Rolling Past Expiry Hard Rock 2010

So, just realized that the obvious '70s sonic precedent for that one lovely Alexander/Boom Boom Band ballad I compared to Jacobites above was probably Marc Bolan too, duh. (Which makes me wonder something. Don't think anybody's ever complained that T. Rex didn't get any albums into Stairway To Hell -- just listed "Bang A Gong"/"Jeepster" as a single in an appendix, but should they have? Just listened to The Slider for the first time forever -- turns out it charted higher than Electric Warrior stateside, weird -- I'd definitely call "Buick Mackane" a hard rock/metal tune, which explains why GNR covered it I guess, but I didn't notice any other tracks near that heavy on that LP. Honestly don't know if I've ever heard Tanx; the title always sounded heavy and metal to me. Doesn't look like T. Rex made the Jasper/Oliver book at all, and their defiition of metal was even wider than mine. Popoff sticks them in his "very very occasionally and slightly hard rocky" appendix in the back of his '70s book, seems to be saying the most metal thing about Bolan was his look. But hair metal bands -- Def Leppard at least -- were big fans, right?)

Speaking of hair metal, decided that 1988 Punch Drunk LP by Helsinki cowboys Gringos Locos I mentioned above (though I think I typed 1978 by mistake) doesn't really have the melodies or singing to put its sleaze over, though its Aero/Nuge/Halen/fast boogie riffs do push into a hefty overdrive a couple times ("Living On Borrowed Time," "Livin In Your Lovin' Light"), and they get a little funky with some Grand Funk cowbell in the title track then a little funkier with a Wild Cherry riff in "Jean Jinx Jane," then close with a six and a half minute talked "Guitarslinger's Blues" that doesn't have the momentum to support its rap. Really wanted to like them, love the idea of Rock City Angels style metal cowpunk from Hanoi Rocks land, but they don't cut it.

In newer news, I actually kind of like the new Heart album, Red Velvet Car, which is out in a couple months, though I'm not sure how much yet. Also kind of like the new Stone Temple Pilots album, which is more a powerpop than a grunge record. Blurbed the latter here:

http://www.rhapsody.com/stone-temple-pilots/stone-temple-pilots-2#albumreview

Favorite rocking album of the year so far, though, is a "country" CD with Link Wray and garage riffs, from Jace Everett. Wrote about it on Rolling Country, and linked to my Rhapsody review of it there too:

Rolling Country 2010

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpmU4xnmxlQ

And yeah, people like Girlschool (and Joan Jett maybe?) have covered that one, too. So what was T. Rex's hard rock percentage -- maybe 20%? More? Less? Kinda weird that I've never wondered about this before.

check out the 9 minute cadilac jam on youtube. i dunno, i think marc and t-rex had plenty of hard rocking moments. and his guitar sound was aped by, like, a million bands.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O6evT5x-wqs&feature=fvw

Okay, Scott, I believe you! (And if you keep posting youtube links I'll never be able to open this thread!) So anyway, different question: Which T. Rex album or albums should've made my metal book? (And isn't weird that me, Popoff, and Jasper/Oliver all missed them?)

T. Rex was not metal no matter how broadly you stretch the term. Marc Bolan's guitar had distortion on it, and wrote maybe three good riffs. That's as far as it goes. He started out making acoustic-guitar-and-flute bullshit and wound up making records that might have rocked had the production not been so unbelievably shitty. T. Rex is rock for eight-year-olds; it sounds like Muppet music, and I don't mean that in a good way (though this being ILM someone will now jump in and say that's the greatest idea ever). They might have been loud enough to be halfway good live, but I don't know; I've only heard the studio albums and that 2CD compilation of singles, and that stuff is about 95 percent crap. "20th Century Boy" is good, "Cadilac" is okay, "Metal Guru" is okay...that's all I can remember right now. But the fuzzy-everything and cardboard-box-drums sound of it all ruins any value it might have had. The continuing veneration of T. Rex is one of the greatest pieces of evidence that a great many English people, particularly English critics, can't make good rock music and can't recognize good rock music when they hear it.

you could have gone with slider or electric warrior. heavily distorted and overamplified chuck berry riffs that influenced everyone from the sex pistols to whoever is starting a guitar band this week.

were t-rex a metal band? no. did they inspire/influence a TON of hard rock and metal and punk bands. hell yes.

Woooaaagggh....Switching gears, just got this mass email mailout from Metal Mike Saunders. He starts talking about a couple Deep Purple outtakes, I think (correct me if I'm wrong), then cuts and pastes reviews he wrote nearly 40 years ago -- absolute time capsule stuff:

yeah, the three "outtakes/B-sides" and the Demon's Eye track (that is replaced in the US by the UK lead single Strange Kind of Woman) all could have been on the album musically --

Freedom
Slow Train
I'm Alone
Demon's Eye

for me the Fireball sessons are the best playing and recording (audio) they did during 1970-1972, ie the Gillan lineup

i know i prepped (propped?) the album in the PRM/73 HM history/overview so i'm going to pull cut/paste the deep purple paragraph. (i wasn't considered a big DP fanboy since i never got into Deep Purple In Rock)

( last week one of the endless $1 bin lps i brought home is the 2nd Captain Beyond sans jacket. never heard/played it for more than 30 seconds when it was in a Warners box of promos...it's pretty cool. Rod Evans was a good singer).

i don't know why the hell i thought Machine Head was that good (it's a really muddy recording or pressing on the american issue) at the time. "new album must be the best" syndrome i think.

the New Haven Rock Press thing is pretty funny so i'll copy it too.

funny anecdote (then and now) about the spring 1972 cover piece/essay i wrote on DP for pete johnson's Warners house monthly mag CIRCULAR...

Purple came through the burbank offices when the issue (may 29th) was new and lying around (the same spring/summer i saw them at the Anaheim Convention Center), Blackmore scans through it and goes, well, any normal day for RB in post-In Rock apparently included the moods "nuclear" and "General Blackmore on the rampage," soo i guess it wasn't exactly a Judd Apatow comedy-hit wrap party when general B interrogated the publicity department point blank. (although nowhere close to the classicness of Ted Nugent calling the CREEM office 1979-80 and telling them he's coming down with a bow and arrow, then when they tell him Gregg Turner's the guy who trashed the bad Nugent album saying he should get guitar lessons from Pat Smear to learn "downstrokes", wants to know "where does that guy Turner live, i'll shoot him instead.").

so, re Circular/pete johnson -- after i subsequently did (or just prior to Deep Purple) a 2-pager (for Circular and pete) on Daddy Cool (that wasn't 100% complimentary since they weren't that good a group, just kinda cool with one certified Aussie hit classic Eagle Rock), pete johnson ok's/greenlights a Black Sabbath cover story (pre-release publicity for VOL 2 before i ever heard it)but mails me a 1-page typed memo, refering the "deep purple incident" and saying"do the black sabbath feature no problem, but be careful mike, you've got to quit pissing off our groups!" hahahaha

the crazy-high word rate on the Black Sabbath piece paid for my rent (a 1-bedroom above a garage right on Highland Blvd just up from the Hollywood Bowl towards burbank) for the 3 1/2 months i was out in LA that summer. (and the expenses-paid weekend trip to nashville to interview Grand Funk for the Fusion career/discography retrospective helped too).

hahahah my summer job in summer 1972 was schlepping down to Manny Aron's original store on Melrose as many mornings as i could, to pull/buy that day's new used-bin input of every/any great album stickered with 10cent and 33cent and 25centlittle handwritten (by manny) white price stickers....all left on the albums forever. inc a MONO white label copy of the 3rd MC5, etc etc etc, velvet underground albums for 25cents that i passed on to samoan-kevin in his "box" of freebies from me from that trip. new Budgie promo lps for 10 cents (about 45 cents in today's $$) included!

from

A Brief Survey Of The State Of Metal Music Today
Metal Mike Saunders, Phonograph Record, April 1973

DEEP PURPLE
Deep Purple In Rock, Fireball, Machine Head, Who Do We Think We Are!

The consensus view on Deep Purple is that In Rock and Machine Head are their best, with Fireball somewhat of a dud. I've been listening to Purple a lot lately, and would like to go completely against that appraisal: I think their albums improved up through Machine Head, and that Fireball has some of the most powerful cuts they've done. Three years old now, In Rock just sounds dated – the album is very poorly recorded, with aimless solos of all kinds cluttering up songs like ‘Flight Of The Rat’, ‘Into The Fire’, and ‘Hard Lovin' Man’.

Still, In Rock does have historical value: it made Deep Purple big European stars, and in retrospect shares honors with Led Zep II as the seminal heavy metal album. Justifiably so, since parts of it do scorch, with Purple in places even sounding like an English MC5.

But Fireball is a different matter entirely. It's their most metallic, best recorded album from the word go – the title cut is supersonic. Ian Gillan's vocals on this LP, I think, have to be the best in all of recorded metal rock...arrogant, petulant, and sneering. ‘Strange Kind Of Woman’ is Deep Purple's all-time most arrogant cut, ‘Fools’ their closest to punk rock, and so on. Fireball's weakness, and the cause for its bad reputation, was its two or three very bad cuts. Machine Head remedied this by being their best album overall, having only one bum cut. The less said about Who Do We Think We Are, the better. It's atrocious.

Deep Purple fans generally regard all the group's LPs through Machine Head as indispensable; those not enamored of the group, vice versa. For the record, Lester Bangs mercilessly bombed In Rock in Rolling Stone when it came out in 1970...he loves the group now. Hi Lester!
===============================================
Deep Purple vs. UFO
Metal Mike Saunders, New Haven Rock Press, 1972

TIME AGAIN for one of those legendary matchups, a method which has in the past answered such immortal questions as: Could Eric Clapton shut down Alvin Lee? Could’ve George Chuvalo whipped Joe Louis? What do Leigh Stephens and Brian Wilson have in common? Nothing.

In one corner we have Deep Purple, and in the other... that renowned band of obscurity, UFO. Now you may laugh, watching Ritchie Blackmore ready for the kickoff by tossing his guitar ten feet in the air (twirling it around his body, walking on it, and that’s just openers) while UFO’s Mick Bolton is stumbling around trying to put his strap on. If so, COOL IT, dummy. There may be some surprises before the night is over. You guessed it, this is one of those classic matchups: virtuosity vs. ineptitude.

Deep Purple’s early moves were bewildering. They had 12 men on the field, then only 10; then tried to pass and run at the same time, tried to please everyone and wound up pleasing no one. 'Hush' and 'Kentucky Woman' were Top 40 hits, with the result that the dunced-out underground crowd wouldn’t listen to them. Their first two albums weren’t too good, at best uneven, the group blowing it by indulging in the progressive foibles of the time.

The third album was really a bobble. Titled Deep Purple, it came out just before Tetragrammaton folded, so it was a stiff in more ways than one. The group was stuck for a year in transit as a result, lacking an American record label.

So ya have to keep in mind Deep Purple’s early problems with image, Me, for instance, now I was a potential Deep Purple fan, having dug 'Hush' and 'Kentucky Woman' (and further dazzled by the guitar solo on the latter, which I considered one of the most scorching I had ever heard). I tried to tell people about this nifty group. Then 'River Deep' came out, which I again liked, and all my friends laughed at me. So, overcome by shame, I quit listening to Deep Purple until later shown the light a couple years later.

At halftime, Deep Purple came up with a brilliant move: they deported their quarterback (who later resurfaced with a minor league team Captain Beyond, but was stoned to death with beer bottles on the playing field one day by a bunch or irate New York fans). Ian Gillan took over at lead vocals from Rod Evans.

ON the opening third quarter kickoff, however, a free-for-all erupted on the field. Deep Purple With Orchestra, otherwise known in sports terminology as an 85 yd. penalty for gross imbecility, was about the most nitwit move since Beano Lujack’s 1921 Eiffel Tower play. Star tailback Ritchie Blackmore stormed to the sidelines and called coach Jon Lord a moron to his face, not the last time Blackmore would express such an opinion, and Deep Purple’s forces seemed to be in utter disarray.

Deep Purple regrouped, of course, and Deep Purple in Rock took over featuring straightahead power plays. Some people have commented on similarities to the MC5, all-time champions of the Honcho Football Association (which eventually merged with the NFL when the Five, along with the Ann Arbor Stooges and the Flamin’ Groovies, pulled up and moved the franchise to England).

But no matter. In Rock was blistering hard rock save for 'Child in Time,' a play that drew a 5-yard penalty for taking too much time. But the rest was great, a landmark of the early heavy metal offense along with Led Zep II.

Fireball was the most enigmatic Deep Purple effort. It started out stronger than any other Purple LP, with 'Fireball,' 'No No No,' and 'Strange Kind of Woman,' but then fizzled totally. Even 'Fools,' one of the group’s strongest songs ever, is fucked up by long instrumental breaks. The entire second side still prompts occasional debate between Ritchie Blackmore Purple’s main songwriter) and Ian Gillan who writes all the lyrics). Blackmore hates Fireball, while Gillan considers such an opinion an affront to mankind.

Back to those first three plays, though, cus they were beauts. 'Fireball' sounds like the thundering British incarnation of the MC5, and if you’ve ever seen Purple strut around the stage to 'Strange Kind of Woman', well… Fireball’s inside liner photos sum the group up better than a thousand words: Gillan in his most arrogant Rock Star pose, Lord and Blackmore simultaneously getting it on. They scored anyway, even if it was a sloppy drive.

Machine Head puts it all together for Deep Purple. Not that it was flawless, because 'Lazy' was pretty indulgent (if you can imagine bringing the coach in when you’re on the ten yard line, in order to call time out and lead the team in pushup exercises), but everything else was fine. Most important, Machine Head looked like the flash effort this team had been capable of all along.

Maybe too flashy for their own good. Last time I heard, rumors had it that all of Deep Purple were going to split to the Canadian Football league…..for opposing teams. But that’s showbiz.

Deep Purple In Performance: The first thing you notice about Deep Purple on stage is their arrogance. They don’t merely take the stage, this group commandeers it. A Deep Purple show invariably settles down to a three-way battle for the spotlight (or the recently revived strobe effects-Ed.): Gillan vs. Lord vs. Blackmore.

The difference from their records is that Blackmore wins, hands down. Ian Gillan may be the archetypal narcissistic handsome(?) English lead singer, but when Blackmore strides out to the front of the stage for a solo, there’s no contest. The man is absolutely crass every trick in the book, from lightning fast runs alternated with slamming his guitar against the amplifiers, to spews of feedback noise while he performs Dir Danelli aerial acrobatics with his instrument. In other words, he plays guitar like it ought to be played.

Deep Purple wastes about 50% of the live show in irritating extended solos evolving out of songs like 'Lazy' and 'The Mule'. Everyone gets one: guitar, organ (Jon Lord makes Keith Emerson look like a model of taste), drums, and vocal. Unaccompanied, each and everyone. When Deep Purple all finally get going at the same time, playing either tight songs ('Strange Kind of Woman,' 'Highway Star,' etc.) or charming, they’re great. The sound is much more metallic than their records, and it’s Grade-A unsubtle English punkoid rock.

UFO
How the Deep Purple/UFO matchup came about was pretty logical. Having been blown off the field in the States by supposed patsy Uriah Heep (Ha!-Ed.), Deep Purple wanted more of a breather for their opening game. They couldn’t have asked for better in UFO, a Class D ballclub making their debut.

Was Purple ever in for a shock. UFO’s first album (Rare Earth 524) was the biggest upset in thirty years, hands down. It was tremendous. Which defied all logic, because UFO had absolutely no ability, but there it was all the same. They sounded like early Blue Cheer played backwards… sludginess in reverse acceleration that was about to grind everything to a total halt.

From 'Unidentified Flying Object,' 'Boogie For George,' and 'C’mon Everybody' to 'Timothy' and 'Follow You Home.' These guys had it. On the strength of 'C’mon Everybody,' UFO placed #1 in the Japanese polls, perhaps the most amazing feat of the decade.

Actually, UFO reminded a lot of the Pretty Things, an outrageous Northern outfit that was the most hated team in football for years. Other clubs hated them because they played dirty! The Pretties would bite, kick and gouge with no mercy whatsoever. Before the ball was snapped. Phil May was considered the vilest quarterback in recorded history; some players refused to tackle him because he smelled so bad. The Pretties talked about how they were paying their dues, but the opposition called them scum and finally had them booted out of the league.

So anyway, the suspicion arose that lead singer/QB Phil Mogg of UFO was a direct lineage of Phil May, if not like latter Phil M. himself. You just had to wonder about a guy whose nickname is Moggy. And Mogg’s only discernible move was a sort of atonal yelp, which made things all the fishier.

One English trade paper viewed these developments with genuine alarm, declaring that if UFO were to have continued success with this sort of nonsense, it would herald in a new Dark Ages. The band reverted back to expectations, though, with their second album Elyi. Phil Mogg was relegated to only occasional duty, with Mick Bolton taking over the show and proving beyond doubt that he was probably the worst guitarist to ever plug into a wah-wah backwards. And not bad/good either. Bad as in awful. When Mogg did get his big chance, towards the end of the title cut, he hit his right tackle in the back of the head with the first and last forward pass of his career.

UFO In Performance: This is where UFO blew the whole show. Recorded live in Japan (live at Hibiya Park, Tokyo, no less), UFO LANDED JAPAN (stateside 80374) is perhaps the most stultifying effort ever to see vinyl. Six cuts, three per side, compose the album…which means you have Mick Bolton soloing 60% of the time. And he outdoes his work on Flying. Honest, Leigh Stephens would roll over in his grave.

Lining up for 4th and 57 with two minutes to go, Phil Mogg improvised a bit from 'Boogie For George' (seriously, this is really on the LP — he probably got the lyric to 'The Hunter' from Music Outside and by his point in to the game, anything seemed believable): 'They call me a punter/That’s my game.' The snap went over his head and out of the end zone.

The final outcome: Deep Purple by a solid nose and a half, 33 to 17.

Editor’s note: originally our cover was to carry a Jay Kinney illustration of Deep Purple battling UFO, but unfortunately we could not get hold of any photographs of the UFO which showed their face. This was after repeated calls to their record company (Chrysalis) and their publicity organ (Gibson & Stromberg). Our sincere apologies to Phil & the fellas.

© Metal Mike Saunders, 1972
======================================================
Breakfast of Champions: Deep Purple's Machine Head
Metal Mike Saunders, Circular, 29 May 1972

IF YOU'RE OVER 20, you needn’t read on. Unless, of course, you want to hear why Deep Purple are a good group – just like Black Sabbath, Grand Funk, Led Zep, Alice Cooper and others. Or unless you’re over 20 and are a Deep Purple fan anyway (congratulations!).

In past years I might’ve cringed at the name Deep Purple. They started out fine enough, with bombastic hit. Then about half the group split, and when they did reform they started running around with symphony orchestras and concertos and stuff like that. Nada.

Heavy Metal Wins Out

But when it comes down to selling a million records, a group gets down and does what they do best. In Deep Purple’s case it’s loud heavy metal rock. Their new album, Machine Head, is their best yet.

Fact is, when Machine Head arrived in the mail, I was so impressed (fevered even) that I sent in an unsolicited review to The New York Ti, whoops I mean Rolling Stone. It turned out, though, that Lester Bangs had already been assigned the review, so we’re presenting the unrun review’s debut here (in abridged form) as a suitable analysis of Deep Purple’s music. As an addendum, that is – we’re still dealing with the sociological aspect here, ‘cos I hear some cretins across the room sniggering.

Though Some Still Scoff

"The new British rock groups... So many of them just don’t have any roots. Look around. Rod Stewart has roots. Fleewood Mac have roots, but there aren't many. If it doesn’t have roots then I’m not interested," says Kim Simmonds, guitarist/leader of Savoy Brown.

Wanna fight, Kim??? Not that Deep Purple need any defense, but I would like to point out that anybody can be a duller-than-Drano imitation Creedence Clearwater rejuvenated British boogie band. Much less that I wouldn’t dream of trading a typical Deep Purple slice of heavy metal for the entire output of the Savouy Brownd Blooze Band. Kip Simmons and all.

And when you’re playing rock and roll and have a wallful of Marshall amps, who needs roots? I mean ask the Kingsmen if they had their B.B. King licks down pat.

So there.

Machine Head is really nice. As the review here says, the first side is a solid 20 minutes of relentlessly consistent heavy rock, with 'Never Before' in particular a great song – a blistering amphetamine guitar riff contrasted by a most effective melodic bridge in the middle of the song. The second side may let up a bit in the middle, but that still leaves 30 full minutes of crash boom bang.

And the cover. The cover is absolutely gorgeous.

Sticking up for the Persecuted

Finally, some thoughtless buffoons around town have been calling Warner Brothers the home of ageing wandering minstrels. This kind of slander really makes me mad. Goddamit, I like Warner Brothers – they have the most albums, the best albums and they’re the only company with the insight to send their promos out in a big box every month.

But more than that, you know the real reason I love Warner Brothers? Because they have Black Sabbath, Alice Cooper and Deep Purple. They may not have intended to wind up with said groups, but they’ve got them, and that’s what counts.

Deep Purple

And yes, Deep Purple. Let’s put it like this: I’ve played Machine Head 247 times so far, and if that isn’t a recommendation of the highest order, why, I don’t know what is. A great group.

Before You Pass This Review off as Lunacy, Think About Fact That You Would Have Considered it Gospel Had You Read It in Rolling Stone:

Machine Head
Deep Purple
Warner Bros. BS 2607
Deep Purple have had a lot of epithets hurled at them during their career, all of them uncomplimentary; I think they must be one of the few groups who have never received a favorable review.

The bombastic Deep Purple who took on 'River Deep Mountain High' were a basically different band together from the recent classical-rock/heavy metal (now you see ’em, now you don’t) bombastic Deep Purple tagged by one critic as "schtick collectors with no personal vision," but it’s ok – bombastic goings-on have never been too well received until lately, and besides, it seems like everyone and anyone English was getting it in the face back then. While in some cases it was deserved, it seems like the Wall Street Stone just didn’t much like those English groups...strange.

Machine Head is a different matter... The entire first side is competent Third Generation rock: four five-minute songs that crunch along (most of the inspired moments coming in 'Never Before', a most effective combination of heavy metal and melody), setting up a splendid 20-minute drone of the energetic street-clatter heavy metal fans have come to love so much.

Side Two is less even, the middle of the side occupied by a seven-minute cut, 'Lazy', that brings out my hereditary impatience with anything under 130 decibels... Sandwiched around 'Lazy', however, are 'Smoke on the Water' and 'Space Truckin’', two of Machine Head’s best cuts. 'Smoke on the Water' is a number about the trials and tribulations of a rock band, which in Deep Purple’s case includes the recording studio burning down. On 'Space Truckin’', Deep Purple come up with some good riffs and really cook the way any self-respecting bunch of Limeys with a wall of Marshall amps ought to.

...All in all, Machine Head has a lot of good heavy metal noise for those who can’t do without. While for my money Deep Purple may be no Sabbath or Led Zep (we can’t all be King Kong, y’know), on this album I definitely find them far superior to a number of touted Third generation bands – Uriah Heep, REO Speedwagon, Bull Angus – that, for me at least, just don’t make it. It’s been a pleasure giving Deep Purple what may well be their first good review ever.

Returns so far show rave reviews of the new Deep Purple album in Rolling Stone, Phonograph Record Magazine and sundry other publications. Though in some cases it’s hard to tell whether the reviewers were raving about the album or just plain raving, it’s a sign – whether of the times, modern decadence or recently enlightened critical standards, Circular just dunno. In any event, Circ leaves Deep Purple with these words of wisdom: keep a knockin’ and keep a rockin’.
© Metal Mike Saunders, 1972

That T. Rex were influential I'll grant you. But man, I fuckin' hate 'em. I hate the whole glam thing, actually. Bowie, the Dolls, all of it. Dull, shittily-produced "rock" for people who cared more about their shoe collections than their record collections.

yeah, see, i love glam. even horrible glam. i dunno, its hard for me to think of a kind of 70's rock that i don't like. i have no taste when it comes to the era.

Me too! And I only have four pairs of shoes, I think.

Well, I dunno about the "horrible" part, tbh. I'm kind of selective. Sometimes. Definitely prefer some Bowie albums to other Bowie albums. (Though he didn't get any in Stairway either, which was probably a fuckup.) But glam might possibly be my favorite kind of '70s rock. It's definitely in the running, anyway.

and i love a lot of t-rex production-wise too. later, things could get more bloated with drugs and way sloppy, but all the early albums twee and post-twee sound great. the slider is one of my favorite records as far as rock production goes. it always sounds amazing to me. i've never heard t-rex on cd though. (i'm lucky enough to own a clean first pressing of the first tyrannosaurus rex album on regal zonophone and sonically it would make your jaw drop.)

yeah, i don't even know what i meant by horrible glam. um, third-tier glam? no-name glam? not BAD music, just, you know, marginal or whatever. that was a poor choice of words. i don't keep every 70's record i hear. for every album i rave about here, there are five more that i throw into my dollar bin.

On the other hand, my high school graduating class's favorite kind of '70s rock was not glam at all, but apparently....R.E.O. Speedwagon! At least judging from the only link on the West Bloomfield High School Class of 1978 facebook page. (I don't have facebook, and don't plan to get it, but I was still happy to have been sent a link):

http://www.facebook.com/posted.php?id=70492750855

i don't know if i could rate my love of genres as far as the 70's goes. hard rock and disco and funk/r&b and pop of that time are all equal in my eyes. and jazz. and psych...and punk...i could go on...

my middle school at the tail end of the 70's was all REO/Styx/Van Halen. rock-wise. (6th grade music class i brought in nazareth - love hurts and argent - hold your head up to play for everyone and you would have thought that i had two heads. utter silence and pained looks on the kid's faces.)

The T. Rex/Marc Bolan concert movie, Born to Boogie, shows T. Rex doing hard rock before big Orange stacks. A lot of it's extended jamming, not particularly great, but not greatly worse than Led Zep live jams.

Chuck, I doubt you'd like Tanx.

Tony Visconti-produced singles that weren't actually part of the album but which were associated with the period -- "Children of the Revolution," "Solid Gold Easy Action" and the above, "20th Century Boy" are all fair+ to good.

I have a deluxe edition of Tanx with a fannish 'alternative' version called Left Hand
Luke. Ehh. He was going down hill at this point.

xp Matter of fact, speaking of third tier glam (hey, I can vouch for Hello, too!), I was listening to Mud's Mud Rock from 1974 the other day and wondering whether they should've made my metal book. Almost all rocked-up covers of '50s and '60s rock'n'roll oldies ("Hippy Hippy Shake" by the Swinging Blue Jeans!), plus their super catchy Sweet-worthy originals "Dynamite" and "Tiger Feet" (the latter also revived in the late '80s by Girlschool): Music for 10 year olds, sure, I'll buy that, but 10 year olds have great taste sometimes.

i don't think i would personally classify T Rex as metal, but if I am going by 'Stairway to Hell' criteria, then yeah they might have fit in there Chuck..

I dunno, looking at that "20th Century Boy" clip that Scott posted just makes my mouth drop. I mean rock and roll doesn't get better than that, that is it, that is what it's all about. the power and the glory

I guess the Brits were way more knocked out by the guy than we were, sadly. they loved the faggy British jew. not sure why T. Rex were not amazingly huge here. they should have been. but like, Def Lep, sure, big influence. Last year I read that memoir by Paul Morley, the British rock critic, 'Nothing', and throughout he pretty much never fails to remind you that Marc Bolan changed his entire life

Off talk, but he used to be a rock critic, then was promoted above his station.

John Leland discovers paranoid rural Americans preparing for a coming collapse, a phenomenon that's been a part of US hinterlandia for decades.

Fatuous excerpt:

For Mrs. Wilkerson, 33, a moderate Democrat from Oakton, Va., who designs computer interfaces, the spill reinforced what she had been obsessing over for more than a year — that oil use was outstripping the world’s supply. She worried about what would come after: maybe food shortages, a collapse of the economy, a breakdown of civil order. Her call was part of a telephone course about how to live through it all.

In bleak times, there is a boom in doom.

Americans have long been fascinated by disaster scenarios, from the population explosion to the cold war to global warming. These days the doomers, as Mrs. Wilkerson jokingly calls herself and likeminded others, have a new focus: peak oil. They argue that oil supplies peaked as early as 2008 and will decline rapidly, taking the economy with them.

To understand why Leland is so bad, you have to know the 'peak oil' conspiracists have been around for a long time. And most everyone with any sense lumps them into the same groups who fancy neo-survivalims, purchase precious metals, still rail against the country going off the gold standard.

In Leland's essay we see a citation of Roscoe Bartlett as some indication of authority. Bartlett
is best known as one of the most infamous nuts in the House of Representatives. Naturally, the reader is not clued into this fact. The would really spoil the narrative.

Back to your scheduled programming.

also, i just read "unperson's" T Rex post above and he could not be more wrong, but that is par for the course for "unperson", who I've always considered garbage as a critic. just laughed with everyone else at his useless New York "free jazz" book. just a totally late to the party guy all the time. a nobody.

I mean you have George Smith, Chuck Eddy, and Scott Seward in this thread .... and then you have .... "unperson"

anyway. ... have you ever talked about early .38 Special on these threads? I got their debut album for a buck a couple of weeks ago, and have been caning it ever since. this guy:

http://www.curiopete.com/images/thirty-eight-38-special-x.JPG

so so good. totally not like their later AOR sound, this is just straight-up meat and potatoes southern rock. cool Chuck Berry cover. and it does end with the obligatory southern rock rave-up that starts slow and gets real fast w/ lots of guitar solos, in "Just Wanna Rock and Roll"

i am a fan

Pat Smear WOULD have been kind of silly to criticize the Nuge on his "downstrokes" tho, no?

that Metal Mike posting is a hoot tho. Man, I do not know those Purple tracks "Freedom" and "Slow Train" at all!! are they on some 'Fireball' remaster or something?? I do know single B-sides "I'm Alone" and "Demon's Eye" because I have them on a Purple "A's and B's" CD.

To think that there are two classic-era Purple tracks out there that I have not heard is giving me chills .... off to the internet...

ah ok, so "Slow Train" is some sort of unfinished sketch for a future song which never materialized

BUT, "Freedom" is a completed song .. the full Purple band in full fucking flight!!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pyenXwFKtlU

holy FUCK am I psyched about this. unbelievable. a new Purple track to rock

I know i've mentioned it tons of times on ILM, but Ian Paice is my favorite rock drummer of all time. for real. I place him above Bonham for the jazziness and versatility he brings to the table. just love listening to the guy

are they on some 'Fireball' remaster or something??

The 25th Anniversary remaster to be exact.

xp Eh, I have nothing against Phil as a critic -- he just has way different ears than most people I know. (But then again, so do I.)

Anyway, the email from Metal Mike was a little cryptic, but yeah, off an archival CD. Here's what he asked Jonathan Hall of onetime rocking Man's Ruin etc. band Backbiter (ccing lots of other people):

do you have this CD? (kevin claimed the 9 euro new truckstop copy from germany)
when i xeroxed the booklet for myself (to stuff into the last DP album i own, a beat up $1 bin copy of Who Do You Think We Are) i made a second copy (pages enlarged by 175% to fill up one 8x11 page per booklet page), lemme know if you need before it gets buried by six other types of incoming/outgoing paperwork

Fwiw, Jonathan had it, but also said this (ccing everybody too):

We did Strange Kind of Woman in the Deep Purple cover band we did.

Kind of related story involving Dio: Backbiter won the LA Weekly Music Award for Best Hard Rock/Metal Band (beating out Queens of the Stone Age, Orgy and System of a Down by the way). Ronnie James Dio and Mike Watt handed us the award. Earlier in the evening our friend, Deep Purple Dave, was talking with his hero Dio. They were both dressed in stone washed looking jeans, cowboy boots, a blazer and poodle hair. Earlier, Marea had said something to the effect of “Have you ever noticed that metal people think they’re the coolest and everyone else is weird?”. Minutes later, Dave came up to our table all excited telling us that he was chatting with Dio. He said “Ronnie said to me ‘Do you notice that we’re the only normal looking people here’”. We all died laughing.

And scrolling back a little, I'd actually say people at my high school were into Styx and BTO as much as REO. BTO iirc huge in Detroit my freshman year, 1974. And junior or senior year some doofus hero grafitied "WELCOME TO THE GRAND ILLUSION" in huge letters across the front of the school, for all to see when arriving in the morning. (Eighth Grade, Our Lady Of Refuge 1973-74, was all about Alice Cooper though. Except maybe for John Gallo, who wore a T. Rex T shirt once.)

So, I revived a dead thread about him last week to mention this, but since today's such an active Past Expiry Hard Rock day might as well mention it here too: Was total Boomtown Rats/Thin Lizzy dead-boys-on-the-street cooker "Only One" off Picture This (1982, LP before Sports) Huey Lewis's hardest rocking track ever? Or is there one I missed, like maybe off the News's allegedly new wavey '80 debut LP?

Aaaaaaand......Also been playing Aerosmith's Rock In A Hard Place a bunch since picking up a dollar copy a few weeks ago; never really paid attention to it before. And I'd say I've now played it enough to state conclusively that nothing else on it comes close to "Lightning Strikes" (which is actually better, and swings a lot harder, than I'd remembered.) Album's sound is definitely still harder and rougher than what they've done post-comeback, obviously, but it also just really lacks the indelible tunes of their '70s stuff. Also, obviously, Dufay and Crespo aren't Perry and Whitford; have a feeling one reason "Lighting Strikes" pulls off the funk of old is because Whitford's still playing rhythm guitar on it. (Only cut he's credited on.) Guess my #2 cut would be leadoff "Jailbait" just because it's so fast, but they'd kicked speed harder before. Some of the structures are definitely not simplistic (esp in the weirdly named because not jazzy "Bitches Brew" and the kind of interminable seven-minute-with-its-prelude violin-pomp extravaganza "Joanie's Butterfly"); "Rock In A Hard Place (Cheshire Cat)" and the sorta jive-talky "Bolivian Ragamuffin" (title a la "Bohemian Rhapsody"???) hint at getting a groove going but don't really stay deep in the pocket somehow. And the side closers, a power ballad cover of Julie London's "Cry Me A River" (had no idea they ever did that tbh) and this sort of brothel piano bar falsetto quasi-jazz diddybop thing "Push Comes To Shove," basically just hint at Tyler's future in torch-schmaltz, near as I can tell. (Don't think I ever really loved Aerosmith cover versions after "Walking The Dog" and "Train Kept A Rollin'," to be honest; always thought their Beatles and Shangri-Las ones were just fillerbusters. Honestly can't remember if "Mother Popcorn" or "Milk Cow Blues" were any good.) Anyway, anybody who's heard this record, am I missing anything on it? I don't think so.

As for John Leland (mentioned by George a few posts up), I'd noticed he had something on Page One above the Times fold a few days ago -- about abortion laws widely getting more restrictive a state level, if I remember right? -- but I didn't get far into it. Hadn't seen his byline in a while before that. Wonder whether they shuffled him, somehow.

don't remember much about it. done with mirrors is the one everyone will tell you is the underrated album. i like that one too. when was the last time i heard night in the ruts!? don't even think i have a copy.

I have everything up through Night in the Ruts in my iPod, including Live Bootleg, which I never ever listen to. I remember seeing a video for "Lightning Strikes" on MTV about 30 years ago, but never heard the rest of the album. Or any album afterward. Singles, obviously, sure.

"Tiger Feet" (the latter also revived in the late '80s by Girlschool): Music for
10 year olds, sure

Nothing beats their dancing performance on tv of it. So I presume it was eminently popular with girls.

Pat Smear WOULD have been kind of silly to criticize the Nuge on his "downstrokes" tho, no?

Downstrokes or upstrokes, in the context of this thread, certainly.

Since revisiting Deep Purple, it's fair to condemn the young Saunders' judgment of Who Do We Think We Are. Blackmore is in his prime and he wants to go solo. So there's friction and it turns in one of DP's best songs, "Smooth Dancer," in which Ian Gillan writes lyrics about Blackmore as a prima donna and Blackmore's guitar furnishes the perfect foil. These guys realize the things that are driving them apart are what makes Deep Purple great and there's this grudging admiration for each other throughout the song. Which works even if you don't get the lyrics or the back story.

And "Mary Long," which is Ian Gillan's sneer at Mary Whitehouse, a famous English school marmish
cutlure warrior, against everything kids liked, the kind of person -- in the USA -- spawned universities like Baylor and movies like "Footloose."

One of my favorite Deep Purple albums. Coming right before Burn and Deep Purple's hard left turn into dumb blues rock and bad funk, American styles Blackmore couldn't make exciting -- and neither could the replacements. Except for two cuts, "Burn" and "Lay Down Stay Down."

Which never quite explained to me why Roger Glover got kicked out but both he and Blackmore turned in almost an entire live double album of dreary but fair to awful blooz hard rock on the first Rainbow live album.

Was total Boomtown Rats/Thin Lizzy dead-boys-on-the-street cooker "Only One" off Picture This (1982, LP before Sports) Huey Lewis's hardest rocking track ever?

Can't even remotely bring this up my mind. Lewis had hard rock in him, it just didn't earn him any money.

This goes back to Clover records. I remember seeing one in large quantity in cut out bins.

From Wikie, and I'm too tired to dig out Live and Dangerous right now to determine if it's real or "henfap."

Under the name "Huey Harp" Huey Lewis played harmonica on Thin Lizzy's 1978 landmark album Live and Dangerous.

Has anyone heard Tom Petty's homage to Physical-Graffiti-era Zeppelin from his new record? It's come up twice on the radio. Lots of riffing, fancy chordings and time signatures. There's even a Billy Squire-eqsue double-time part at the end. Not sure I love the vocals, and I'm not sure it's going to stick with me as a song, but as an exercise it's well done. Either they got Jimmy Page to do some lead work on it or Mike Campbell is an excellent mimic.

Huey Lewis did play harmonica on Live and Dangerous

"Coming right before Burn and Deep Purple's hard left turn into dumb blues rock and bad funk..."

Man, I think Burn is the best thing Purple ever did.

As a cut, Burn's fairly great. It got 'em a lot of mileage. And the album is certainly a lot better than Stormbringer and Come Taste the Band.

speaking of Styx..is the learned consensus that they never did anything else that rocked harder than "Earl Of Roseland" and "I'm Gonna Make You Feel It" at the end of Styx II?

Actually now thinking "Midnight Ride" on Equinox (last LP w/John Curulewski, pre-Shaw) gets dangerously close to straightforward meat-eating Nugent territory. (And I just checked Popoff, who makes the same comparison.) Honestly didn't realize they had it in them. Other hard-rocking action at the beginning of "Mother Dear," middle of "Suite Madame Blue," and here and there through "Born For Adventure," so I'd count this album as a good one, especially with nostalgic dazed and confused fondness for opening twosome "Light Up"/"Lorelei" worked in.

Stormy asked about early 38 Special above, and I actually don't think I've ever heard the debut, or maybe even anything from their Suvvern Rock period at all besides "Rockin' Into The Night," if that still counts. (That was '80; '77 debut barely charted; '78 followup didn't.) Was enjoying fourth LP Wild Eyed Southern Boys a couple weeks ago though; still some reasonably boogiefied remnants of Skynyrd influence amid the "Fantasy Girl"/"Hold On Loosely" powerpop on that one. LP cover looks really redneck and rapey too, with that girl with the crunk butt cheeks hanging out the sides of her shorts walking toward the bar with six drooling good old boys outside. (Btw, related question, has anybody ever heard the first three Van Zant albums -- one each from the 1985, 1998, and 2001? They must be the only band ever to jump from two albums on CMC International to two top ten country albums -- which are pretty good, definitely Southern rock though not real heavyweight boogie. Wonder if the earlier ones were any heavier.)

"Midnight Ride" and "Suite Madame Blue" were, with the other cuts mentioned, as heavy steak and taters as Styx got.

I recall reading in the booklet in a double CD of .38 Special that they tried really hard to be traditional southern rockers and were quite proud of being like elders Lynyrd Slynyrds onstage. And being totally dismayed, along with the record company, at how abjectly failure the early albums were, saleswise.

So they tried with pop songwriters.

http://dickdestiny.com/blog1/2010/06/09/samuel-l-jackson-stomp/

BBA, ZZ Top, trash movie fan-ness, etc.

Notes on a pile of stuff I've been listening to lately:

Aerosmith, Done With Mirrors -- hadn't played this in a few years, but listening to Rock In A Hard Place so much last month inspired me to pull it out, and turns out it really was a creative comeback of sorts as well as the last great album they made; just the way superior record of those two, maybe partly because it's almost entirely Perry and the rhythm section's record, all big fat chunky funky boxy boogie riffs -- the songs never get complicated, at all, and there's only eight of them (all under five minutes, half of them under four) so it doesn't wear out its welcome, and I can't think of another Aerosmith album that so fully favors rhythm over melody. Which isn't to say the songs aren't catchy; just that the band's Beatles-pomp side is pretty much nowhere to be found. Also, the two best tracks are the first two -- "Let The Music Do The Talking," which Perry had already done solo of course, and "My Fist Your Face," which has maybe the last great tongue-twisting Tyler ever pulled off. And after that, there's really nothing earthshaking on the record, but it just keeps punching.

Pat Travers Band Crash And Burn from 1980 -- Finally gave in to George's persitent advice and spent a buck on a Travers album; now I'm wondering what took me so long. I guess, somewhere in the back of my mind, I've just assumed I wouldn't like him much -- used to think of him as a one-hit cover-novelty wonder since "Boom Boom (Out Go The Lights)" is the only song I remember ever getting much airplay in Detroit; then figured he was probably just stodgy boogie bore. Probably people including George told me otherwise, but I just wasn't listening. Anyway, I was wrong -- biggest surprise about this record is all the cool, fancy, almost proggy keyboards (played by Travers himself -- synths mostly, sounds like?) that somehow keep it melodic and light on its feet no matter how heavy the boogie guitars get. Lots of side two is space-rockier than I would've guessed, and "Crash And Burn" rules in that dept. That's the opener, and from there side one kills -- "Can't Be Right" (riffing reminds me of "D.O.A.," the VH II song that always reminded me of the Stooges), "Snortin' Whiskey" ("...and drinkin' cocaine": this might have got AOR play, but more likely I remember it from Missouri college radio), "Born Under A Bad Sign" (famous blooze-rock cover, totally earned by that point.) He also covers a Bob Marley song to open side two, which I could take or leave, but which isn't bad. So now I need to start scarfing up all his other old albums, I guess. (Early ones tend to be purer and heavier, right?)

Trigger -- Had always taken these never-charters to be pretty decent faux-Slade (or faux-Kiss, being on Casablanca) shouters, and that's mostly what the first side of their self-titled '78 LP (only one I've ever seen) turns out to be now that I've gone back and checked again. But there are also midtempo powerop semi-ballads on both sides that I'd peg closer to Badfinger or the Raspberries (Popoff says Babys or Piper, fine.) But what really knocked me out this time is the first half of side two, where they seem to be going more for Rocks Aerosmith,
way darker stuff than the mere party rock Popoff kinda dismisses them as, and in "Deadly Weapon" and "Beware Of Strangers" they come dangerously close to pulling it off; later reminds me of the Hounds, too. Jasper/Oliver say they were a Cleveland club band, discovered by Gene Simmons. (Btw, Casabalanca had a pretty good hard rock roster for a disco label, didn't they? Was that mostly Simmons's doing, or whose? Wonder how often Trigger shared bills with the Godz, from Columbus.)

Jerusalem -- Totally fell from these '80s Christian metallers' clearly Thin Lizzy-infused '82 LP when I bought it last year, but only remembered a few weeks ago that I also had their much goofier artworked '83 followup Can't Stop Us Now on my shelf. Must've bought it for the cover at some point, then filed it soon after. '83 album though is sadly not nearly as heavy or majestic as the '82 one: More like Survivor crossed with early Queensryche, with occasional clueless new wavey touches. Passable, or least I'll keep it for the cover, but the only song I really like a lot is the self-expanatory glam-beat bootyshake "Let's Go (Dancin')." Anyway, here's what I wrote about their previous LP last year, followed by the cover of this one:

Rolling Past Expiry Hard Rock 2009

http://www.nifty-music.com/images/vinyl/j/jerusalem.1984.6873.jpg

Eh, did I "i" instead of "img" by mistake there? Oh well, either way works.

Anyway, what else?

Most Lizzy-sounding song on Huey Lewis's Sports turns out to be the Viet vet tribute "Walking On A Thin Line," though "The Only One" on the album before still sounded a lot tougher. This is the more solid album, though, and not just 'cause of the four two 10 hits. Hardest popping of those is probably Chapman/Chinn's "Heart And Soul," which the Busboys and Exile had failed to hit with before. But my favorite cuts nobody remembers are "You Crack Me Up," the most nervous new wavey thing on the record, and "Bad Is Bad," which Dave Edmunds had done on Repeat When Necessary better. Also forgot Huey had covered a Hank Williams song -- "Honky Tonk Blues," so if he influenced country singers later, that partly explains it. Anyway, you could probably call this the biggest selling pub rock LP in history, and have a point there.

The Animals Animalism from 1966 -- Another $1 purchase, pretty much all smoldering grumpy blues and soul covers: "Shake," "Lucille," "Smoke Stack Lightning," "Hey Gyp" (okay that's Donovan, whatever), "Hit The Road Jack," etc. But it's the six-minute closer, "Going Down Slow," that makes me wonder whether these guys have kinda got the historical shaft as far as being considered progenitors of heavy blooze rock, because that cut totally does it, and I bet it wasn't the only one. They probably deserved to have an album or two in my metal book more than some bands who did get in there.

Finally, anybody here have any opinion about the Strawbs? I don't, and I've never listened to them much, but I do have a couple albums by them, so finally I'm trying, and seems like they have occasional guitar-rocking moments -- at least in, say, an almost-Jethro Tull sense -- amidst all the pastoral rural prog (which is often real nice itself.)

(Uh, just went to file Travers' Crash And Burn, and saw his Makin' Magic from 1977 there, in the exact same alphabetical order. When the heck did I get that thing? Guess I'll play that pretty soon.)

Also should mention that Trigger's more Slade/Kiss type shout stuff does in fact have some hardy troglodyte glam stomp to it -- especially probably "Rockin' Cross The USA," which you could almost convince yourself came from Australia if it had different geography and if you squint your ears a bit, and "Gimme Your Love," which is not subtle. No complaint about their rhythm section, but their Aerosmith swings harder.

Also, it's probably misleading to keep talking about "boogie" in relation to that 1980 Travers LP; boogie's definitely one big element of it, but the overall sound is just a lot more modern and scientific than that implies. Not just 'cause of his synths -- his guitars, too. The record's just really listenable, not what I was expecting.

anybody here have any opinion about the Strawbs?

I have this 2-CD anthology which I like a lot, especially the early stuff. def more rural-prog than gtr-rocking IIRC. the stately track "Benedictus" got FM airplay in Cincinnati.

http://cover7.cduniverse.com/MuzeAudioArt/Large/02/574802.jpg

guessing than Pashmina knows way more about these guys.