TV Party Tonight! Part Ten: Bands I've Gotten Mail From - by Ricki C.

It's a pretty simple concept: back in the day, at the dawn of time, say 1974 or so, when KISS had barely been invented, and Colin was 5 years old, I was sending away for 45 rpm punk singles through the mail.  (iPhone kids, ask your parents what 45 rpm singles were; ask your grandparents what "mail" was.)  The first one I sent away for was Patti Smith's "Hey Joe" b/w "Piss Factory."  The second was Boston rock & roll genius Willie "Loco" Alexander's "Kerouac" b/w "Mass Ave."  When I got it, at my second apartment ever, back in the old Lincoln Park West Apartments - that complex right across from the Hollywood Casino that I believe set a city record for most police runs last year - it contained this note from Alexander.......

I couldn't find a decent-sounding version of that indie single b-side on YouTube, this is the later LP version, when Alexander signed to MCA Records.  It's not quite as good, but it's still rockin', and kicks anything from Grouplove's ass......

Okay, let's shift coasts now, to maintain chronology, but we'll get back to Boston later.  I sent away for The Pop!'s first single "Hit & Run Lover" b/w "Break The Chain" in 1976 or so, when I was running Teenage Rampage - my Columbus punk fanzine - and corresponding with the staff of Back Door Man magazine (who taught me everything I needed to know about DIY publishing) out in Torrance, California (the mean streets/working class 'hood of L.A., definitely NOT Malibu).  Here's a letter The Pop! guys sent me one year, and a tune of theirs from when they were part of the 1979 post-Knack "My Sharona was a big hit!  Sign up any power-pop band you can find in L.A!." major-label signing frenzy.......  

By time 1977 rolled around I had already spent my hard-earned, workin'-in-the-Service-Merchandise warehouse money on tickets to a Styx/Ted Nugent double-bill at Vet's Memorial and a KISS debacle at St. John's Arena on the OSU campus, because my A-1 punk/hardrock heroes The Dictators were supposed to OPEN both those shows, but managed to get themselves booted off both tours due to "musical differences" or "attitude adjustment" problems.  That brought about this postcard from Dics founder/leader/songwriter Adny Shernoff.......

(by the way, this Dictators video features some of the WORST camera work I've ever witnessed by a professional camera crew, as they seem to search vainly for WHO in the band is singing lead at any given moment.  I guess those hippie audio/visual stoners out in San Franscisco didn't know how to shoot anybody but hopelessly sedentary Grateful Dead-style bands.)

(plus whoever filmed seemed overly fond of showcasing rhythm guitarist Scott "Top Ten" Kempner's ass) 

Okay, back to Boston: The Atlantics were a classy new wave/power pop band who I first started reading about in Bomp! and The New Rocker in 1976 or so.  They always wore suits onstage, they always had cool haircuts, they knew how to tune & play their instruments, and they wanted to be rock & roll stars, as opposed to punk-rock rumors.  (The musical fame dicotomy that later saw Nirvana frontman Kurt Cobain blow his brains out.)  They lasted into the early 80's, battering their heads against all the usual music biz walls: endless club gigs that finally led to being signed to a major label - ABC Records - in 1979 (that same power-pop boomlet that swept up The Pop! and The Plimsouls out in L.A.), only to watch their major label debut - Big City Rock - sink without a trace when ABC Records folded within weeks of its release.  I was a roadie for Columbus' The Buttons at that time (see The Buttons Opened For Judas Priest), wrote to The Atlantics to commiserate about our power-pop troubles 'n' woes and got this postcard back from them.......      

 

BONUS PREVIEW VIDEO

I started listening to Elliott Murphy in 1973.  In 1989 he emigrated from New York to Paris.  In 1992 I was lucky enough to meet him at a show at the Bottom Line in New York City when he played there during a visit back to his Long Island hometown.  (I took a Greyhound Bus to that show, a trip I wrote about at length in my old blog - How I Spent My Summer Vacation - if you'd care to read more.)  Anyway, we've corresponded ever since - first by postcard & letter, now via e-mail - and when I got this postcard from him in January, it gave me the idea to ask if we could conduct a trans-Atlantic / Paris-to-Columbus interview for Pencilstorm.  That interview will run this coming Thursday, March 16th: Elliott's birthday, by the way.  Here's a little bonus video to preview that piece.......

ELLIOTT MURPHY / "Continental Kinda Girl" / 1984 

 

 

 

 

    

Ace In The Hole Music Is Closing Next Week: You Should Stop In - by Ricki C.

Ace In The Hole Music Exchange (1153 Kenny Centre, inside the Kenny Centre shopping plaza, right by the corner of Kenny & Henderson Rds. / 614-457-5666) is closing its doors for good on Saturday, March 18th, 2017.  You should go there before it does. 

Owner/proprietor Mike "Pepe" Depew has kept Ace In The Hole going since 1995 - virtually single-handedly for the past seven years - but the crushing economic realities of keeping an indie record store afloat in our current downloadable music culture has made continuing the venture impossible.  (see store hours and closing-week discount schedule below)

I worked at Ace In The Hole for nine years in the first decade of this 21st century, 2001-2010.  I lived a pretty clichéd rocker existence that decade: I played action-packed acoustic solo rock & roll gigs; I served as road manager for Hamell On Trial, a punk-blast of MC 5-derived acoustic energy; halfway through the decade I signed on as merch guy & guitar tech for Watershed (and later for Colin’s spinoff bands, The League Bowlers and The Lonely Bones); and in between all that touring my day job was at Ace In The Hole Music.

I can’t tell you how cool that day job was.  Essentially I was getting paid to hang out and listen to music for eight hours a day, while talking ABOUT MUSIC to various strangers, friends & acquaintances who dropped into the store, both of which I WOULD HAVE DONE FOR FREE!!!  Other than a very short stint at Camelot Music right before Ace In The Hole, I had spent 25 years of my life working on receiving docks and in warehouses, unloading trucks and humping freight about for 40 bone-crunching/soul-destroying hours a week; BELIEVE ME, working in an indie record store work was better.

Plus I can’t tell you the number of good friends I made at that store: a local cancer physician, who – due to his rather retiring nature – I’m guessing would rather remain nameless here, who has subsequently become my sister’s oncologist as she battles cancer, and whose friendship has made that entire process SO MUCH EASIER; local rocker (and current Nashville émigré) Erica Blinn, whom I met when she was in her early teens when her dad – Ace In The Hole regular Jerry Blinn, bassist of the fine, fine, superfine West Side rocker elite Black Leather Touch – brought her into Ace, where she later became an employee; and, crucially, Joe Peppercorn – leader & master songwriter of first Mrs. Children, later The Whiles, still later the mastermind & driving force of the annual Beatles Marathon, perhaps Columbus’ finest yearly musical throwdown.

I met Joe one chilly Monday morning after I had co-hosted Invisible Hits Hour – Curt Schieber’s long-running Sunday night CD 101/102.5 record review show – the night before.  Joe came into the store – all but twisting a cloth cap in his hands like a character out of some Dickens novel – and said, “Are you the guy who was on Invisible Hits Hour last night?”  (I continually plugged my employment at Ace In The Hole on the show: why waste an hour of free advertising?)  “Did you like the show?” I asked back at him.  “Yeah, it was great.” he replied.  “Then yeah, that was me,” I said, brightening.  “What were you going to say if I didn’t like the show?” Joe asked, meeting my eyes for the first time in the entire shyness-slanted conversation.  “I was gonna say it was the white-haired guy who owns the store,” I said, “the last thing I need is little assholes coming in here and berating me because I badmouthed their favorite 311 record, and I can’t walk away from ‘em, because I’m at work.”

It was the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

There’s so much more about my nine years at Ace I’d like to get into: Watershed playing a great gig in the parking lot of the store on a gorgeous Sunday afternoon back in 2002, when The More It Hurts, The More It Works was brand new, YEARS before they ever became my employers (maybe Colin will write about that separately this week); the fact that Jim Johnson – ace drummer of various Willie Phoenix bands through the years & decades – was our record distributor throughout my employment and remains in that position to this day (plus he got me my job at the store, that’s a cool story in itself); but all that has to wait for a later blog, ‘cuz here’s what you have got to know RIGHT NOW!!!!!!! 
   
Ace In The Hole is open this week and next week Tuesday through Friday 11 am-7 pm; Saturday 11am-5 pm; and Sunday March 12th from noon to 2 pm or so, whenever the traffic and the conversation run out.  Final business day is Saturday March 18th, 2017.  All used CD’s in the store are 50% off; vinyl records $6 and under are 50% off (and, you’d best believe me, there’s still a BUNCH of great, cheap vinyl left in the store, I got that Brotherhood album – offshoot band of Paul Revere & the Raiders – for 50 cents last week, among others); vinyl $7-$30 is 20% off, and vinyl over $30 (and there’s some gems in that price range still there, too) is 30% off.  You really should go in and drop some cash, you could do much worse stuff with your time and your disposable music money until the 18th. – Ricki C. / March 6th, 2017. `

National Record Store Day, April 18th, 2009: Colin plays music, future Pencilstorm movie critic Rob Braithwaite reads the paper, local singer/songwriter John Vincent watches and waits for his turn to play.....

TV Party Tonight! Part Nine: Guilty Pleasures (and a couple not so much) - by Jeremy Porter

From Google:

guilt·y pleas·ure
noun
plural noun: guilty pleasures
something, such as a movie, television program, or piece of music, that one enjoys despite feeling that it is not generally held in high regard.
"everybody has a guilty pleasure—for me, it has to be mid 70s disco"

These are some of the things I pontificate about over drinks in the back rooms of dive bars, on soap-boxes at social gatherings, and during long drives between shows. It takes work to digest a piece of music objectively. It takes time, too. You have to learn to navigate through a quagmire of distractions that might include too much reverb, electronic drums, sterile or dated production, computerized perfection, and layers of unnecessary tracks. But beneath it all is the song and performance. Here’s a few that I’ve come to terms with, and learned to admit that I love, despite what you think.  

This isn’t going to make me any new friends. 

Aerosmith - Janie’s Got A Gun

 

This song made every old-school Aerosmith fan cringe. A lot of them left and never came back. The Toxic Twins were no more. The days of “Draw The Line” and “Sweet Emotion” were long gone. Well, ok, let’s get this on the table right off. This is a GREAT F*ING SONG. The writing and arrangement is just perfection. It rises when it’s supposed to and drops out when it’s supposed to. There’s not a wasted note or lyric anywhere.  If I had to take points off, it’d be the sheen over the mix and the synthy strings over the outro.  But Jesus, I love the tone of the guitar solo. And there are some real classic Aerosmith elements at play here: the piano shuffle going into the pre-chorus, the layered Tyler harmonies in the intro, and especially the Joe Perry rat-tail guitar bends over the “run away, run away from the pain” bridge.  All things considered, Steven Tyler is the greatest American rock singer of all time, for my money. His genius and talent as a singer and composer shines on this from front to back.  

Van Halen - Jump

Continuing with bands that jumped the shark, here’s another one that made old-school fans want to puke. You’ve got the greatest guitarist on the planet….and you write a synthesizer song. Ugh. Well, let me tell ya, this too is a GREAT F*ING SONG. And mostly thanks to Diamond David Lee Roth. Anyone else behind the mic and this song probably sucks. His delivery is just amazing. It’s funny and soulful and just overflowing with sex and energy. The highlight? “Whoah-oh, hey you? Who said that? Baby how you been?” is just classic brilliant rock and roll writing. It’s pure snarl,  idiot-in-a-bar-pickup-line conversation that - through a stroke of genius - becomes the lyric that opens the second verse. Who does that? No one but DLR would have thought of it. It’s an uninhibited move. Eddie’s smile in the solo is infectious. These guys nailed it with this one, and it was the hit it deserved to be. 

Bruce, Elvis, Steven, Dave - London Calling (Tribute to Joe Strummer)

Clash tribute.

OK, I’ll pull you back in with a not-so-guilty pleasure. Not sure I need to say anything about this, other than everytime I hear Bruce yell “This is for Joe!” at the beginning I get goosebumps, then I get sad as I remember how bummed out I was after Joe unexpectedly died. I never feel as out of touch about music as I do when someone brings up the Grammys and the crap that flows through there, but every once in awhile… Tony Kanal of No Doubt plays bass here, which gets us back (in a roundabout way) to our next guilty pleasure. Better watch this first cuz it’s about to get sappy here.  

Gwen Stefani - Cool

OK, we’re getting really guilty here. I’ve never been a No Doubt fan, and her solo stuff has been even harder for me to appreciate. Frankly, I loathe most of what I’ve heard. That Bananas song is horrible. But damn, this is a GREAT F*ING SONG! Like “Janie” above,  the arrangement, the lyrics, and the vocals are just great and so efficient. Four minutes goes by quick. The real key here is that hooky synthesiser riff that carries it throughout. The back story is cool, about her ex, the dude playing bass for the Boss up above (see how I did that?), and how they’re all adult now and get along after she hooked up with the dude from Bush. Yeah, it’s heavy on the Madonna and Lauper vibe, and the video is Godawful (tho Gwen is lookin’ fine), but it kills me every time. 

The Ataris - Boys Of Summer

Music Video-The Ataris, posted while I was bored...I sing this song with Resty a lot. =]

Annoyed yet? Even as an unapologetic Eagles fan, I can’t get on board with Don Henley’s solo stuff. But as a teenager watching MTV I saw that there was a really good song in here somewhere. I fell for the hook and the lyrics and wished the DH version and video were better.   Then I heard this a couple decades later. Yeah, it’s a bit stiff, a bit emo. It’s been through the Pro-Tools time lock, and you probably can’t find a single damn mistake in the whole thing, but somehow I can get past all that. The vocal is strong and the guitars are huge and the song is up front where it belongs. It’s a great cover of a great song that everyone hates.  

Bangles - Hazy Shade of Winter

The Bangles' official music video for 'Hazy Shade of Winter'. Click to listen to The Bangles on Spotify: http://smarturl.it/TheBanglesSpotify?IQid=BanglesHSW As featured on The Bangles: Greatest Hits.

Here’s another cover that I think is an improvement over the original. Everyone knows the Bangles for “Walk Like an Egyptian” and “Eternal Flame” - easily two of the weakest songs in their catalog (even if Susanna was naked when she sang the latter). But they have a dark streak: minor chords with themes of loneliness and betrayal, delivered with moody melodies and layered harmonies and '60s fuzz. More polished than the also amazing Go-Gos, but the material warrants some extra shine, and this Simon & Garfunkel tune from the Less Than Zero soundtrack pretty much kicks ass. Vicki plays a great Carvin and sister Debbie hits the snare hard. I played this a lot in 1987, between spinning Please To Meet Me, Document No. 5, and Warehouse: Songs And Stories, and I saw them open with this on tour that summer in Milwaukee, too. Most of my friends didn’t get it. I think it holds up pretty well.

Britney Spears - Womanizer 

If you’re still with me, then this ought to do it. Auto-tune, drum-machine, vocal-fry bullshit by the heap. It flies in the face of everything I love about music. This ain’t white guys with low-strung guitars! Whoever spent days and days at the mixing board and computer keyboard assembling this deserves credit for crafting a perfect combination of arrangement, punch, vocals and groove. The bridge is a nice change of pace. Let’s drop some molly and dance! 

The Nils - Freedom

video from this awesome and under-rated montreal punk band cicra 1986. this song Freedom, is off their Sell Out Young ep

I have to try to save some face here at the end: so this is no guilty pleasure, but something near and dear to my heart. The Nils were a disaster of a band from Montreal in the '80s/'90s who churned out some of the best punk, power-pop and rock that was never heard. Alex Soria wrote amazing songs from an early age until his untimely suicide in 2004. They had one full length (self-titled on Profile Records), 3 eps, and a coupla posthumous releases. This was their only official video. If you’re looking for something new (to you) and love bands like The Replacements and early Soul Asylum, check them out.  Start with the self-titled record.   

  
Jeremy Porter lives near Detroit and fronts the rock and roll band Jeremy Porter And The Tucos. Follow them on Facebook to read his road-blog chronicling their adventures and see his photo series documenting the disgusting bathrooms in the dives they play. He's a whiskey snob, an unapologetic fan of "good" metal, and couldn't really care less about the UofM - OSU rivalry since he once saw The Stones at the Horseshoe. Still, go blue.     

www.thetucos.com
www.facebook.com/jeremyportermusic  
@jeremyportermi
www.rockandrollrestrooms.com

In 1979 The Buttons Opened for Judas Priest; It Didn't Go Well - by Ricki C.

(editor's note: Ricki C. wanted to follow up Scott's Judas Priest blog with his own first-hand Priest story.)

Click here to read Scott's story

Sometime in early 1979 Willie Phoenix’s then-current band The Buttons opened for Judas Priest at the Agora Club here in Columbus, Ohio.  (I tried to find the exact date utilizing the InterWideWeb, but couldn’t locate it in Judas Priest tour logs.)  I was working as a roadie for The Buttons when that show took place.  It was a bloodbath.  For the uninitiated, it was roughly like The Raspberries (Eric Carmen’s pride of Cleveland, Ohio power-pop assemblage) opening for Black Sabbath in 1972 or so.  (I guess in more contemporary terms it would be like Columbus’ The Whiles opening for Metallica.)

My job at that point on the road crew of The Buttons – at least when they played The Agora, which had a first-class lighting rig – was to run lights.  Willie’s reasoning was that I knew all the songs, knew when the choruses, bridges & solos were going to come up and could do the most to highlight those changes.  I was no Marc Brickman with Bruce Springsteen, but I have to admit (and simultaneously pat myself on the back), I became a pretty good lighting guy.  

When the opening slot for Judas Priest came up, pretty much NOBODY on the band or crew were crazy about the idea. True, The Buttons (and Romantic Noise, the previous incarnation of The Buttons before a name change at the end of 1978) had become the go-to local Columbus band to open Agora shows.  Previously Willie & the guys (Greg Glasgow on bass, John Ballor, lead guitar & drummer Dee Hunt) had opened shows for The Ramones, The David Johansen Group, Squeeze and a coupla others that slip my mind.  (Later, after Dee & I left the organization they did a TRULY STUNNING opening set for Talking Heads at Mershon Auditorium.  I witnessed that performance from the audience and DESPERATELY wished I could have been a part of it.)

But I digress……Did I say NOBODY in the band thought a Judas Priest opener was a good idea? No, WILLIE thought it was a good idea.  Willie was a force of nature at that time (as he still shows flashes of to this day).  He had a truly charismatic stage presence and a KILLER band to back him up.  He knew no fear, no goal he set was unattainable, he admitted no limits.  BUT – and this is a big but – opening for Judas Priest was another beast entirely. Playing in front of The Ramones’ or David Johansen’s crowds was a natural fit for the punk-edged power-pop of Romantic Noise and The Buttons; the Judas Priest mob of metalheads, quaalude-kings and West Side reprobates I had grown up with and amongst were another animal entirely.  (My use of the word “animal” in this context borders more on the literal than the figurative.)

From my catbird seat at the lighting board up in the Agora balcony I could tell there were gonna be problems from the very beginning.  When I brought the stagelights up after the Buttons had positioned themselves onstage there was this kind of low murmur of disapproval at the sight of five-foot two, black, dreadlock-sporting, left-handed Willie Phoenix center stage in some kind of Sgt. Pepper jacket.  

Boos were starting before they played a note, but Willie cut ‘em off by counting in the first song of the set.  After the first tune, not one person clapped. There were probably 750 people in the 1300 capacity Agora that night (this was well before Rob Halford’s arena days) and not one person clapped.  In fact, nobody made a sound.  It was the quietest I had ever heard that club.  (One night in spring or summer 1978 Romantic Noise had played a no-publicity, virtually-unannounced Wednesday night show at the Agora and only SEVEN people showed up.  And THAT audience was noisier than the Judas Priest crowd.)        

Things never got better.  By the end of the second song loud, sustained booing started ringing out.  During the third tune the crowd started throwing stuff at the stage: cups, beer bottles, coins, sandwich wrappers, pieces of pizza (the Agora served food back in the day) began raining down on the band.  Mid-set a CRUTCH flew out of the crowd and crashed into Dee’s drum-kit.  (Three or four years after that night I was telling this story in a West Side bar and the guy who THREW that crutch was sitting at the table. “Hey, that was ME!” he slurred, “I had banged up my knee on my Harley and Security wouldn’t give me my crutch back.  My buddies had to carry me out that night.”)    

Partway through the set, Steve Sines – the lead singer of local band The Muff Brothers (later simply The Muffs) – sat down next to me at the lighting board.  He’d been hired by the Agora to run lights that night for Judas Priest, who didn’t even carry their own lighting guy at that point.  “Your boys are havin’ a rough time up there,” he said, lighting up a joint and offering it to me.  “Yeah, I noticed,” I replied, declining the joint, feeling like I shouldn’t be enjoying myself up in the balcony as debris and boos washed over my employers down on the stage.  I was nothing if not fiercely loyal to Willie & the guys. 

The Buttons had stopped even pausing between songs in the set, powering right through from one song to the next, to not give the crowd time to catcall and throw beer.  (I figure the whole thing was pretty much like when Watershed opened for The Insane Clown Posse, but with a lot less Faygo; and this was just one show, not an entire TOUR.)  I give ‘em credit, they finished the 40-minute set.  They never backed down for a minute.  They battled that Judas Priest crowd to at least a stalemate.

During the last song, Willie took off his prized Les Paul Junior and bashed it to kindling on the Agora stage, Pete Townshend-style, giving his all to do ANYTHING to get a rise out of that audience, to salvage that set.  “Can he AFFORD that?” Steve Sines asked, wide-eyed, the joint paused in mid-air as he took in Willie’s six-string destructo finish.  “No, he cannot,” I said back to Steve, “no, he CAN NOT at all.”  I would’ve walked off that stage after five songs.  I wouldn’t have given that mob the time of day; Willie gave them his Les Paul.  That is why Willie Phoenix is a rock star and I am a Pencilstorm writer.  Willie, I salute you. – Ricki C. / February 26th, 2017

The Buttons / 1979

The Buttons / 1979 / "Hot Beat"

Judas Priest / 1979 / students, compare & contrast…….

     
 

TV Party Tonight! Part Eight: Generation Axe - by Wal Ozello

Colin let me take over this week's TV Party. When this was first pitched at Pencilstorm’s Editorial Committee meeting, we all started visiting each others' You Tube feeds to check out what each other was watching.

Much to the surprise of most of the staff, mine wasn’t filled with Journey, Bon Jovi, Queen or dozens of those tenor rock vocalists. When I go deep diving on Youtube, it’s all about the gods of guitar. And not those bluesy, riffy guys like Keith Richards or Slash.  I like the pure distorted rapid neoclassical sounds of what’s known now as Generation Axe. 

So sit back, relax and prepare to have your mind blown. Remember all this stuff is LIVE. Engage rabbit hole… NOW.

We start with the man who broke the ceiling with rock guitar virtuosos and I'm not talking about Eddie Van Halen (snooze), I’m talking about the one and only Steve Vai.

 

You can’t listen to Vai without his contemporary, Joe Satraini.  While Satriani has dozens of amazing songs, here’s a gem I found.

 

Eric Johnson is another amazing guitar talent from this generation.  It’s hard to mention Vai and Satriani without Johnson.  Here’s his most famous.

 

Europe gave birth to this neoclassical heavy metal guitarist, Yngwie Malmsteen. Wow. Just wow.

 

There are some people out there who can do on four strings what others do on six. Here is bassist Billy Sheehan and guitarist Paul Gilbert doing an amazing duet.

 

And speaking of duets… make sure to watch this completely. At first, it’s just Joe Satriani playing his signature, “Always You, Always Me,” but half way through Steve Vai joins him on stage and it’s just mind-blowing to hear two masters go at it together.  It's like watching Leonardo da Vinci and Michelangelo paint together.

 

Pencilstorm contributor Wal Ozello is the lead singer of the Columbus Hairband, Armada, and the author of several time travel books.