Aerosmith

Most of you know that Aerosmith is one of my favorite bands. Today I have been able to listen to them all day so far and not hear the same song twice. I have listened to Honkin on Bobo, the two new songs from Ultimate Hits Disc 2, Just Push Play and all 3 discs of Pandora's Box. Up next is Pump and after that Toys in the Attic ( my fav album). When I hit Toys, I will hear some songs that are on Pandora, but that's ok. I love not having an office mate.

New video

If ANYONE has any connections at VH1, MTV, Fuse, etc. SEND THEM THIS VIDEO!

"Into the Light" by Honor By August

HONOR BY AUGUST

Check them out. The guitarist on the right was one of my best friends in middle school.




Here is their website:

http://www.honorbyaugust.com/

THEY ARE AWESOME!!!!

The Art of the Album

So I was just telling my friend about Steve Vai. One of the most talented, inventive contemporary electric guitarists today. His first album came out in 1984 and his newest one is being released this month. When I was in middle school, I was lucky enough to have a friend who played the guitar who introduced me to all these musicians I had never heard of then, but are now, a huge part of my life, including Steve Vai. Vai is coming to Providence later this year and I really hope to get to see him.

One thing that is really great about Vai's albums is that they are true albums. The tracks make up a cohesive unit, each telling an individual story (and yes, a story can be told without words), but all having a similar feeling. This is becoming a lost art, the album. In an age where you can download a song from the CD or that soundtrack, fewer and fewer artists are putting the thought into making a complete album. Not that Vai releases concept albums (except for maybe Fire Garden), but the tracks go together. The thing about Vai is that even his compilations are true albums. He puts tremendous thought into what track should go on the compilation and writes insightful album notes for explanation. What are your favorite albums?

2007 Rock Honors

So this year VH1 honored ZZ Top, Heart, Genesis and OZZY. It was a pretty interesting show with a bit of randomness:

Who is Bam Margera and why was he the host?

Billy Bob Thornton wore a jacket with shoulderpads.

Jada Pinkett-Smith was in a band that played at Ozzfest?

Nickelback played ZZ Top fantastically.

Gretchen Wilson played with Alice in Chains and sounded amazing.

Genesis didn't sound that good.

Heart still rocks and Nancy is a great performer and guitartist.

Criss Angel is a freak.

Ozzy and I have the same haircut if I part my hair in the middle.

Zakk Wylde is jacked!

Aerosmith is better than Aretha Franklin

Horrors! Gasp you might say! How could I say that ANYONE is better than the Queen of Soul? I apologize friends, but, quite easily. I TiVoed the RnR HoF ceremony and Ms. Franklin sang a few songs as a tribute to Ahmet Ertegun who founded Atlantic Records and who passed away last year. I forget the first song she sang which was great. She then sang her hit, "Never Loved a Man (the way that I love you)" which was covered by Aerosmith on their latest studio album, Honkin on Bobo, changing the title to "Never Loved a Girl (the way that I love you)." I just like Aerosmith's version better (at least compared to Aretha's live version during the ceremony). Maybe her album version is better. It just seemed this song was too low for Ms. Franklin's range. Maybe it used to be her range, but it's not anymore.

I can't wait to watch the part about Patti Smith (she also got inducted along with R.E.M., Van Halen, Grandmaster Flash and The Ronnettes).

I love Rock and Roll (and yes, I know that is a Joan Jett song).

Rock of Geezers

This week VH1 hosted a show called Rock Honors. It was the first of such shows and they decided to honor Queen, Judas Priest, Def Leppard, and KISS. Now, I don't know what kind of "rock" they were honoring but it was interesting that a classic (in every sense of the word) rock band in Queen, a father of metal band in Judas Preist, a pop rock band in Def Leppard and a performance/merchanidising band in KISS can all be classified as rock.

Now, most of you who know me, know that I am a die-hard for anything rock and roll. I was pretty excited to watch this show and watch these great bands perform and have tribute paid to them by some of the great artists of today. In my opinion, Priest stole the show, although, the mega-band that was put together to pay tribute to KISS was a close second. I will admit right now that I never owned a Priest tape or really listened to them much, but they were still full of piss and vingear on that stage and you could tell they really were enjoying themselves (and they didn't sound half-bad either). They are a great band because they have great riffs behind their songs and bad-ass lyrics. They also showed that they were the ones who started the move where all standing members of the band get together and move as one back and forth (NOT KISS). I thoroughly enjoyed their performance and was glad they were honored since they are not and probably won't get into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame since Sabbath is already there. Plus, anyone who drives a motorcycle on stage rules.

The mega-band put together for the KISS tribute was as follows:

Tommy Lee - drums
Slash - guitar
Scott Ian - bass guitar
Gilby Clarke - guitar
Rob Zombie - vocals
Ace Frehley - guitar

It was really cool that Ace played with them since he was an original member of KISS. They performed "God of Thunder" which is a pretty good song, and Rob sang it really well. I actually love Rob Zombie and if I wasn't scared, I would go to one of his shows. Part of the time he looked just like a marionette dancing all over the stage - his jacket had a skeleton bones on it and his pants were cut just so they looked like his legs weren't really attached to his body. The rest of the time he looked like he was dancing an Irish jig, but sounded like a monster the whole time.

I was not impressed with Def Leppard at all.

KISS was as good as they usually are and I'm sure it was much better if you were actually there. Pyrotechnics are much better in person than on TV.

The major complaint I had about the show was Jamie Pressly, the host. Who the hell is she and why did she get the gig? I wouldn've much rather had one of the VH1 VJ's or someone who actually knew something about the bands (bsides just loving them) up there to introduce them. OR ME! ;)

A few other things:
Did Rick Savage get an entire new face? Come on, he's not that old! Rock stars who get plastic surgery are just weird.

Paul Rodgers is NOT a good fill-in for Freddy Mercury - unfortunately, no one is. :(

Brian May is still amazing, I'm sure he is wicked nice too, he looks so kind and gentle.

If Gene Simmons wants to make out with his fake Ace, go for it - I don't think anyone would be surprised.

It was really awesome at the beginning of "We Will Rock You" when Roger Taylor, Dave Grohl, Taylor Hawkins were all playing the drums. Still one of my favorite songs of all time and associated with one of my few happy memories from high school when it was playing on the radio when were were pulling up to the field where we beat Wheeler in lacrosse for the championship. Go Fighting Quakers!

They had an air guitar champion - this is an actual thing - there is a national championship for this. Really? Wow.

My last question is how did they decide who would get these rock honors? Apparently they all got rings like the World Series rings (not as expensive I'm sure, but it looked like just as big made of silver and black onyx). However they decide, next year's should be just as interesting.

The Ringers

To stick with the family theme, my friend Chuck (brother to my friend who just had twins twins!) and his band, The Ringers just made a demo CD. It is AWESOME!!! When you click on their name here, it will take you to their myspace.com page and it will start playing a few of their songs. If you are in the New London area, GO SEE THEM! I, unfortunately, have not been able to see them live yet, but I imagine they are great live. You can purchase the demo for $5. Quite a reasonable price I must say. Congrats guys and come to Maine if you get a chance!!!

1st Concert of the Season

Went to see NICKELBACK last night in Manchester. It was a fun show. Trapt and Chevelle opened for them, and Trapt was WAY better (in my opinion). Chevelle is the kind of band that has good music and a good singer, but they don't go together - their music is very Metallica/Megadeth-like but then the singer starts, it just doesn't work, plus you can't understand one work of what he sings and screams a lot. Unfortunately, neither band did a good job warming up the crowd - which is what opening bands are supposed to do. Finally, Nickelback came on about 10 pm and played until about 11:30. Set list follows:

Animals
Woke Up This Morning
Photograph
Leader of Men (which Chad informed us he wrote while out of his mind on 'shrooms)
Someday (extended with guitar and drum bit)
medley of rifs from the Curb album
Never Again
Savin' Me
Side of a Bullet (very nice video tribute to Dimebag Darrel)
drum solo - AWESOME!
Follow You Home (Chad changed one of the lines in the last chorus to Duchess of Manchester - on the album it is Duchess of Detroit)
How You Remind Me (crowd did a fairly good job singing along)
Too Bad

encore:
Rockstar (Chad and Ryan playing acoustic)
Figured You Out (crowd also did well singing along to Mike)

It was the last show of this leg of the tour and now they have a break until the end of April when they go to Australia. They have been touring pretty much for the past month with sometimes a few days, sometimes no days between shows and you could tell. Chad's voice was very tired although he still was able to pull off the songs, he just sounded a bit more gravelly (is that a real word?) than usual. I think all the guys were happy to be playing, but mostly happy because they were finally going to get a break.

The pyro at the show was amazing - lots of flames, fireworks falling from the ceiling, sparks everywhere. Everytime I am at a show with pyro, I am amazed that the people on stage just don't spontaneously combust or melt into nothing because we can feel the heat half-way back from the stage so they must just sweat like crazy up there.

I have only seen Nickelback once before (I think it was in 2001 after Silver Side Up came out) in Providence at the Prov. Performing Arts Center. It was a GREAT show - it was their first "major" tour and they had so much energy, sounded phenomenal and really solidified me as a fan. It was nice to see that Chad and Ryan have learned to share the stage and play off each other for a good show. Mike (bass) still doesn't do much, but the new drummer (Daniel Adair, formally of 3 Doors Down) was amazing as proven by his rockin' drum solo, his set moved out to the middle of the stage and he pounded for about 15 minutes.

It was funny when Chad introduced that they were going to play a medley from the Curb album (their first album) and practically no one knew what he was talking about. I thought it was great though. I know there are some people who think Nickelback sucks and all their songs sound the same, but I would like to differ and say there is nothing wrong with writing a hit song that is catchy and has good music, singing and lyrics behind it. And, not all their songs sound the same.

The crowd was amazing - there were very young kids there (about 7 yrs old I would guess) to the oldish (about 60s) crowd. Not as amazing at an Aerosmith show, but I was surprised at how many yound kids were there.

All in all, it was a fun night, and considering it is probably going to be my only concert this year, I am glad we went.

I also want to send a message out to Steven Tyler who is having throat surgery sometime soon - take care Steven!

3 days till OPENING DAY!!!!