Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Heaven and Hell

I thought Black Sabbath was over. We all did. Ozzy left or was kicked out. He had his own thing, which I adored. Black Sabbath was supposed to go in to that good night and disappear. The architects of metal were bloated and sad and devoid of ingenuity.
How wrong were we?
In 1980, along with Ozzy's solo record and AC/DC's seminal work "Back in Black", Sabbath hired former Rainbow lead singer (See how it all comes together?) Ronnie James Dio and put out Heaven and Hell.

It's easily their best work in ages. It ranks up there with Paranoid. It's great.

The driving, pounding turbo engine of "Neon Nights", the slog-metal of "Children of the Sea"and the remarkably ominous title track raise this record to a place I had long consigned to either history or a new generation of metal-heads.
Heaven and Hell is a lean piece of plastic. A great example is "Die Young" which is like a car crash where the driver, bleeding, head smashed against the steering wheel, finds his way out of the car and straggles out of the car, his shoulder dislocated, his arm hanging like a duck in the window of a chinese restaurant, gets his bearings, and races away from the scene to parts unknown.
It's exceptional. And Iommi transforms himself into something elegant and stratospheric. Perhaps he's influenced by the likes of Eddie Van Halen and the new guitar gods. As it should be, those guitar heroes are all students of his. It's fitting that he become the student once more.

H&H isn't a "return to form". We wouldn't want that. The metal of the early factory town days was infused with psychedelia, LSD and Boris Karloff movies. This is the 80s. Things move a lot faster. This is cocaine metal. Metallica is nipping at the heels and this album is a deep breath by the grandparents who refuse to go gently.

Grade: A+
ASIde: Neon Nights, Children of the Sea, Heaven and Hell
BlindSide: Wishing Well, Die Young

Why are we WI?

A friend of mine wrote a note on his facebook page questioning what's going on in Wisconsin. His point is that a governor is a CEO and the unions are holding an conflict of interest for the politicians in their state.
It prompted me to write this.
--
A CEO is beholden to the corporation and the stockholders. A statesman is beholden to the constitution and the constituency and their well being. These are not necessarily the same jobs.
W ran as a "CEO" president and under his watch the economy collapsed, the housing market imploded and Friedmanomics was proven to be a ponzi scheme.

What we are witnessing across the country is union-busting. There's no ifs ands or buts about it. It's an attempt to strip the unions of all teeth.
But why? Why would that be something that a politician would want?
Why did Reagan, who led a union, want this? He levied the sounding alarm for this.
Why is it that the only party that constantly wants to strip unions of their power are the republicans?
Beyond the ethics and the "reasons" for dismantling unions that you and I are being told. Why would they want this?

Unions support democrats, plain and simple. To strip them of power is to remove a gigantic fundraising arm for a political party. This is not about what's good for Wisconsin. Or Indiana. Or New Jersey. It's about the Republican party trying to eliminate their opponent once and for all.

For much of what bothers people about public unions, the overreaches, the gridlock, etc, the benefits far outweigh them.
The hazard pay for firemen. The overtime for overworked cops.
But, Walker doesn't want to strip them of their ability to bargain collectively.

Why?

Because it's a smoke screen. They are hoping that right minded people with logic will see both sides of the issue and eventually fall into the "you know, I don't think it's so bad to strip them of this..." bracket.
They're counting on it.

Why?

Because the GOP is in hell. The Tea Party split them right down the middle and they are having a helluva time holding on.
In the meantime the world economy is on the verge of collapse. They aren't totally to blame (well, they are, but more on that another time) but, when gas prices hit $7 because WALL STREET is going nuts due to the mid-east, it's gonna be harder and harder for them to justify laying off thousands of workers. These aren't wealthy americans we're talking about. Walker's tax loopholes gave 100s of millions in breaks to the rich and the union worker he wants to break pulls in 50K. Barely.

In addition, there is something happening that the GOP knows about and terrifies them. It's quite simple, actually.

Someone born in 1994 was 7 years old when the towers fell. That child was terrified. It was a scary day. No two ways about it. But 7 year olds don't understand complexity. They see the world as good and bad. And they were scared because the bad guys were coming for the good guys.
But, 8 years later, when that child was 15, they came in to their own cognizance. They began to form rational thoughts of their own and let's face it, young people are ideological to a fault and usually side with the left. After all, they are poor, day laborers whose future is uncertain.

That child came to hate the Iraq war. The pictures from Abu Ghraib. The money it is costing. The veil pulled back to realize that much of it was just a revenge scheme for one guy ('He tried to kill my dad) and a money making scheme for the other. The war isn't righteous for that kid. It's ruined our standing in the world and we never got the bad guy.

Much the same way that a 7 year old in 1965 would hate the Vietnam War in 1973. Hmm...that war was brought to an end then and a president who was grossly unpopular was chased out of office by an invigorated youth vote.

The child of 9/11 gets to vote for the first time in 2012.

The millenials are coming. And they are a huge wave of voters.

Why do you think the right is trying to start id cards for voting? Why do you think they are trying to make it harder to register?

The millenials are coming.

And they know that, if they don't codify their ideologies now, they will be doomed.

But, they didn't count on invigorating the left. They galvanized the left. Who knew that was even possible? This is their doing. It's a gross miscalculation.

This bludgeoning of the worker's rights has less to do with balancing a budget than it does anything else I've described above.

It's an attack on the middle class. Just as the defunding of PBS is an attack on the lower class (the only free, non-commercial television. They can't monetize it and they can't control the message)
Just as the attack on planned parenthood is an attack on women's rights.

Funny, these are all happening at the same time.

We are witnessing the Republican Party's last stand. The gunfight at the OK Corral.

The next 18 months are going to be amazing.

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Rainbow - Down to Earth

Rainbow - Down to Earth - 1979

Well, Ritchie Blackmore didn't waste any time. No sooner is Dio out of the band, Graham Bonnett is in, and the Power Pop is in full force. From the outset, Down to Earth sounds like a band trying to be radio friendly. The on the horizon voices of Hagar, Springfield loom while at the same time this could be mistaken for an Ace Frehley record.
Not that this is bad. "All Night Long", the lead track, is already more ear-friendly than anything from the first record and, in a way, makes me happier than anything on the last record, despite how good the second half of that one is.
As important as robot/android themes are to funk music, the latter part of the 70s were, for metal at least, all about space. ELO was the shining power pop beacon but Frehley had a comet and Rainbow has "Eyes of the World". It may be mired in evil doing and the like but it's wrapped in shiny aluminum space suits, to be sure. And on "No Time to Lose" Blackmore sounds like he's having a good time for the first time since...Rising at least, maybe that's because Don Airy's organ playing sounds like it could be Jon Lord. Perhaps this is what Deep Purple would have sounded like if they just took a break in the early 70s and regrouped.
Oh, well.
The extreme leap into Power Pop of "Since You've Been Gone" is a reminder (to me) of what 1979-1982 was really about. It's a great track and just makes me dig this record more and more.
There are occasional missteps ("Love's No Friend" "Danger Zone") but there's more to enjoy on this record that I would have been led to believe. And I love love love LOVE that closer, "Lost in Hollywood". Just great, guitar licking, speed-synthy greatness.
It's my favorite Rainbow record (so far). A real treat.

Grade: B+
ASide: All Night Long, Since You Been Gone
BlindSide: Eyes of the World, No Time to Lose, Lost in Hollywood
DownSide: Nothing is really awful. This record's just a lot of fun.

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Rainbow - Long Live Rock and Roll

Rainbow - Long Live Rock and Roll - 1978

There's a theory that the children of a movement are more like the cult of that movement. More earnest. There's less irony. I think that's sort of true. And it's no truer than it is with Rainbow. Only it's weirder because the group is led by one of the leaders of that movement.
Ritchie Blackmore may have been an inventor of modern metal but, with the addition of Ronnie James Dio, all the cliches that Spinal Tap would skewer just 4 years later make sense. The mythology, the epic stories set to the template of METAL GODS is, well, it comes off as downright childish. And I've got little interest in it.
The lead track, "Long Live Rock and Roll", should be good but by this time AC/DC has sort of already cornered the "song about how great rock and roll is" song. A trope they will revisit for 35 years.
Rainbow sounds like they are diluted. Second rate. Just when you think, "oh, yea, this is more like it" on a song like "L.A. Connection" & "Gates of Babylon", then Dio comes in with his crappo lyrics and just ruins everything. Although I do love the music on the latter.
Side Two really explodes with "Kill the King" a track that Judas Priest could have sued Blackmore and Dio over. Ritchie is in fine shred here and that is followed up by the blues-infused metal "The Shed" a song that has Motley Crue's entire career written all over it. But it can't redeem the whole record, especially when that awful last song, "Rainbow Eyes" drags the whole thing down.
There are moments, though. They are just buried too deep to help the record. Good luck getting to them.

Grade: C+
ASide: Kill the King, The Shed
BlindSide: Gates of Babylon, Sensitive to Light
DownSide: LA Connection

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Never Say Die

Um.....What?

Black Sabbath - Never Say Die! - 1978

Talk about sounding absolutely nothing like yourself.
Never Say Die!, the last Sabbath record with Ozzy is one of the most confusing records I've ever head. Let alone from Sabbath. It's as though, at times, a power pop group decided to make a metal record. Then at other times it's crazily disjointed like the mess of "Junior's Eyes". At other times, it reminds me of some weird Beatles meets Bay City Rollers mess (A Hard Rock).
I don't know what to make of this. It's as though I got dropped off in an alternate universe and was told that metal was something that it really wasn't.
Weird. You should hear it. Or maybe not. It's not worth looking for. I'm putting this record in the closet and saying, "Never Again".

And with that, the Black Sabbath that led the charge and changed the world of music as we would know it, like their Purple counterparts, said farewell. The lineup that meant so much was gone. This record is a fitting explanation as to why.

Grade: D
ASide: Never Say Die!
DownSide: Air Dance, Junior's Eyes, Breakout (Saxophone? WTF?)

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Rainbow - Rising

Rainbow - Rising - 1976

It's probably best to forget the last outing and just get started with Rising. After all, it's loads better, more exciting, less reliant on ridiculous lyrics and uses a tighter band.
I would say that this is what I was hoping and expecting from the Deep Purple guitarist and at the same time, it's nowhere near as interesting as some of that band's best work. Its pedestrian metal but that doesn't mean its bad. In fact, it probably feels pedestrian because of all that has come since. There's no "Fireball", no Machine Head sound and power, but that's okay. It can be mentioned in the same breath as those comfortably as it is no letdown.
I'll be interested to hear what the band does next.

Grade: A-
ASide:Tarot Woman, Starstruck
BlindSide: Stargazer, A Light in the Black

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Technical Ecstasy

Black Sabbath - Technical Ecstasy - 1976

That chukka-chukka guitar! The soaring Ozzy vocals! It can only be one thing: It's the Blizzard of---what? Oh, this is still Sabbath? But why does it---? Ok. I'll stop asking. This first song really sounds like, hey, waitaminnit..electric synth? What? And why does Ozzy sound like he's fighting with Iommi for melody? What the fuck is this? They get close to what we've come to love on "You Won't Change Me" but it's half-hearted at best. This is a band that has run out of ideas and are bored with themselves and their music.
The album has some high points, relatively speaking. "It's Alright" is a neat little anthem and "Dirty Women" takes the rock as symphonic opera to a new place. But all told, Technical Ecstasy is neither technically interesting nor ecstatic about anything.
It's Technical Dullness.

Grade: D
ASide: It's Alright
BlindSide: Dirty Women

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Come Taste The Band

Deep Purple - Come Taste the Band - 1975

I can't believe I'm saying this but, I've never been so glad to hear Jon Lord's organ. After the abysmal borefest that was Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow, that instrument is a welcome sound.
It should be noted that by this time the only original members of Deep Purple are Ian Paice, the drummer and Lord. So, how does the band sound?
Energized, at least on the first track. Tommy Bolin avails himself well on the boogie rocker "Coming Home". Had he not died the following year, one only knows how far he might have come. "Lady Luck" continues the faux-soul that the band had been exploring and it's just short enough to be sweet. The same can be said for "Gettin' Tighter", which could act as a blueprint for The Hellacopters 25 years later.
Tracks like "Dealer" and "I Need Love" are funktastic metal and make for a fine listen on a Saturday night cruising through your small town looking for chicks. It's not great, but it'll do.
The second half of the record is flabby and unmemorable. The wannabe-funk of "Drifter" and, worse, the horrendous "Love Child", which comes across like a reject from Aerosmith's "Train Kept a Rollin'" are just torture to listen to. And that ballad..."This Time Round Owed to God"...oh, dear. That one's like bad Elton John meets Freddie Mercury in a smoky piano bar, drunk on sake and feeling treacly.

And thus ends the contribution to metal from one of the genre's architects. We won't be hearing from them for another decade.

Grade: C
ASide: Coming Home
BlindSide: Lady Luck, Gettin' Tighter
DownSide: Love Child, This Time Round Owed to God

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Rainbow - Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow

Rainbow - Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow - 1975

A few months before the last Deep Purple album of the 70s (and the first without Blackmore, an album that Ian Gillan, who did not sing on it, would decree not really a DP album) Blackmore came out with his new band and a new album.
And that's where this Listening Post starts its true converging...
See, when Deep Purple was on tour their opening band was a group called Elf. THe lead singer of that band was the diminutive Ronnie James Dio. Dio, who would later from Black Sabbath, first joined forces with Purple's Blackmore to front his band and the result was Rainbow.

And this was their first record. The first time we would really hear what Blackmore was all about without Jon Lord's organ to challenge him or supplant him.

A blues-rocker with semi-mythological overtones starts off the album and it's not that bad. "Man on Silver Mountain" is not a total surprise, given all that I've read about the Holy Diver himself. It only makes sense that, as the co-writer/lyricist, whatever Dio's obsession were would get in to the music. Trouble is, while it's not a bad track, it's no "Fireball". It's barely a "Stormbringer".

Songs like "Black Sheep of the Family" are harmless if forgettable, whereas something like "Catch the Rainbow" is just terrible AND forgettable...I hope...

Probably the most unforgivable thing about Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow isn't how "bad" it is. It's how dull, uninventive and boring the whole thing is.

If Purple and Sabbath were the stuff that Spinal Tap was made of, I can hear the roots of Tenacious D all over this record.

Grade: D+
ASide: Man on Silver Mountain
BlindSide: Self Portrait
DownSide: Catch the Rainbow, Temple of the King

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Sabotage

Black Sabbath - Sabotage - 1975

After two years off, primarily touring for Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, their most well reviewed album to date, and partying apparently, Sabbath returns with the album you never hear about.
Listening to it for the first time in ages I sort of understand why. If SBS was experimental in its soundcraft and attempts at wider appeal, Sabotage takes the same progressive stance but instead of trying to appeal to a wider audience, it sort of doubles down on the sludge.
The result is a terrifically appealing Sabbath record but only slightly more accessible than Vol. 4. With the stench of mid-70s rock all over it, Sabotage (which suffers from one of the worst covers in the band's history) has some enormously ambitious moments. The mega-epic "Megalomania" is a triumph of styles, tempos and textures. And some terrific vocals by Ozzy on the closer, "The Writ". While the first track, "Hole in the Sky" and the side two opener, "The Thrill of it All" are both genuinely tasty metal tracks, I can't help but feel as though there's nothing to hang on to. The single, "Am I Going Insane" is a great song and it even has one foot nestled nicely in late 60s structure and style. After 6 records, it's nice to know that the lads haven't completely eschewed their beginnings.

After listening to Sabotage I can't imagine reaching for it as the go-to Sabbath record. It's not even in 4th position.
It's good, but it's just not...fantastic. If you have Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, nothing will really move or surprise you here.

Grade: B+
ASide: The Thrill of it All, Am I Going Insane
BlindSide: Supertzar, Megalomania, The Writ

OscarWatch 2011

So, the Saggies, the DGAies, the Proddies, the Globies, are all done. And where are we?

Things have changed decidedly.


BEST PICTURE
127 HOURS
BLACK SWAN
INCEPTION
THE FIGHTER
THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT
THE KING'S SPEECH
THE SOCIAL NETWORK
TOY STORY
TRUE GRIT
WINTER'S BONE

Previous prediction:
The King's Speech - 65%,
The Social Network - 35%

I think it's safe to say it's now The King's Speech to lose which really sucks. It's a nice little movie but, let's face it, The Social Network is about the website that has brought down a "King" in Egypt and who knows where else?

New prediction:
The King's Speech - 95%
The Social Network - 5%


BEST ACTOR
JEFF BRIDGES - TRUE GRIT
JAVIER BARDEM - BIUTIFUL
JESSE EISENBERG - THE SOCIAL NETWORK
COLIN FIRTH - THE KING’S SPEECH
JAMES FRANCO - 127 HOURS

Previous prediction:
Colin Firth - 100%

No change. This is a lock

BEST ACTRESS
ANNETTE BENING - THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT (Focus Features)
NICOLE KIDMAN - RABBIT HOLE (Lionsgate)
JENNIFER LAWRENCE - WINTER’S BONE (Roadside Attractions)
NATALIE PORTMAN - BLACK SWAN (Fox Searchlight)
MICHELLE WILLIAMS - BLUE VALENTINE (The Weinstein Co)

Previous prediction:
Natalie Portman - 100%

There's some blog-buzz about Annette Bening but that's just bore-talk.
No change.
It's Portman's

BEST ACTOR IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
CHRISTIAN BALE - THE FIGHTER
JOHN HAWKES - WINTER’S BONE
JEREMY RENNER - THE TOWN
MARK RUFFALO - THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT
GEOFFREY RUSH - THE KING’S SPEECH

Previous prediction:
Christian Bale - 100%

I'm hearing little birds talking about Geoffrey Rush. Enough that it's got me thinking. There's been enough splitting on this category to change my mind a little.

New Prediction:
Christian Bale - 75%
Geoffrey Rush - 25%

BEST ACTRESS IN A SUPPORTING ROLE
AMY ADAMS - THE FIGHTER
HELENA BONHAM CARTER - THE KING’S SPEECH
MELISSA LEO - THE FIGHTER
HAILEE STEINFELD - TRUE GRIT
JACKI WEAVER - ANIMAL KINGDOM

Previous prediction:
Haley Steinfeld: 35%
Melissa Leo: 35%
Jackie Weaver: 30%

Well, this has changed quite a bit. After the multiple wins I have to say that it's pretty rock solid for Leo. Not a lock, given the weirdness of her acceptance speeches, though.

Melissa Leo: 90%
Heilie Steinfeld: 10%

BEST ANIMATED PICTURE
HOW TO TRAIN YOUR DRAGON
TOY STORY 3
THE ILLUSIONIST

Previous prediction:
Toy Story 3: 100%

No change

BEST DIRECTOR
DARREN ARONOFSKY - BLACK SWAN
DAVID FINCHER - THE SOCIAL NETWORK
TOM HOOPER - THE KING'S SPEECH
JOEL AND ETHAN COEN - TRUE GRIT
DAVID O. RUSSELL - THE FIGHTER

This is the one that pisses me off and has me all confoozled. I don't think it's a lock in any way but when was the last time a DGA winner lost the Oscar?
Previous prediction:
Fincher: 99%
Hooper: 1%

New Prediction:
Hooper 60%
Fincher - 40%

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
ANOTHER YEAR, Mike Leigh (Sony Pictures Classics)
THE FIGHTER, Scott Silver and Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson, Story by Keith Dorrington & Paul Tamasy & Eric Johnson (Paramount)
INCEPTION, Christopher Nolan (Warner Bros)
THE KIDS ARE ALL RIGHT, Lisa Cholodenko & Stuart Blumberg
THE KING'S SPEECH, David Seidler

Previous prediction:
The Kids Are All Right: 75%
The King's Speech: 25%

I don't think Kids has any more momentum. The truth is, I think voters saw the movie and realized just how mediocre it really is.

New Prediction:
The King's Speech - 100%

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
127 HOURS, Danny Boyle & Simon Beaufoy
TOY STORY 3, Michael Arndt, Story by John Lasseter, Andrew Stanton, and Lee Unkrich
THE SOCIAL NETWORK, Aaron Sorkin
WINTER'S BONE, Debra Granik & Anne Rosellini
TRUE GRIT, Joel Coen & Ethan Coen

Previous prediction:
New Prediction:
Just change the name to the Aaron Sorkin Award for Writing and be done with it.
Aaron Sorkin: 100%

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Stormbringer

Deep Purple - Stormbringer - 1974

Wow, one year, two Deep Purple albums. I've said before that I think 1974 was a watershed year for rock music. The coalescence of so many ideas and pinnacle of concepts and conceits.
In 1974 you could buy Burn and dig on the journey that had become Deep Purple from prog rock 60s psychedelia to heavy metal architects to soul infused version of both.
Or you could get Stormbringer. A half assed attempt to follow the soul tropes set down on that previous record.
How bad is Stormbringer? It's not awful. It's not like Dee Dee Ramone's rap album. But from a band widely recognized as one of the three godfather bands of metal, it's just generic. Dull. Uninteresting. Like a band's 9th album. Only I would have hoped that the new inclusion of David Coverdale which had infuse the previous album with such energy, would have carried over to this one. I have to believe that 12 years later both of those records would have been put out as one CD and we would have combined the ratings between the two to come up with something very very average.
Nothing will prepare you for the third rate soul stylings of "Hold On" (which I swear Chicago should cover) or the 5th rate wannabe-Purple "Holy Man".
I will admit to kind of enjoying the speed-sheen metal of the title track and "Lady Double Dealer", the only time Blackmore really gets to shine on the record. "High Ball Shooter" is not bad, either, even though I think it would work better as an Aerosmith tune.
Stormbringer is what happens when you let the bassist get too much input. They always wanna funkify everything. They really should best be left to laying down a bottom and leave the filigree to the others.

It wouldn't surprise me if Ritchie Blackmore just quit after this experience.
Oh, wait. He did.


Grade: C-
ASide: Stormbringer
BlindSide: Lady Double Dealer, High Ball Shooter
DownSide: Holy Man (oh, snooze city), Hold On

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Burn

Deep Purple - Burn - 1974

Remember Machine Head? How great that record was? And then it was followed by the highly mediocre Who Do We Think We Are?
Forget that. And forget Deep Purple as you might have known them.
From jump street the addition of David Coverdale as Ian Gillan's replacement has infused the music with something more incendiary than before. On the title track Jon Lord seems to be playing catch up to Blackmore's guitar and Coverdale's voice. It's refreshing and exciting and one of the best tracks this band has put out in a long time. And when he does finally get his chance to shine, it's superfluous. The song's already done what it needs/wants to. Ugh, I'm tired of organ....
Of course, no sooner do I write that then I get to the next track, "Might Just Be Your Life", a hybrid child of "Woman of Tokyo" and "Smoke on the Water" with some of Lord's most subtle and interesting work. Tracks like "Lay Down Stay Down" rip with Madison Square Garden anthemic quality.
Songs like "Sail Away" and "You Fool No One" show a leaning toward a more funkier sound, an even heavier sound, the convergence of metal and soul, if you will. The torch-blues of "Mistreated" is a ready-made stadium track if I've ever heard one. Lighters up!
The closing track, "A 200", a space age, trippy instrumental number, is inconsequential, inessential and perhaps the worst thing Deep Purple has ever recorded.

Grade: A-
ASide: Burn
BlindSide: Lay Down Stay Down, Sail Away, Mistreated
DownSide: A 200

THe A-Z of your Life Meme

This is going around. I never do memes. I thought I would try one.

• A-Available/Single? No. I hated every moment I was.
• B-Best Friend? My partner. My wife. She's my best friend with benefits.
• C-Cake or Pie? The pie I like, chocolate cream, is really just pudding, so I'll go with cake. But it's pie.
• D-Drink Of Choice? Diet Pepsi. Coke can suck it.
• E-Essential Item You Use Everyday? My smartphone. Samsung Vibrant. Never not within 4 feet of me.
• F-Favorite Color? Used to be blue. Now it's red. Deep, blood red.
• G-Gummy Bears Or Worms? I'm a diabetic so I'd say worms. But fried, never alive. Blech.
• H-Hometown? Never felt at home til I moved to Los Angeles.
• I-Indulgence? Listening to and writing about music. Even though I don't think anyone is reading....
• K-Kids & Their Names? Elizabeth (LIzzie), Zoe (Zig Zag) & Zack (too young to have a nickname)
• L-Life Is Incomplete Without? Worrying about something and living in the fiction of the future.
• M-Marriage Date? February 14th. Valentine's Day. Was a great idea at the time. Now, we can't get a table on our day.
• N-Number Of Siblings? 1 but we don't speak anymore. His decision.
• O-Oranges Or Apples? Oranges are a mess. Apples can be dipped in peanut butter.
• P-Phobias/Fears? Heights, money and the future. Fuck I need help.
• Q-Favorite Quote? The more complex the mind the greater the need for the simplicity of play.
• R-Reason to Smile? My daughter doing ballet.
• S-Season? Spring. Fall. Not too hot, not too cold. I'm Goldilocks.
• T-Tag Three or Four People? I don't run anymore.
• U-Unknown Fact About Me? I'm not really that closed a book.
• V-Vegetable you don't like? Okra. Fucking veg deserves to be served in hell.
• W-Worst Habit? Killing free time with worry.
• X-X-rays You've Had? Everything. I should be dead.
• Y-Your Favorite Food? Chinese. Anything chinese.
• Z-Zodiac Sign? Gemini. We both are.

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Who Do We Think We Are!

Deep Purple - Who Do We Think We Are! - 1973

WDWTWA starts off with that familiar classic rock radio staple, "Woman From Tokyo". I always thought it was Skynrd or Foghat or someone. Could have been Kiss for all I knew. It's not bad it's just very generic. It's a great track. But it's not genius. I'm beginning to smell a roller rink....
While I kind of enjoy "Smooth Dancer", the song brings to focus that this is a band that seems to have run out of ideas. It's as rote a swingin' rocker as I've ever heard.
And "Rat Rat Blue" sounds like a band that was so bored they just rewrote the opening track. It's awful. And the swirling solos in the middle just sound like a bunch of guys showing off.
Singer Ian Gillan would leave the band after this. I don't entirely blame him. Being forced to sing "Place in Line" would make anyone leave.
The album closer, "Our Lady" could have been a leftover from some late 60s Beatles/Stones Satanic/Mystery epic. But nowhere near as good and 6 years too late.

Grade: C-
ASIde: Woman from Tokyo
BlindSide: Smooth Dancer
DownSide: Rat Rat Blue, Place in Line, Our Lady

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath

Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath - 1973

SBS opens with a demonstrative salvo. The title track, with it's enormous verses and the quiet counter choruses, says we're a long way from that industrial town. The boys are holding on to the mantle of metal god and refusing to let it go. What we're left with is almost a manifesto.
Just what is "Fluff"? Can you imagine being a die hard Sabbathhead and hearing that for the first time? I actually can because Randy Rhodes did a lot of that stuff for Ozzy years later and what a teenage music fan like me did was get validation out of. "It's like classical music! See! They can really play, Mom!" This is the stuff that Tenacious D would mock 25 years later. Hell, almost 30. And, sure it's indulgent and pretentious, but that's what ROCK is supposed to be, dammit.
And, oh, "Sabbra Cadabra". What rifftastic treat is that, huh? Is that Yes's Rick Wakeman ripping it up on Keys? Hell, yes, it is.
Then again: Ring ring...Hello, Sabbath? My name is Gary Numan. I really like what you've done on that track, "Who Are You". Would you mind if I totally appropriate that sound, never give you credit and try to make an entire living based on it? No? Great, thanks."
But I kind of like that track. It's very Jon Carpenter. Very Dark Star.
There's no way pre-SBS Sabbath would have been able to record something as grandiose and assured as "Looking for Today". A song as much fun to listen to as it must be to play, it has no relationship to "Iron Man" or "Paranoid" or "War Pig". But that's fine, in fact, it's more than fine. It's important. It separates this more mature band from its raw youth and elevates the album to something unexpected and special. And "Spiral Architect" fits that bill perfectly. It couldn't exist on the previous four albums, not like this. This is great.

Grade: A+
ASide: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, Sabbra Cadabra
BlindSide: A National Acrobat, Fluff, Looking for Today, Spiral Architect

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Machine Head

Deep Purple - Machine Head - 1972

Hey, what's that sound? That driving metal with the rock n roll wail? It sounds so familiar. It's...the theme to Rock Band 2! And it's 40 years old.
"Highway Star" is the track, Machine Head is the album, Deep Purple is the band. This is the one that we think about when we think about the architects of metal. Zeppelin 4, Paranoid by Sabbath and Machine Head.
Having listened to all these albums in a row I can finally really hear the connection between 70s metal and 60s prog rock. They have more in common than I would have ever thought, having been weaned on the blues based meta of AC/DC or the glam metal of Crue and Poison and GnR.
But, this is where the Motorheads of the world find their genesis. Metallica, Megadeth, the great shredders of the 80s owe a lot to Richie Blackmore, Jon Lord and the rest of Deep Purple. There's no doubt in my mind that all the great metal bands of the next decade had this in their collection.
Next up is "Maybe, I'm a Leo". And like the previous album, it's a let down after that opening attack. It's not bad, it's just more of a back beat, later in the record sort of track.
After that the album really rights itself and doesn't let up. "Pictures of Home" and the ubiquitous classic radio staple, "Smoke on the Water" cement the record's heavyweight status. Listening to it again it sounds indelibly like what I would expect from DP, and yet, like nothing else in their catalog really. it's as though it crawled out of a southern rock swamp. A truly remarkable song.
Not to be undone, the mostly instrumental blues rocker with harmonica, "Lazy", is one of the grooviest tracks the band's ever produced.
Rounding out the album is the almost glammy rocker, "Space Truckin'".

This might be one of the greatest rock albums of all time. At least in its genre. No doubt about that.

Grade: A+
ASide: Highway Star, Smoke on the Water
BlindSide: Pictures of Home, Lazy, Space Truckin'

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Vol.4

Black Sabbath - Vol. 4 - 1972

The world of dark metal gets a little sludgier in 1972. You can almost feel the band shedding off it's working class England stink and sliding through a thick morass of L.A. debauchery. These are gods among men, these musicians. In 1972, before glam would become the next big thing, before punk, before stadium prog, there was Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, Blue Oyster Cult, etc.
Vol.4 is a bit more experimental than the previous three albums and, you know, thank god. "Wheels of Confusion", a multi-part opener, sort of challenges the listener to go on this journey with the band. If you were expecting "Iron Man" you would get that plus a healthy dose of psychedelia.
We get back to the riffage right afterward with "Tomorrow's Dream", it's the Sabbath we've come to count on and it's immediately followed by the completely unexpected piano ballad "Changes". Stretching their wings the band pretty much invents the metal power ballad. And it's awesome.
And what can you really say about powerhouses like "Supernaut" and "Snowblind" (& Under the Sun) that haven't already been said.
It all gets a little tired toward the end. Imagine how bloated this record would sound if it was recorded 15 years later in the era of the 70 minute cd? Yikes.

Vol. 4 is a metal classic and deserves to be.

Grade: A
ASide: Changes, Supernaut, Snowblind
BlindSide: Wheels of Confusion, St. Vitus Dance (I include it here cuz I never remember that it's on this record and I love that riff)

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Fireball

Deep Purple - Fireball - 1971

This is great. This was what the band was leaning toward on In Rock. In fact, this is the logical progression from there. Building on the toughness of that album, Fireball, with just a few exceptions, is one strong beefcake of a record.
With a shredtastic opening title track, Deep Purple puts to rest the memories of "Hush" and psychedelia. Embracing Blackmore's edgier tendencies seems to have infused the entire band with energy. There's still a lot of room for Jon Lord to show off some superb organing but this endeavor leaves whatever classicism the band portended to have in the dust.
The blues-ified Lord showcase number, "No No No" is almost a setback, but I found myself enjoying more toward the end. Of course, this was every time Gillan's vocals came back or Blackmore's guitar cut through the clutter. At this point I'm ready to say goodbye to Lord's organ. I know this is sacrilege but I'm over it. I can feel this is a band that wants to cut loose and kill and that sound softens everything.
It's nice to hear piano instead of organ on the very weird and fun "Anyone's Daughter", a personal favorite of mine.
Toward the end the LSD is back on "The Mule" and it's not awful, but when the guitar and drums kick in for that middle 8, they effectively brush aside the haze. That's what a lot of this record is; the brushing aside of hazy hippyness by stratospheric metal. The sludginess of "Fools" is the perfect amalgam. It's psych-metal. It's delicious.

Grade: A-
ASide: Fireball
BlindSide: Anyone's Daughter, No One Came

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Master of Reality

Black Sabbath - Master of Reality - 1971

Is Master of Reality really just Paranoid Part 2? Sure. Why mess with success? In fact, what's more interesting to me is that Iommi had hurt his hand before recording this record so he just tuned his guitar down a notch and played everything that way. Butler followed suit and the result was a record even more sludgier, murkier and denser than the others. And sort of brilliant all at the same time.
There are tracks like the brief "Embryo" and "Orchid" and "Solitude" that are actually quite beautiful, while others, like "Children of the Grave" are downright terrifying. And Iommi's shredding is nothing short of pre-Randy Rhode-ian genius. One listen to "Lord of this World" and just about everything Josh Homme's been about for the past 10 years makes sense. And he owes Sabbath some royalty checks.
However, I should say that, at this point the Sabbath tricks and licks are getting tired. Maybe it's just me. Maybe 3 albums in a row is overkill, but that's the whole point of the LPs.
For now, they, um, what do the kids say, rule? Sure.
MoR is as good as the last.

Grade: A
ASide: Sweet Leaf
BlindSide: Children of the Grave, Orchid, Solitude

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Paranoid

Black Sabbath - Paranoid - 1970

Metal. Heavy Metal. Just what is it?
I could go on some kind of descriptive bender. I could vomit adjectives till you and I are sick of reading them and writing them.
Or.
You could just pick up Paranoid and listen to the seven minute opening opus, "War Pigs" to get exactly what HEAVY METAL is.
It's a kind of horror show in minor keys. It's the voice of the people, if the people are sequestered in a dungeon and have no ability to speak for themselves. It's a wail and cry. It's a brick wrapped in a wet towel soaked in gin and pummeled into your head.
Listen that epic build toward the end of "War Pigs". 15 years later that would be augmented by strings and keyboards and massive overproduction. Without it, it's just as powerful but even more stark and terrifying.
In the hands of Iommi, their "hit single", the title track, would be the very basis for everything The Ramones would do in just a few years.
And what can be said of "Iron Man"? If there was ever a song built around one great riff, it's that. It holds up 40 years later, so much so that it sounded fresh in the Robert Downey Jr movie just a few years ago.
The first time you listen to Paranoid you might feel a little let down toward the end. This is, I assure you, only because the first half of it has become part of the musical lexicon that you, like me, might feel like the rest is too familiar. Listen again. THen I think you'll get past the Spinal Tappiness of the record. (Man, in retrospect, they really ruined 70s metal.)

Grade: A
ASIde: War Pigs, Paranoid, iron Man
BlindSide: Fairies Wear Boots

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - In Rock

Almost as though answering a salvo laid down a few months earlier by Iommi, Osbourne and crew, Deep Purple came out with this spin.
Rod Evans is out as vocalist and Ian Gillan is in. In other words, from the moment you hear the first track, "Speed King" you realize, this is not your father's Deep Purple. In fact, on that track, for the first time in four albums, I find the Hammond organ to be a pain in the ass. It gets in the way. The metal is so pulsing, so energized, Blackmore's fuzz if fuzzier, the bass sounds more like "Radar Love" than anything on the previous records. And what Gillan's doing with his voice is Robert Plant but without the flowers and grooviness. It's more Halford than Plant. And on the ferocious "Child in Time" he becomes the 5th instrument, not just something to put the words out on what would otherwise be an instrumental. After listening to "Flight of the Rat" it's become obvious to me that Brian May MUST have been listening to Ritchie Blackmore and this album when writing some of Queen's harder rocking stuff. it's all there.

Nothing on the previous albums can prepare you for this. This is the Deep Purple of notoriety, not the prissy, neo-classical, prog rock. This is cock rock at it's finest. Hard to believe that in a few months all this stuff turns 40.

Grade: A
ASide: Speed King, Child in Time
BlindSide: Bloodsucker, Flight of the Rat

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath

Black Sabbath - Black Sabbath - 1970

And then came Sabbath.
If ever there was a band that could be said epitomized all that was terrifying about Rock and Roll too ill informed parents, I would say, it was Sabbath. And the first strains of the first song on the first album, the band's title song, should strike fear into the hearts and ears of the listener. It's a rainy night, all the lights out, candles lit, seance, ouija board, conjuring the dead kind of sound.
i imagine that no one had heard anything like it at the time. I sure didn't, when I heard it years later.
That this album was recorded in a DAY and everything was played live is astonishing.
Klosterman called it seminal, the album that begets nearly everything from Alice in Chains to Soundgarden to Queens of the Stone Age, etc.
Lester Bangs called it "like Cream, but worse."
Divisive, yes, but I think Bangs was reacting and Klosterman is reflecting. The album holds up much better than Cream or Deep Purple. It's urgent, sludgy and aggressive as stoner metal is supposed to be.
Song like, "N.I.B." which comes to a crashing implosion and "Evil Woman" sound like they have been meticulously crafted. I challenge any contemporary act to go in studio and come out with something this polished and powerful. In a day.

Grade: A
ASide: Black Sabbath, N.I.B.
BlindSide: Behind the Wall of Sleep

And now, a word from the uninformed but pious.

When you believe in something so devoutly that you refuse to see or hear any opposing views, that makes you, what? Crazy? Narrow minded? You bring the adjectives. What bothers me more than Rush Limbaugh being ill informed is that he is a leader of a massive political party in this country and they, gulp, want control.
And yet, they have no earthly idea what they are talking about.
Take a listen:



Man. He can't even argue because he knows that he's wrong in every respect.
Ronald Reagan was NOT the standard bearer for the Tea Party. If he was running today they would never elect him, he'd be considered too liberal.

I believe that, if he were running for office today he would say the same thing about the GOP that he did about the Democrats in the 60s: "I didn't leave the [Republican] party. They left me.

Happy birthday, Ronnie.

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Deep Purple

Deep Purple - Deep Purple - 1969

Deep Purple's eponymous album comes a year after their debut AND sophomore records. And from the very first few seconds you can tell it's a different affair entirely. "Chasing Shadows" is a drummer's showcase and Ian Paice is up to the challenge. The blending of tribal percussion to Blackmore's psychedelia drenched lead licks is nothing short of astonishing. It would sound contemporary 3 years later. Nothing on the previous two albums is as exciting, and I'm including "Hush" in that statement. There's only one cover on Deep Purple and it's Donovan's "Lalena", a rendition so slow and meticulous that its almost funeral. It's a terrific pairing with their cover of "Help".
On the other hand, while original material like, "Blind" COULD have fallen into the ho-hum category of the previous band's material offerings, the intensity of Blackmore and Lord's playing, each seemingly in competition with each other, upping the ante, bringing more and more power to their instrument's contribution, is perfectly matched with Paice's drumming. So, what might have been trite prog-rock of the 60s, is, instead, the foundation of what rock could and would be.
Deep Purple is an important entry into the pantheon of Metal. I think it's terrific, dark, brooding, haunting and amazing that just 9 years earlier the music scene was all about bobby soxers and teeny boppers. If you were 15 in 1955, you were 29 when this record came out. You either got it, or you got off it (or you dropped some acid and got off on it). Talk about a generational divide.
Deep Purple is the first DP album I can really get behind. It's terrific. The semi-orchestral "April" is worth the whole damned trip.

Grade: A
ASide: Why DIdn't Rosemary, The Bird Has Flown
BlindSide: Chasing Shadows, The Painter, April

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - The Book of Taliesyn

Deep Purple - The Book of Taliesyn - 1968

The first thing you notice when you drop the needle on Deep Purple's sophomore offering is the edge. This is a darker album, but not murkier. It's edgier, cutting, trippier by virtue of frenzy. Mirroring the landscape that was being mined by bands like The Moody Blues, DP merges it with their improvisational jam theories and runs it through their own taffy machine so it's all musch scarier and harrowing than even the darkest moments of their debut.
The issue with this is that the overindulgence is still present and that, married with the galloping drive of the musical engine creates an exhausting listen. And very little lingers long enough for the listener to hold on to it. That's not to say the songs are short. They are quite the opposite. Nothing clocks in at under 4 minutes and three tracks are over 6. They are healthy and robust but unfocused and immature.
Not the best of the genre that I've heard. There are moments, though: Ritchie Blackmore's guitar work toward the end of "Wring That Neck" suggests at what he might be able to achieve later on.
Half of the album is covers, most notable, Neil Diamond's "Kentucky Woman". It's no "Hush", to be sure. It's spectacularly predestined as the HIT SINGLE, and that sense of the pre-ordained stinks all over it. Blackmore really comes in to his own on this track, though. The duel between him and Lord's Hammond is a treat.
The pomp and majesty of "Exposition" gives way to a veritable psychedelic rave and, finally, pounds in to the cover of another Beatles track, this time it's "We Can Work It Out". By the time you get there, if you aren't already believing that Jon Lord is something of a genius on par with Walter Carlos or Rick Wakeman, you aren't really listening.
Taliesyn isn't any great shakes. It's non-essential, like Moody Blues' In Search of the Lost Chord.

Grade: C
ASide: Kentucky Woman
BlindSide: Exposition/We Can Work It Out
DownSide: Shield, Anthem

Listening Post: Purple Sabbath - Deep Purple - Shades of Deep Purple

Deep Purple - Shades of Deep Purple - 1968

The Guinness Book of Records has called them the "World's Loudest Band". I'm sure Deep Purple contribute to the pastiche that made up Spinal Tap 14 years after this record was released. But, in 1968, Deep Purple started to change the way the world would listen to music. Along with Zeppelin and Hendrix, they lay the groundwork for all that would come to be called "Heavy Metal".

Shades of Deep Purple opens with the instrumental track, "And the Address", an instrumental piece that comes across as a psychedelic, heavier Strawberry Alarm Clock. It's very emblematic of the times, noodley guitar leads, quickly delving into transformed blues motifs, reliant on cow bell and tremendously indulgent organ work. The whole affair is huge and could easily serve as the soundtrack for "The Incredibly Strange Creatures Who Stopped Living and Became Mixed Up Zombies". However, I imagine that, at the time, this was pretty cutting edge. And a bold way to start off an album.
From there we transition to "Hush" and if there was ever a song that defined an era, it's this one. The perfectly delectable melding of psychedelia, hippy grooviness, rhythm and blues, and slashingly smart guitars. John Lord's Hammond work is nothing short of brilliant.
Fully half of the album are covers like "Hush" and The Beatles' "Help" and the epic, "Prelude to Happiness/I'm So Glad" and they show that the group's solid understanding of dynamics and their skills as musicians are unquestionable. Their originals are a little less inspiring but they could never be called failures. Especially "Mandrake Root" whose middle section is as inspired an LSD trip as anything the Moody Blues ever put out. Just listening to it the first time I want to shoot something into my veins. Doesn't matter what it is, so long as it's not a natural color.

A terrificly solid effort that is a perfect representation of one of the prevailing sounds of the late 60s.

Grade: A-
ASIde: Hush
BlindSide: Mandrake Root, Help
DownSide: Love Help Me

Listening Post: Fathers of Metal

I was looking back over my old Listening Posts (LPs) and rereading the Judas Priest reviews. Partially to rank them because I was bored one day waiting for my son to come home from the hospital and also because, well, I do enjoy me some Judas Priest.
When it occurred to me: I meant to do a Black Sabbath retrospective right after but I got distracted, what with the In Vitro and the new house and the one man show and the writing and the teaching and the auditioning, I just plum forgot.
But, how can you do just Black Sabbath? If you listen to Sabbath, it's only natural to follow them to their conclusion. And I love me some Ozzy (early Ozzy), so I would have to do his solo records. But, Mob Rules is pretty great so I would have to follow Ronnie James Dio out. Then it occurred to me that Dio got his start in Deep Purple and the real true roots of metal lie in that band as well.
Now Richie Blackmore was a co-founder of DP and when he left he created Rainbow. So, naturally, I'd wanna hear that band as well. And how can you even talk about Deep Purple without mentioning David Coverdale? Which would bring us to Whitesnake.
I've decided that, with Coverdale I will only look at three respected Whitesnake records and I'm not touching Coverdale/Page. Probably wanna do that when I do the Zeppelin LP. (And I've still gotta get through the Rolling Stones. Leave me alone, they're half written.)
So.
18 Deep Purple Albums
18 Black Sabbath Albums
8 Rainbow Albums
10 Ozzy Osbourne Albums
10 Dio Albums.
3 Whitesnake albums
67 albums.

It will be called Listening Post: Purple Sabbath
Wish me luck.

Listening Post: Aerosmith - Honkin' on Bobo

Aerosmith – Honkin' On Bobo – 2004

Aerosmith goes back to its roots and becomes...The J. Geils Band?
If you go wayyyy back into the Geils catalog you'll discover that they were one of the best blues bar bands in the country. Also from Boston, their live record Full House is a dynamic explosion of rockin' blues.
Aerosmith's last album isn't live. And, while it is an album of straight ahead blues covers (except for one track, “The Grind”) it has that sleazy Tyler/Perry goo all over it.
And it's their best record in a while.
From the opening track, “Road Runner” by Bo Diddly, straight on to the penultimate song, “Stop Messin' Around”, with Sonny Boy Williamson and Willie Dixon songs among the blues breakers in the middle, it's a blast. Even the last song, “Jesus on the Mainline” sounds like everyone involved is having a grand time.
Except for that god awful title, which sounds more like a euphemism for sex with a drunken, fugly stripper instead of a nickname for Tyler's harmonica, Honkin' On Bobo is a blast.

Grade: B+
A-Side: Road Runner
BlindSide: Really the rest of the record.

Listening Post: Aerosmith - Just Push Play

Aerosmith – Just Push Play – 2001

Just Push Play is, without a doubt, the ugliest record that Aerosmith has ever recorded.
Still following the formula, utilizing outsized orchestrations whether or not they are appropriate, the band just comes across as tired.
And we are not the beneficiaries of anything good here.
The major single, “Jaded”, is as cut out a track as the band has ever done. While it's somewhat catchy, it's time for these guys to put it to rest. The rest of the record is forgettable at best.
Earlier this year Joe Perry went on record disavowing Play, saying that none of the members were in the same room when it was recorded and it taught him “how not to make an Aerosmith record.”
Indeed.

Grade: D
A-Side: Jaded
BlindSide:
DownSide: Trip Hoppin

Listening Post: Aerosmith - Nine Lives

Aerosmith – Nine Lives – 1997

So, it's been more than a year since I was doing the Listening Post for the Toxic Twins from Boston. I actually listened to this record once, but it was playing in the background while I was out in the backyard playing with Zoe and I wasn't really paying attention.
And I also have no real recollection of the band's catalog anymore so I can't really place it in any great context.
I can only rate it on it's own merits.
If Nine Lives was a soundtrack for some Hollywood big screen epic it makes perfect sense. It's a giant sounding record. Power ballads (“Hole in My Soul”, “Full Circle”- a song that sounds like the big hits “Cryin', et al, and which, while I can't quite recommend it, I kind of love), sprawling world music sound (“Taste of India”), rock monsters (“Nine Lives”, “Something's Gotta Give”) and radio friendly huge blues (Ain't that a Bitch).
All of them Rock-by-the-numbers formula songs. By this time, Aerosmith has it down. They are hiring the right producers, co-writers, buying the right tracks, selling to the people who will buy their stuff. I am imaging it's the same group that buy Bon Jovi records. In fact, an Aero-Jovi tour would probably make a gazillion dollars, except that Jon Bongiovi doesn't need Aerosmith the way Tyler and Co. might need him.
The drug fueled, hallucinepic, “The Farm” with it's Wizard of Oz re-enactments is a noble experiment, but it's just not very good or engaging. On the other hand, the speed-punk “Crash” is, for me, a much better song. It's not trying to be anything other than what it is. And it's the most alive the band has sounded in a while.
The single, “Pink”, is a grotesque as far as I'm concerned. Still obsessed with adolescent interests, it just grates and it's probably the first time I would include a hit single as a DownSide.
Nine Lives tries to keep the Pump – Get a Grip formula alive. And it doesn't fail. It's just that, once you've heard those records, you've heard those records and that's sort of enough. It's a comfortable sound, if not completely interchangeable. I prefer those others over this one, though. It's a solid, if lonnnnng record.

Grade: B-
A-Side: Nine Lives, Hole in My Soul,
BlindSide: Taste of India, Crash
DownSide: Ain't That a Bitch

Listening Post: Kiss - Ranking

Excluding the solo records, of which there are too many, and also discounting the live records, even though the first one helped put the band on the map, how did Kiss rank up in the Sept-O-meter?


Destroyer: A+ (100)
Rock and Roll All Night: A+ (100)
Kiss: A (96)
Dressed to Kill: A- (93)
Creatures of the Night: B+ (88)
Sonic Boom: B (85)
Hotter Than Hell: B (84)
Revenge: B (84)
Lick it Up: B (83)
Love Gun: B- (81)
Dynasty: C (75)
Unmasked: C (74)
Psycho Circus: C- (70)
Animalize: C- (70)
Hot in the Shade: D (65)
Crazy Nights: D (64)
Asylum: D (63)
Carnival of Souls: D- (61)
Music from The Elder: F (50)

Kiss Average Grade: 74. C is "average". And that's Kiss for you. Not that great, not that bad. Just in between. Certainly those top 2 belong in any rock lover's record shelf but the rest you don't need.

Listening Post: Van Halen - Ranking

There are two VHs. Okay three.
Let's see how it all ranks up.

Van Halen: A+ (100)
1984: A (97)
5150: A (96)
OU812: A (95)
Van Halen II: A (95)
Balance: A (94)
Fair Warning: B+ (88)
Women and Children First: B+ (88)
Diver Down: C (75)
For Unlawful Carnal Knowledge: D (64)
Van Halen III: F (50)

Complete: 85 Solid B
David: 90. A-
Sammy: 87 B+
Fairly even. That Gary Cherone album really drags down the band. Without it, they get a strong B+. Which is high for anyone's career.

Listening Post: Judas Priest - Ranking

They were the architects of modern metal. On the cutting edge of rock in so many ways.
So, what happened when they were given the Septenary treatment?

Hell Bent for Leather: A+ (100)
Screaming for Vengeance: A+ (100)
Painkiller: A (97)
Sad Wings of Destiny: A (96)
Stained Class: A (94)
Point of Entry: B+ (88)
Sin After Sin: B+ (88)
Angel of Retribution: B+ (87)
British Steel: B- (82)
Defenders of the Faith: C (75)
Ram It Down: C (73)
Nostradamus: D+ (68)
Demolition: D (64)
Rocka Rolla: D- (61)
Turbo Lover: F (50)
Jugulator: F (50)

Complete Catalog: B- (80)
With Halford Only: B (83)
It's a shame that Those bottom three Halfords exist. Without them, this is a really solid metal band. But, really, those first 4 are brilliant.

Listening Post: Green Day - Ranking

So, what Green Day should you buy? In what order? Hmmm....

Dookie: A+ (100)
American Idiot A+ (100)
21st Century Breakdown: A (97)
Insomniac: A (96)
Foxboro Hot Tubs: A (96)
Warning: A (95)
39 Smooth/Slappy Hours B+ (88)
Shenanigans: B+ (88)
Kerplunk: B (85)
The Network's Money Money 2020 B- (81)
Nimrod: C+ (78)

Tough. Have to rank it two ways:
Green Day Plus: 91 A-
Green Day Prime: 92 A-
So, I guess it doesn't matter. If you dig power/punk/pop, Green Day has something for you. The top 3 are must owns. The second 3 are fine. Round out with the bottom 5 if you're a completist.

Listening Post: Elvis Costello - Ranking

How does Septenary rank Declan McManus?

My Aim is True: A+ (100)
This Year's Model: A+ (100)
Imperial Bedroom: A+ (100)
Punch the Clock: A+ (100)
Armed Forces: A (97)
Blood & Chocolate: A (95)
Trust: A (97)
Secret, Profane and Sugarcane: A- (93)
Momofuku: A- (92)
When I Was Cruel: B+ (88)
All This Useless Beauty: B+ (87)
Brutal Youth: B (85)
Almost Blue: B- (82)
King of America: B- (82)
Mighty Like a Rose: B- (81)
The Delivery Man: B- (81)
Spike: C (75)
Kojack Variety: C (74)
Get Happy: C- (72)
Painted From Memory C- (71)
Goodbye Cruel World: D+ (68)
The Juliet Letters: D (65)
North: D- (60)

Elvis Costello Average Grade: 85. Solid B. Impressive considering the amount of work AND the amount of experimentation. He has a new one that I will be reviewing soon.

Listening Post: R.E.M - Ranking

How do the darlings of Alternative fare when all their albums are ranked? Which should you buy? What is their average output? How much time do I really have on my hands?

Murmur: A+ (100)
Reckoning: A+ (100)
Lifes Rich Pageant: A+ (100)
Automatic for the People: A+ (100)
Accelerate: A (96)
Document: A- (92)
Chronic Town: A (95)
New Adventures in Hi Fi: B+ (89)
Out of Time: B- (82)
Monster: C- (73)
Fables of the Reconstruction: C- (71)
Green: D (66)
Reveal: D- (63)
Up: D- (61)
Around the Sun: D- (61)

REM Average Grade: 79 C+. Not too shabby considering how pisspoor those post Bill Berry records are. Let's remove those from the equation and see what happens: 88. B+. Had they just stopped.....

Listening Post: AC/DC ranking

How does the band from down under fare according to Septenary?

Back in Black: A+ (100)
Let There Be Rock: A (97)
Powerage: A (96)
Highway to Hell: B+ (89)
Black Ice: B+ (89)
High Voltage: B (86)
Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap: B (86)
The Razor's Edge: C+ (78)
For Those About to Rock: C (75)
Ballbreaker: C (75)
Stiff Upper Lip: C (75)
Flick of the Switch: D+ (68)
Blow Up Your Video: D+ (67)
Fly on the Wall: D- (63)

AC/DC Average grade: B- (81)
Not that surprising. The post Back in Black output is just god awful.

Listening Post: U2 - Ranking

Following the metric I established for Devo I thought it prudent to apply the same to the very first Listening Post artist and see how they fare. (Seriously, with my newborn son still in the hospital, I've got nothing to do....)

The Joshua Tree: A+ (100)
Achtung Baby: A+ (100)
The Unforgettable Fire: A (98)
War: A (98)
Boy: B+ (89)
How To Dismantle An Atomic Bomb B+ (88)
All That You Can't Leave Behind B (85)
No Line on the Horizon D (65)
October: D (64)
Zooropa: D- (61)
Pop: D- (60)

U2 Average grade: C (74). When they hit, they are classic. When they miss, they are awful. The bottom of the pile really drags down the average inasmuch as the top 5 are some of the best rock music has to offer.

Listening Post: Devo - Ranking

Something I've never done but might go back and complete is the the actual rankings of Listening Post and Reflecting Pool records in order of grades.

I'll start with the latest Listening Post for Devo.

Freedom of Choice: A+ (100)
Q: Are We Not Men A: We Are Devo: A+ (99)
Something for Everybody: A (93)
Oh, No! It's Devo; B- (81)
Duty Now For the Future: B- (80)
New Traditionalists: C- (74)
Shout: C- (72)
Smooth Noodle Maps: C- (70)
Total Devo: D- (61)

Devo output average: B- (81)
In other words, about average. What one can expect from any artist. Stick with the top three and you'll be fine.

Listening Post: Devo - Something For Everybody

Devo - Something for Everybody - 2010

The image clean, the icon reminiscent, the name familiar, it's 20 years later and Devo has a new album.
Should we care?
I'm not sure, I want to like it, the way I dug Freedom of Choice and Q/A.
For one thing, they've seemed to bury the hatchet between the band and guitars. Because the first single and first track, "Fresh" is boiling with lead solos, a sound sorely missing, and Mothersbaugh's chimpanzee vocals have a newfound freshness. In other words, it works in every way that the last 2 albums (20 years + old) did not.
The techno-march of "What We Do" perfectly matches the Devolution concept and the song itself is an unapologetic anthem for the band and any spud followers.
What comes to mind is that Devo has found its sense of humor again. They aren't trying too hard to be the leaders of the tech revolution. They've learned a LOT from scoring cartoons and, realizing that their sound and image and concept is basically a cartoon to begin with, they've embraced this with love and aren't...angry about it anymore. More corporate than ever before, I would have fully embraced and accepted it if they had shorn hasmat suits in favor of suits and ties ala The Tubes during Completion Backwards Principle.
The techno-soul is finally back on the near perfect, "Please Baby Please" and it's welcome, baby. Followed by "Don't Shoot, I'm a Man", a song that harkens back to the first album in both style and substance, S4E really feels like a return to form. Incorporating "Don't tase me, Bro" and grafting it to a song about a hybrid car driver worried about being shot by a rooftop sniper, I'm reminded that this is a band that once wrote a song based on the writings of President Reagan's would be assassin.
If you remember and sort of miss Devo from the "Whip It" days and you have a little space in your heart for herky jerky new wave space rock, Something For Everybody is the record for you.

Grade: A
ASide: Fresh, What We Do, Please Baby Please, Don't Shoot I'm a Man, Sumthin'
BlindSide: Mind Games, Human Rocket, Step Up
DownSide:

Listening Post: Devo - Smooth Noodle Maps

Devo - Smooth Noodle Maps - 1990

Remember all that anonymous pseudo-dance synth music on the last Devo record? It's ba-a-a-ck! Only more monotonous than before. At least this time we are only treated to a 30 minute blast. Half the time, the same amount of schnooze!
I have to believe that opening track, "Stuck in a Loop" is a commentary on the banality and exhaustive sound the band is vomiting out.
It says a lot that the most interesting track is the cover of the early 60s hit, "Morning Dew". One of the things I notice as I listen is that Devo is exceptionally capable of making acceptable dance tracks. But, it's like dance tracks done by someone with low-functioning Asperger's. Their ability to embrace the sex or sensuality or connective tissue that is required of dance tracks is missing. It's dance music for robots. Which is why it must fail. To dance is to connect. Not just to put words on beats.
It isn't until the album is almost over that the band gets their snark on for real. "Jimmy" is like Ween's "Spinal meningitis" for people with very thin skin. And there's "Devo Has feelings, Too", with it's crunchy guitars and the sense that the door might be closing on the spuds. Not a moment too soon.

Grade: C-
ASide: Post Post Modern Man
BlindSide: Morning Dew, Jimmy
DownSide:

Listening Post: Devo - Total Devo

Devo - Total Devo - 1988

Here's the thing about this record. Besides the fact that who the fuck knew it even existed?
It's really boring. There's no doubt that Devo know how to put notes together and create music or "songs". And the first track, "Baby Doll" does contain a certain amount of nightmarish soundscaping. But, beyond that it's a dull record.
And, most egregious, it's almost an hour long. That's almost TWICE the length of Oh, No! IT's Devo, or Shout or Freedom of Choice and a full 20 minutes longer than their previous longest record, Duty Now for the Future. So, not only is it boring, it's a LOT of boring.
That it sounds like every other third rate synth-o record from the era is an insult to Devo AND those other records. Weirdly, I think Harold Faltermeyer is to blame for most of this stuff's success. A track "The Shadow" which incorporates that era-popular orchestral synth chord that was used to death by Trevor Horn (Or is it Rabin...?) sounds like a desperate attempt to write the soundtrack to some comedic actioner. No surprise that Devo's foray into that world was the distant and desperate to be funny, Doctor Detroit. While the theme to that god-awful Dan Ackroyd movie was awful, we didn't need an entire album's worth. Let alone 58 mintues worth.
And what's with the synthetic xylophones? Why did you ever bring this to us, Thompson Twins??? Worse, Devo, why did you appropriate them?
I'm often reminded of a great passage from a review of Adam Ant's alter work on Allmusic where the reviewer pointed out that Adam had been rendered anonymous on his own record. I will use that here and never again offer it as anything but my own idea.
Devo couldn't sound less like "Devo" and more like "every other band of its type" on this record. Anonymous is the perfect adjective.

From a band who, just ten years earlier were on the cutting edge of theory, ideology and cracked pop, this is an egregious offering.

Grade: D-
ASide:
BlindSide: Baby Doll
DownSide: The Shadow, Man Turned Inside Out (Adam Ant probably owes Devo some royalties because this song sounds TOO much like Room at the Top), Sexi Luv, Blow Up

Zack Attack: Oh, you gotta be fucking kidding me edition

Took Zoe to school today. She's alternating between the thrill of being a big sister and the abject rejection of her loss of station. That's cool. I understand that. I was a 5 year old who lost his power position to an obnoxious, screaming, whining pain in the ass baby. I remember the experience like it was yesterday.
We explained to her that the baby was coming home today and that she could help and watch her own movies and blah blah blah.
I got home to find Beth on the phone.
Turns out the hospital never asked us to sign a consent form for our Dr. to perform the circumcision. I don't much cotton to religion but we were going to have a mohel do it. Mainly because I've seen them done poorly by internists and I wanted a pro. I have no family here in LA and no real reason for a ceremony. This is a conformity/health issue with a smattering of "If he wants to be a religious jew later, so be it".
Anywho, now we have to wait for that operation which can't happen until we get to the hospital and sign the form.
But! There's another snag. Guess who must have figured out he was going home so he decided to stop breathing a little again? You guessed right.
Our little bundle of neuroses did it again (sort of). He didn't turn blue this time, nor did he have an apnic reaction but the nurses threw him on oxygen again.
The neonatologist ordered the oxygen stopped, that it wasn't necessary, so that's a relief.
BUT.
He also vomited. You don't wanna vomit in the icu, it gets everyone all up in arms and nervous. His pediatrician thinks that he was just overeating, since he's actually a healthy baby who should by now be out of the ICU. The nurses probably just overfed him and he barfed.
However, the doc thinks it might be prudent to keep him there one more night for observation.
He did stress, however, that if we wanted to take Zack home tonight, we could. They expect nothing to go wrong. But, heck, if he's gonna have surgery and he's already there.....
So, it looks like Zack WON'T be coming home today.
Tomorrow.
Unless he does something else.......

No good deed goes unpunished

So, this happened last night.



Beth and I were in the tv room watching Californication, enjoying the soft core comedy stylings of David Duchovny and Evan Handler, when we heard a loud BOOM outside.
We raced out to see a car had been heading down the street, lost control, hit a parked car and ended up on its side. People said they had called 911, but they were doing it from their cell phones and we have learned that land lines are the best for that. So, Beth handed me the home phone that we barely use, except for emergencies and I called.
911 was extraordinary. The asked that the passenger be given space so I started to yell, "Get away from the car!". At first they did exactly that.
Then 911 wanted to be sure that no one touch the car. Inasmuch as the car could topple over, to leave it be.
One jackass went over to the car and put his hand on the roof and was trying to get the driver to open a window.
"Get your hand OFF the car!" I was yelling. It took about 4 times for me to yell this for the guy to respond.
His reaction? To get in my face and call me out for yelling at him!
I told him that 911 said the car could fall over.
"They don't know." He replied. "It wasn't gonna fall over". I could see the beer in his eyes.
I thought he was going to take a slug at me.
the rescue team arrived and cordoned off the scene as you can see. I made mea culpas to the drunk simply because I'm the new guy in the neighborhood and I don't want my house robbed.
People suck. You know?