the synthesizers and that voice.  A combination that as a sure fire hit.  Which it was as the album actually went to #2 on the Billboard charts.

However, this album almost didn’t get made.  After 10 years of playing with little to no success, David Coverdale was ready to call it quits for Whitesnake.  The U.S. had pretty much ignored the band and the former Deep Purple singer had about had enough.  If it wasn’t for the record label, Geffen Records, Whitesnake as we know it, would be gone forever.

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My Sunday Song – “A Boy Named Sue” by Johnny Cash

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My Sunday Song #45 is the great Johnny Cash Song “A Boy Named Sue”.  The song was first recorded during the live concert ‘At San Quentin’ and is one of my favorite Johnny Cash songs.  It tells such an amazing story about a boy seeking revenge against his deadbeat dad who left him and his mom and who named him Sue.

The song was Johnny’s biggest charting song on the Billboard Hot 100 where it reached #2.  It was also his only Top 10 song which is amazing.  Why didn’t he make it to #1, well a little known band named the Rolling Stones held that position with “Honky Tonk Woman”.

“A Boy Named Sue” is a song only Johnny Cash could sing and pull off.  I don’t think the song would have been as successful with any other singer…at least to me it wouldn’t have been.  The grittiness of Cash’s voice and the way he sort of spoke it instead of singing it was absolutely perfect.  It gave a life and a charm to the song all its own.

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Father’s Day – The Vinyl Gifts

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I hate holidays…I don’t know why, but i just do.  Ok, I hate the ones where I have to buy gifts…I feel so much pressure.  The holidays I do like are the ones where I actually get gifts.  The old adage “it is better to give than to receive” is crap.  That person never received vinyl records as a gift obviously.

For Father’s Day this year, my wife and daughters gave me some nice gifts.  Not only did I receive some great cards and some candy, but I got some nice shirts for work as well.  Which I needed.  They also got me some really cool, crazy socks.  One was blue with some pineapples (don’t know why, but I love them) and the other was some gray socks with guitars on them (I understand that one and love them as well).

But what I loved most of all was some vinyl.  I love to go buy vinyl, but I generally only buy used records from the 70’s & 80’s and if I am lucky…early 90’s.  The brand new copies I generally don’t buy…too expensive.  So I always ask for those as gifts.

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Friday New Releases – June 23rd

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Happy Friday!  I hope your Summer is going well.  This week has very few releases that are on my radar so not a lot to choose from.  There are a couple that will get a spin and maybe I can catch up on all the releases earlier in the month.  The ones I will listen to are highlighted in Blue…as usual.

  • 170x170bb-60  Imagine Dragons – Evolve – (Interscope):  The pop/rock band is back with their third studio release.  After breaking on to the scene in 2012 with “Radioactive, they hope to capture the magic yet again.  If “Believer” is any indication of what is to come, we should have another great release.

  • 170x170bb-33  King Gizzard & the Lizard Wizard – Murder of the Universe – (Flightless Records):  King Gizzard returns with their 2nd album of 2017.  The first ‘Flying Microtonal Banana’ was exceptional and can they repeat the magic so quickly?  We will see.  Plus, they intend to release 4 to 5 albums this year so they better get moving as we are almost half way through the year.  This album appears to be quite different from the last as it is broken up into 3 chapters to tell an overall story I am assuming. I will have to wait and hear I guess.  NOTE: Video has a warning that if you are susceptible to seizures, DO NOT watch the video.

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Bryan Adams – “Straight From the Heart” & “Cuts Like A Knife” – The 45 Single (1985)

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For the next single that was in my box of vinyl, you get two for the price of one.  It is actually a re-issued single of two of Bryan Adams most popular songs from his ‘Cuts Like a Knife’ album.  A&M Records had a 45 single series called A&M Memories where they re-released singles of artists and both sides were previously released singles from the artist and from the same album.

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The original singles “Straight From the Heart” and “Cuts Like a Knife” were actually released in 1983 as separate singles.  The B-Side for “Straight From the Heart” was “One Good Reason” and the B-Side for “Cuts Like a Knife” was “Lonely Nights”.  This release of those singles was done only a couple years later in 1985. The concept of this A&M series was pretty smart as it gave the customer two hit songs for the price of one.

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