Tag: Joker

Kiss – ‘Live Vol. 1: Detroit, Michigan April 7, 1974 – Album Review (The Kiss Bootleg Series)

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I have been doing a Kiss Bootleg Series for years. You get a review every time I add a new one to the collection. Well, after buying 38 Bootleg CDs from John Humphrey’s personal collection, I figured let’s jump right back in and do a whole lot of reviews on the Bootlegs. Oh, if you don’t know who John Humphrey is, you need to know he is a massive Kiss collector. And he is the drummer of the band Seether. John decided to sell off his entire collection…sort of…he kept all the vinyl (like 4,000 of them). He did it through an auction at Backstage Auctions and I had to have a piece of it…and I did wind up with some things.

This time around we go back to 1974. April 7, 1974 to be exact. This bootleg is from their Detroit, Michigan show that was recorded at the Michigan Palace. The release is called Live Vol. 1 and is out of Australia from a label called Joker. It is Unauthorized as it says in rather large print on the front cover. This is real early in their career and is from The First Kiss Tour!! This was for the Radio Station WABX-FM Kite-In and Balloon Fly show and if I’m not mistaken, there was another up and coming band called Aerosmith on the same bill along with Michael Finnelly and The Mojo Boogie Band. As far as the track listing, there is an error…well, not an error but more of an omission. On the same track as “Cold Gin” is the song “100,000 Years” which is not listed. So that was a plus.

The sound is not that great. Very muddy and sounds like a recording of a recording of a tape. The volume starts off low and suddenly you can hear it getting louder as someone was turning it up. The band is introduced as “the most unusual band” which is totally awesome and so true for the time. Kiss opens with “Deuce” and like I said, the sound is bad. The volume goes up and down and not a good recording at all. But this is hungry, early Kiss and you can hear how good they still sound. A rocking opening song and Gene’s scream during Ace’s solo towards the end was awesome!!

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Babe Ruth – ‘First Base’ – Album Review

Published on by 2loud2oldmusic19 Comments

Let’s go back to the year 1972.  I was just shy of 4 years old and didn’t know anything about music at this point.  Obviously, I don’t remember this release.  I do know that 46 years later, I would discover this album in a collection I picked up.  And I also know this was one of the coolest albums in that entire collection.  I thought it would be fun to go deep in my collection and talk about one of my favorites and this is definitely out of the ordinary from my usual reviews.

Babe Ruth is a blues rock band that leans very progressive and they hail from England.  Formed in 1970 with Alan Shacklock, Janita “Jennie” Haan and Dave Hewitt.  The band would later add Dick Powell and Dave Punshon and we would then have the band we hear on this album simply titled ‘First Base’.  Lots of baseball theme with the band name, album title and even the weird cover of spacemen playing baseball.

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SIDE ONE:

The album kicks off with the most rocking song of the bunch called “Wells Fargo”.  It is the story of the old western stagecoach and has a whole cowboy theme to it.  Jennie Haan’s vocals are totally brilliant with a hard rocking edge with the hints of Janis Joplin.  Alan’s guitar riff was fuzzy and cool and when you bump that up against Brent Carter’s saxophone you are in for a treat.  The whole blues rock feel is what I’ve been digging a lot of lately and this helps satisfy that thirst and then thrown in a damn fine guitar solo and life is good.  There is also a cool groove throughout the song by the fantastic rhythm section of Dave on bass and Dick on drums.  This is how you kick off your debut album folks. Continue reading “Babe Ruth – ‘First Base’ – Album Review” →

My Sunday Song – “Ace of Spades” by Motorhead

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For My Sunday Song #109, “Ace of Spades” by Motorhead gets the focus this week.  This is one of the most iconic Motorhead songs and it reached #15 on the charts when it was released back in 1980 on the album titled ‘Ace of Spades’.  The song actually hit the UK charts again after Lemmy’s death in 2015.  It went all the way to #13, two spots higher than the original run.

The song is all about gambling and has every known gambling cliche known to man included in the song and yet it works.  It was only 2:48 in length yet so memorable and impactful.  The menacing opening bass riff by Lemmy and that fast driving, dirty rock sound matched up with that gritty vocal by Lemmy is what makes this one of the great rock songs of all time.  It was the song that introduced me to Motorhead and I am sure I am not the only one.

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As I am not a gambler (ok I am not a good one), I was curious about the dead man’s hand.  It turns out the Dead Man’s Hand relates to the hand that Wild Bill Hickok had when he was shot in the back of the head by Jack McCall while playing poker back in 1876.  The hand he supposedly had was 2 Black 8’s and 2 Black Aces.

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