1298. W.A.S.P. / Still Not Black Enough. 1995. 3/5

From the band’s inception through to 1990, and the tour to promote the release of their fourth studio album “The Headless Children”, W.A.S.P. had been on an inexorable rise in the heavy metal scene. Four excellent albums and one live album had seen their profile rise across the world and their stage shows had created an enthusiasm and a horror at turning up to one of their shows. The rise in tensions within the band, especially between band leader Blackie Lawless and guitar hero Chris Holmes had seen Holmes quit the band, and eventually following the conclusion of the tour the band broke up.
In its place, Lawless went about creating a solo album, a writing and recording process that took over two years to complete. A concept based around a rather autobiographical character named Johnathon Steel, the album came to be called “The Crimson Idol”. However, his plans to release it as a solo album were thwarted by his record company and promotors, who insisted that it should be released under the band name W.A.S.P. Lawless eventually acceded to their wishes, and the album and following tour enjoyed great reviews and sales. This did not save the band as such, with the end of the tour once again seeing Lawless retreat on his own, and begin to compose his next album, which, once again, he was determined to release as a solo artist.
This time however, although the sounds and themes were familiar, there was to be no hiding behind a fictitious character, or to create a story that took elements that he knew and experienced and create a story around them. For this follow up album, the words coming out onto the page were of Blackie’s own stark and sometimes desolate emotions. Whereas “The Crimson Idol” had been deliberately written as a rock opera, a story that utilised fictional characters to represent the story that he had wanted to tell, his follow up to that, a solo album, was Blackie Lawless speaking from the heart, about things he had known and experienced, and hiding behind no mask. He also added some cover songs, as he had done in the past of W.A.S.P. albums, to fill out his album. Once again, though, despite his desire to release this as a solo album, his record company convinced him that it needed to be released under the W.A.S.P. name in order to be able to promote it. Unlike “The Crimson Idol” though, this was not an album with a purpose, it was a letter to his fans describing his inner turmoil, not designed to be an album released by a band. And thus, with the release of “Still Not Black Enough”, the one member of W.A.S.P. and his paid assistants brought out an album that seemed to promise something that it was not – a fully fledged album by the band.

Still Not Black Enough can be seen to be a collection of dark, introspective tunes that extended the Crimson Idol mythology, this time with Blackie speaking directly to his audience about his own feelings. As we will discuss, this album lacks the cohesiveness of its predecessor even as the lyrics explored similar topics to Crimson Idol: being an outcast and misfit, the pressures of fame and society, and the search for love. This album has several different track listings and also tracks, with each version being different from the other, so rather than trying to combine all of those into one review, I will be going off my CD version of the album and reviewing it in that order.
The title track “Still Not Black Enough” is straight away the same style lyrically and musically as “The Crimson Idol”, so much so that it really is almost a cut and paste or colour by numbers reimagining of any numbers of songs from the album. And look, Blackie wrote that album and he wrote this album, so he can perform however he wants. But even the drumming and drum rolls in the song mimic what has come three years earlier on that album. It’s a bit disconcerting from the outset. Blackie offers us lyrics that also reference the darker side of his conceptual magnum opus such as “I can't go on till I get off, for me it's still not black enough, with darkness gone, my fear is seen, my fear is real, my fear is me”. Yes, this is Blackie talking and not Jonathan, but as we all know they are mostly one and the same, and so is this song. “Skinwalker” follows another similar structure musically as Blackie walks us through the torment of his mind, questioning his sanity and how he can fight his way out of the darkness and find his way back to normality. “Black Forever” has Blackie further expunging his fears and doubt and regret, making everything black forever, but wanting to hold it inside and keep it there forever.
The first real change up musically comes from “Scared to Death”, an excellent mid-tempo hard rocking track with a great riff chugging through the main part of the track as Blackie once again spews froth with his fears and the contents of his blackened soul. Bob Kulick offers a great solo through the middle of the song, but the fact that the album has moved beyond its Crimson Idol melodies is what makes this song far more accessible on this album. It doesn’t last for long though, as the similarities return on “Goodbye America”. We have spoken word passages at the start and in the breakdown in the middle, and then Blackie preaching to us about how his country is broken. It reveals more about Blackie’s political ties than it does anything else, and as a poor man’s “Chainsaw Charlie” it doesn’t quite live up to what has come before this. It then, perhaps strangely, is followed up by a cover of the popular 60’s track “Somebody to Love” which was popularised by Jefferson Airplane. Is it a statement from Blackie on what he has been singing about to this point of the album? Is he looking for somebody to love, or vice versa? The cover is fine, but it asks more questions than it answers. This again is followed by the next step with the ballad “Keep Holding On”, acoustically based and with harmony vocals from Blackie himself. Now W.A.S.P. and Blackie know how to do power ballads, and they have some beauties in the past. But this one comes across half-arsed and just there for the sake of throwing in a ballad on the back of the emotional outpouring he has been making lyrically on this album.
There’s a bit of a bounce now though, as “Rock and Roll to Death” channels not only 60’s rock and roll but an old school W.A.S.P version of it, and adds that lyrically as well. It brings a bit of sanity back into the mix here and a feel for traditional W.A.S.P. into the album. It is short-lived though, because then we are accosted by a second power ballad, this one called “Breathe”, which is attempting to channel “Hold on to Your Heart” from the previous related concept album. Again though, it is the poor cousin of that. It lacks the emotive yet powerful element that that particular song enshrines. And if that isn’t enough, then we have the further recycling of musical passages and riff and drum beats to create “I Can’t”. And I get that by now you are probably wondering whether or not I am amplifying the purported similarities of the songs on this album to the previous album, and that I am perhaps being harsh in that comparison. But it really is inevitable when you listen to the album, you cannot help but hear that this is just an offshoot of that album. “No Way Out of Here” does make a much better mix of those characteristics, once again pulling together the themes of this album with the colours of red and black again being brought into play to describe Blackie’s state of mind. “One Tribe” closes out the main part of the album with Blackie crying out for love, whether it is on a personal basis or a part of his whole world.
Following this are two more cover songs which do not appear to be connected to the emotional outpouring that Blackie has done on this album, but are surely just because he loves the songs and the artists. The versions here of Queen’s “Tie Your Mother Down” and AC/DC’s “Whole Lotta Rosie” are faithful and you can hear the joy as Blackie plays them, and is a good way to finish off the album.

Given that this album came out in what for me was the black hole year of 1995, I didn’t actually pick this album up until the early months of 1996 once my life had settled down a little again. I had bought the greatest hits CD called “First Blood, Last Cuts” that had kept me company through most of that preceding year, so that when I saw this in Utopia Records when I walked in one day it was very exciting. W.A.S.P. had grown into one of my favourite bands, especially on the back of both “The Headless Children” and then “The Crimson Idol”, so seeing “Still Not Black Enough” meant for me more of the same. Surely! It is fair to say that this album was not what I expected, but looking back from this long length of time I don’t know why I didn’t expect it. As you have heard, this album is almost a direct continuation of “The Crimson Idol” both musically and lyrically. It could almost be a sister as such. But what it truly lacks is that fable story, the one with the start and the finish, and with the songs written to tell that story chronologically. Here Blackie expels his heart into song, but this is now his story and not a characters story, and that gives a point of difference to the way this album plays out. And for me, at that time, having been through a year where emotionally I had been completely wrung out, I probably wasn’t in the best headspace to get the most out of this album at that time.
So don’t get me wrong, I listened to this album the usual required amount that you do when you buy a new album, and eventually came to the conclusion that if it came to a choice between listening to this album or “The Crimson Idol”, then the latter would win hands down every time, and that was the direction I followed.
Over the preceding years this has been played sporadically. I have never not enjoyed it, but again when it comes to W.A.S.P. there are any number of other albums that I would prefer to listen to when it came to me wanting to listen to something from that band. The most recent time before the past week was a few months ago when I was a guest on Uncle Steve’s Mega Maiden Zone and we waffled on for three hours on a W.A.S.P. retrospective that was very enjoyable to do.
And so we come to this week, and my CD has come out again, and I have had a lot of fun reliving the album again on multiple occasions. And I still consider this to be a Blackie Lawless solo album, just under the W.A.S.P. moniker. And I think if you accept it as that you’ll find you can get more out of it, because you aren’t searching for things that just aren’t there. If you allow yourself to compare it to the previous album you will walk away disappointed. If you give it a chance, you will find some songs here that are worth your while checking out. And it does rank low on my list of W.A.S.P. albums. Of the 15 studio albums the band has released I rank this at #14.
Not for the first time this could have been the end for W.A.S.P. and yet once again they were pulled from the flames at the last instance, or perhaps it was the phoenix rising from the ashes. Because the return of the prodigal son set up the phase the band’s career, and set them on a musical course that was as at the furthest reaches of the spectrum that you could possibly imagine over their next three releases... but that’s a story for another episode...

1293. Various Artists / Music from and Inspired by M: I-2. 2000. 3/5

When the first Mission: Impossible film was released in 1996, it was a smash hit. The remake of the original TV series from the 1960’s and 1970’s was a rollicking film full of amazing action sequences and the required surprise ending. And as always, it also left the door ajar for a sequel to be made. So when it was announced that Mission Impossible 2 was going to be made it was big news. For Australians, the fact that it was to be filmed in Sydney also gave it an extra bit of enticement. The film itself? Well many people think it is terrific. I was always underwhelmed by it.
What the producers did decide on that had some merit was to load up a soundtrack album with some of the heavy hitter bands of the time, and give them the chance to create a song that could be featured in the movie itself. When compiled, some of those songs were featured in the movie, while the rest were put together on this album, which was stamped as “Music FROM and INSPIRED BY Mission Impossible 2”, so as to cover their backsides when it was finally revealed that not all of the tracks appeared in the film itself. All of the songs were recorded and produced by the bands themselves.
And it is an eclectic selection of bands and artists, which is very much a snapshot of heavy music at the time. Because it is dominated by nu-metal bands and alternative metal and rock bands. And if you are fans of that era in music then this album is most probably already in your collection. But if you are not fans of the standard of the turn of the century, then there are probably a lot of reasons not to go near this album. As a study of the era though it acts as an interesting collection to listen to and remember just where certain parts of the world were at when it came to the evolution of heavy music. It isn’t really necessary to tie this to the movie, but then again perhaps the enjoyment of the movie or the music comes from how you view the other.

The Australian version of this album has an overloaded 19 tracks on it, and the running time in total is an hour and 20 minutes. It’s almost as long as some films, though not as long as this one was. There are three bonus songs tacked onto the end of the regular 16 songs, one is “Iko Iko” by Zap Mama, an electronica reggae version of this well covered song, while the other two are by Australian artists, “Sucker” by 28 Days is a solid hard rock track from this very good Aussie group, ne that keeps the intensity high, while the “Theme from Mission Impossible” by Josh Abrahams is a nice way to exit the album.
Back to the top of the track list and this is where the heavy hitters of the album reside, to drag you in from the outset. Leading us off is Limp Bizkit with “Take a Look Around”, which utilises the main riff of the Mission Impossible theme tune as its basis and works onwards from there. I can’t say that I know a lot of Limp Bizkit and most of what I hear is not really my cup of tea, but I do like this song, the way it moves from moody to heavy to clear to raging. The song is a little long at over five minutes but it's a good listen. Metallica’s “I Disappear” follows, and interesting bridge between what they had written for “Reload” and would then write for “St Anger”. It is more or less their nu-metal anthem, one they made a film clip for that was probably better than the film itself, and which would go on to be the catalyst for their legal action over the peer-to-peer networking application Napster when a demo of this song appeared on that network well before the release of this album, or the song as a single. It is sometimes overlooked as it doesn’t actually appear on a Metallica album. Rob Zombie’s “Scum of the Earth” is typical Rob Zombie and blasts through the album as a result. The Butthole Surfers’ “They Came In” is an interestingly recorded track, full of differing instrumental effects that showcase a side of the band that isn’t always obvious. Then “Rocket Science” by The Pimps mirrors the Limp Bizkit style of rap and metal grooves. The cover version of Pink Floyd’s “Have a Cigar” is performed by the Foo Fighters with two differing performers. Firstly, the song is sung by drummer Taylor Hawkins, who gives the vocals a whole new sound. He is obviously a fan of the band, and his performance is passionate as a result. This also has Brian May guesting on guitar which gives the solo through the track lovely sound that only May can provide, as a counter to David Gilmour’s original. It’s an interesting interpretation of the track. Chris Cornell’s “Mission 2000” has moments that sound great, when his vocals hit those tones that we all know and love, but the track itself does fall a little flat. On the other hand, Godsmack’s “Going Down” was recorded during sessions for their debut album but not used, and was recycled here and then on their sophomore album.
Into the second half of the album, the lesser known acts get their chance to showcase their wares, and the range of genres of music here extends as a result. “What U Lookin’ At?” by Uncle Kraker, who had worked with Kid Rock up to this point in time, has a similar vibe to his music here. “Backwards” by Apartment 26 sits in an alt-metal phase, and given the relative newness of the band is an interesting choice for this soundtrack. The song is solid but is very rigid in composition. Diffuser’s “Karma” is very alternative rock of the late 1990’s but is an enjoyable trip down typical movie soundtrack songs from teenage coming-of-age movies of the day. It could easily have been in the movie “Empire Records” for instance. Buckcherry’s “Alone” is a standard hard rock offering from the band here.
Powderfinger’s “Not my Kinda Scene” is the standout from the back half of the album, the professional and excellence of their music immediately noticeable around the other tracks here. Tori Amos’s “Carnival” will please her fans but is not instantly brilliant, while the Hans Zimmer track “Nyah” seems like something that could easily have been omitted at the final hurdle.

I remember buying this after the movie had been released at the cinemas. I’d been to see the movie, and as I mentioned earlier, I had been underwhelmed with it. It isn’t a patch on the first movie, the story and the stunts. But some of the music from the movie I thought had been pretty good, and having sat through the credits in order to see who contributed to the songs I decided I may as well go out and buy the CD of the soundtrack. And, overall, it was good. I wouldn’t say that I’m a fan of all of the bands on the album, but I enjoyed about half of the album from the first couple of listens.
I have quite a number of soundtracks in my collection, and they all get bought after I’ve seen a movie and like the music, and then they get an occasional listen and then go back on the shelves. This album is no different. I listened to it when I first bought it, and then it has been residing in amongst my other CDs forever. I don’t remember when the last time was that I listened to this album. When I go to listen to music at home, I go for an album by a band, not really a compilation or soundtrack album. Sometimes I’m in the mood for that but mostly I swing the other way. So while I have these soundtrack albums that I have bought over the years, they don’t get much of a run. Which is one of the reasons I do this podcast. To pull these albums off my shelves and give them a chance to listened to once again. Just like Andy and his toys in Toy Story.
I guess I feel about the same way listening to this album today as I did all those years ago. It’s okay. It has some good songs here, and some that are very dated to the era. There are bands and artists here that I have never really listened to much that sound better than I would expect. There are bands here that I generally enjoy that have offered a reasonable track to the album. And as with all soundtrack albums there are bands and artists here that I just don’t know at all, and don’t really feel any desire to change that.
I could have skipped doing an episode on this album and it would probably not have bothered anyone in the world. All it would have done was annoy me because I knew it had an anniversary, and it was in my collection, and I passed over it. So now it is done. Everything is in order. And we can all move onto the next episode.

1278. UFO / No Place to Run. 1980. 3/5

Through the 1970’s the band UFO had been on a steady rise in popularity and sales, mainly on the back of their harder edged music predominantly on the back of the lead guitar and writing skills of Michael Schenker. Five albums stretching from 1973 to 1978 had proven to be popular through the UK and Europe and into the United States, and the live album recorded on the tour to promote the “Obsession” album, released under the title “Strangers in the Night”, is an amazing retrospective on those years, showcasing the absolute best that the band had to offer in their best setting.
Tensions had arisen over the previous 18 months however, through the antics of Schenker in particular. It had become a habit of his to leave shows prior to them commencing, or sometimes even in the middle of performances. Lead vocalist Phil Mogg in particular felt the relationship between the two strained, while the rest of the band also felt that it as reaching a point of no return. After a show in Berkeley California on October 29, 1978, Schenker officially quit the band. In a retrospective interview in the Classic Rock magazine, bass guitarist Pete Way recalled, "Obviously we were disappointed. It's not easy to promote an album without a guitarist. We were starting to draw a lot of people and the album was selling. But he'd also disappeared on the Lights Out tour, so nothing surprised us."
In his stead, the band hired Paul Chapman to take Schenker’s place for the remainder of the tour and to be a part of the follow up album. Chapman had briefly been a part of the band, touring as the second guitarist alongside Schenker on the ‘Phenomenon’ tour, before leaving to start his own band Lone Star, who released two albums before breaking up with Chapman’s return to UFO. This would be Chapman’s first time recording with the band.
One of the pieces of the puzzle here that seemed to be a great move for the band was the hiring of George Martin to produce the album. Martin of course is legendary as the producer of The Beatles among dozens of other artists, so this must have been seen as coup for the band as they looked to move forward into a new era. The album was written and recorded in Montserrat and London in late 1979 and was released onto the shelves in January of 1980.

Though I did not hear this album until many years after it had been released, I don’t doubt that I went into it in exactly the same way as fans of the band at the time first listened to it – and that is, they were waiting to hear what this band could produce now that the talisman of the group had left. Because although the singer, drummer, bass guitarist, keyboardist and rhythm guitarist remained the same as the band's recent albums, it was Schenker’s fingers in the writing pool along with his magic on the guitar that fans were wondering whether it could be replaced.
The album opens with Chapman’s instrumental “Alpha Centauri” that segues into “Lettin’ Go”, a song that could certainly be seen to be discussing the departure of their previous lead guitarist. Paul Chapman’s credentials by this time cannot be questioned, and all through the album he shows that he is a very good addition to the band. One of the interesting decisions on this album was to do a cover of a 1953 blues song “Mystery Train”, originally written and performed nu the American blues artist Junior Parker. This version by UFO however is of the more rockabilly cover version that was done of the song by Elvis Presley in 1955, and UFO here do try to mix a bit of their own style into it. I’m not sure who brought this song to the band and said ‘hey, we should put this on the album!’ - I mean, it was most likely Chapman – but for a band of the style and genre they were, it seems a strange choice. The version here is fine but not memorable.
“This Fire Burns Tonight” is classic UFO, especially the vocals from Mogg that fall straight into that groove and honey their way through the track. “Gone in the Night” by contrast almost mimics an Elton John song with vocals that sit in that range that he sings at, the prominent keyboards from Paul Raymond and then the blistering guitar solo that leads out the track from Chapman. The solo is the hardest rocking part of the song, with the rest sitting in that pop AOR style that Elton almost made his own during the 1970’s.
Side two opens with “Young Blood” which really just plods along without much in the way of inspiration. It’s a song that you listen to but find it pretty much goes in one ear and then out the other without gaining a reaction. The title track “No Place to Run” follows and packs a bit more punch with a more engaged vocal performance from Mogg and enjoyable solo break again. “Take it or Leave it” though... well, the song name speaks for itself. You can take it or leave it, and I choose to leave it. It's in a softer style much like “Gone in the Night”, almost a country ballad and one that just chills me to the bone. It’s a stinker. “Money Money” ups the tempo and energy to mid-quantities, while the album concludes with “Anyday”, much more representative track of what UFO generally produces, which reproduces the habit of the album of Chapman soloing until the song fades out rather than having an actual conclusion. I’d have thought once or twice, ok, but every song? That’s a bit of overkill if you ask me.

I first discovered UFO in the first year of my ill-fated university career in 1988, when I was crate digging at my then favourite second hand record store in Wollongong, Illawarra Books and Records. It was there I found a 2LP album titled “The Michael Schenker Anthology”, which had a selection of songs from his days in UFO and his own Michael Schenker Group. It was there I first heard songs such as “Doctor Doctor”, “Natural Thing”, “Only You Can Rock Me” and “Lights Out”, and from there I had to dive deeper. Not long after at the same store I purchased “Strangers in the Night” and I was completely hooked. I eventually got copies of the classic five albums that the band released in the 1970’s, but as for the following albums, well, that took longer to obtain. When I did listen to “No Place to Run”, I had thatear on, where I needed to hear something that was going to convince me that UFO could be the same band with the departure of their previous guitarist. And the guitar solos on this album are admirable. Paul Chapman is an accomplished guitarist, but he is no Michael Schenker. And on this album, that is a problem. Beyond this album it isn’t such a concern, because by then Chapman was the incumbent and Schenker was off doing his own thing that didn’t include UFO. Here he is judged on what came before, and although his soloing is strong and forceful, the lack of any real identifiable riffs in the songs themselves does help to make this a generally uninspired selection of songs. He’s not the only culprit. The lyrics and vocals overall don’t offer the same energy that they have on earlier albums, and the songwriting does feel a little lacklustre.
And that becomes a problem when you look around at what was surrounding it at the time. This album had so much up against it when it was released. It was the start of a new decade, and the music coming with that new decade had an impressive start. How do you come up with an album that can match the offerings released in that same year? The revitalised Black Sabbath with “Heaven and Hell”, their former vocalist Ozzy Osbourne with “Blizzard of Ozz”, Judas Priest and “British Steel”, Motorhead with “Ace of Spades”, and the arrival of Iron Maiden with their self-titled debut album and Def Leppard with theirs titled “On Through the Night”. That’s just a small cross section of the British bands that UFO was up against. And let’s not forget Michael Schenker’s own release, his self-titled “Michael Schenker Group” album. It was a pretty intimidating time for hard rock and heavy metal music.
Suffice to say, “No Place to Run” figuratively had no place to run, and suffers as a result. I have spent two days listening to the album on repeat once again, and have found very little inspirational about it. The band is solid, but the songwriting and songs themselves just don’t cut it. Of the band’s eventual 23 albums, this for me would not rank inside their ten best. Fear not! Better was to come, but as their first effort in the new decade and without their talisman, UFO were found to be well short of the mark here.

1256. Stryper / The Yellow and Black Attack. 1984. 3/5

The arrival of Stryper on the music scene in the early 1980’s is an interesting story of returning to one’s faith and building a band around those beliefs in an industry that on the surface appeared to have little of that about it. The band itself began under the name Roxx Regime in 1983, the double x in Roxx showcasing the era of the band and the direction their music was going to take. On formation the band looked to be a straight-out glam metal band, with brothers Michael and Robert Sweet the core. A number of soon-to-be-famous guitar players, including Doug Aldrich and C.C. de Ville, all had short stints in the band before the arrival of Oz Fox who became a permanent member of the group. At around this time they began to write songs that reflected the band members Christian beliefs, and this was the direction they followed from that point onwards.
A change of band name came once bass guitarist Tim Gaines came on board, to better reflect the songs the band was writing. The name of Stryper is coined from a passage from the Book of Isiah from the Old Testament that concludes “by his stripes we are healed”, with the band taking ‘stripes’ and extending it to ‘Stryper’. They also began wearing what was coined as their bumblebee suits, with the yellow and black stripes becoming a major part of their stage act.
Signed on by Enigma Records in 1983, the band then recorded what would become their debut EP. It was originally just a six song EP, with a limited number of pressings made, as their record company was still unsure just what the Christian metal music market would be like.
The opening track “Loud ‘N’ Clear” is the clear winner on this EP, energetic, enterprising and fun to sing along to. Th true mastery of the song can really be judged on the album “Second Coming’ some 20-odd years later, when the band re-recorded their best songs, and this one got the full metal treatment that it deserves. It slays. This version has the bones without the meat. “From Wrong to Right” is highlighted by the great duel guitar solo breaks in the middle of the track from both Michael and Oz, which showcased their amazing talent on their instruments, and that they had more to offer than Christian themes. Michael’s vocals are also supreme during this song. “You Know What to Do” offers the harmony vocals of Michael along with Oz and Tim as its highlight in a feel good tone to pull along the lyrical content. “Co’Mon Rock” sounds great musically, again moving at a fast clip with a good riff throughout punctuated by that dual guitar solo spot in the back half of the song, the way Stryper does so well. “You Won’t Be Lonely” dials things back a little, not to the extent that future Stryper ballads would, as the music here is still up tempo and actually moving forward, not something that could be said about songs on future albums in this respect. “Loving You” closes out the EP in an energetic burst that also suggests the power that this band has musically without the production really giving it what it feels it deserves. This was another song that benefitted from being re-recorded down the track to showcase how good it can sound.

Let’s address the lyrical side of this album and band first. I’m not a Christian, and for those of you who happened to listen to the episodes that cover other Stryper albums on this podcast, you’ll know that for me it hasn’t been an issue. It’s great that the band has a message that they want to expand on, but for me the music and the band’s performance far outweighs anything I may or may not believe about what they are singing about. And I guess this is what their record companies worried about early on. Would there be enough Christians who wanted to listen to Stryper’s music? The answer really ended up being that you don’t have to be a Christian to like their music. I am a case in point.
This album, however, was initially a bit different. The EP gained a slight following but didn’t set the world on fire. It was eventually re-released following the success of the band’s follow up “Soldiers Under Command”, with two additional songs included to make it more appealing. And this was where I first heard it, having already digested and loved the two albums that followed it, “Soldier Under Command” and “To Hell with the Devil”, and having seen them in concert on the “To Hell with the Devil” tour in Sydney in 1987. Still probably the loudest gig I have ever been to. The problem for this EP was that, compared to those two albums, this one was... a bit tame sounding. It came across as less energetic and exciting in comparison to the material I knew so well. So I listened to it, but never really with ears that were willing to accept it.
Flash forward 20 years to the afore-mentioned “Second Coming” CD, a best-of by the band where they re-recorded all of those hits, including the two I mentioned from this EP. And – they sounded enormous. I actually couldn’t believe how good they sounded, so I went back and listened to this EP again, and two things happened. One, I was again left slightly disappointed by the original versions of those two songs compared to the new versions, but second, I gained an appreciation for the EP as a whole that I probably hadn’t had before. And over the time since, that appreciation has improved. Having pulled this CD off the shelves again over the last couple of weeks, it has been fun reliving it once again. It is only six tracks long (unless you count the re-released version from 1986 that has those two added tracks, which in my opinion actually drags back the enjoyment rather than expand it) so it is only a short sharp visit, but from a historical aspect it shows a lot of the great aspects of the band that were exploded over the next five years.

1252. Nirvana / Bleach. 1989. 3/5

In another one of those ‘school bands made good’ stories, vocalist and guitarist Kurt Cobain and bass guitarist Krist Novaselic met when they were at high school together. Their band, and the lineup, went through a number of changes over their initial period together. In fact, they started out as a Creedence Clearwater Revival covers band, with Cobain on drums and Novaselic on guitar and vocals. Eventually they began to write their own songs, and rotating through drummers like spinning tops, almost as many as different bands names that they played under. Some of their names included Skid Row, Ted Ed Fred, Pen Cap Chew, and Bliss, before they finally settled on the name Nirvana. Around this time, having collated a football team full of former drummers, Cobain and Novaselic were introduced to Chad Channing, who became their next, and longest serving to that point in time, full time drummer.
After six months of playing together, the band recorded their first single release for the Seattle independent record label Sub Pop. It was a cover of the song “Love Buzz” by the band Shocking Blue, a Dutch band from the late 1960’s. Following this, the band practiced for two to three weeks in preparation for recording a full-length album, even though Sub Pop had only requested an EP. The band went back into the studio in the final week of December in 1988, to record their debut album, with the main sessions taking place at Reciprocal Recording Studios in Seattle, with local producer Jack Endino. Combined with three tracks that had been written and recorded in January 1988, these came together to form what would become Nirvana’s debut studio album, titled “Bleach”.

As mentioned in the first part of the episode, three of the album's songs were recorded during a previous session at Reciprocal Studios in January 1988. These recordings all featured Dale Crover on drums, who was the drummer from the band The Melvins. The band did try to re-record them with Channing but eventually decided to just release those original versions. Those tracks all have a similar vibe as well, but the most obvious one is ”Paper Cuts” which is difficult to take for several reasons, but one of the main ones for me is the amazing similarity in a 16 bar snatch of the song, on two occasions, that sounds almost exactly like the song “Angry Chair” by Alice in Chains. Of course, this song came before that song, so it begs the question – was the Alice in Chains song a direct rip off of this? Or is it just an amazing coincidence? That’s for you to work out I guess, but it is uncanny just how similar the music and vocals sound between the two. I also know which is the better song. “Downer” only appeared as a bonus track, while the other song was “Floyd the Barber”, whose lyrics are somewhat strangled while the riff and drumbeat retain the same medium throughout. An early example on the album of less lyrics and more repetition.
In the back half of the album, you have songs such as “Scoff” which continue in this tradition of five or six lines of lyrics that still fill four minutes of the song through constant rotation. “Swap Meet” also does this, and with the less refined way that Kurt sings in only to keys all the way through the song. And the closing track “Sifting” repeats this style once again.
Elsewhere, “Blew” opens the album on a positive note with Cobain’s warbling guitar and early grungy guitar riff. The band’s first single, the cover track “Love Buzz”, also found its way onto the album, and is an immediate obvious different track from those written by the band. It is almost a freeform psychedelic journey, with those changing qualities from the rest of the album. There is a lot of buzz coming out of the speakers on this track.
The upbeat songs for me generally come across the best. “Negative Creep” is one of them, though the lyrics again aren’t anything to write home about, pretty much four lines repeated ad nauseum. The same goes for “School”, a song from the same lyrical song book, with the music banged out for Cobain to sing over. It mightn’t be imaginative, but again here the riff chords and drum lines are excellent and enjoyable to listen to. And “Mr Moustache” is perhaps the best of them all, finally breaking out into a faster tempo, allowing the guitar to speak, and Kurt actually sounding like he wants to break into a more energetic vocal line.
The star attraction of the album is “About a Girl”, with almost no distortion, the drums perfectly played and recorded, and Cobain’s best clear vocal melody. It is still difficult to comprehend that this song comes from the same band and the same recording sessions, so different is it from pretty much every other song on the album.

While I did pick this up on CD at some point following the demise of the band in the mid-1990's, my best guess is that it was after the demise of Cobain, and a point at which I had played both “Nevermind” and “In Utero” to death and went back to find this album as a stop gap. I was also eventually gifted this on vinyl by a work colleague, who had a still shrink wrapped second edition vinyl on the Sub Pop label, unopened and unplayed, which he claimed he would never listen to because he didn’t have a turntable. So that was an absolute bonus. Cheers Trent.
One of the problems with re-listening to this album over the past couple of weeks has been that at the same time I have been listening to an album that was released just five days after this, one that got a far greater exposure around the world, one which I knew a lot more of on its entry point to the world, and is a far superior release in every way, shape and form. And that episode is coming up next, on Music from a Lifetime. Stay tuned!
The other major problem that this album always holds, is that there are very few people who could honestly say that they knew of this album, and had heard this album, prior to the release of the band’s follow up effort, the slightly better known “Nevermind”. Indeed, if you meet one of these people who say they DID know of “Bleach” before hearing “Nevermind”, I’d suggest you make them take a lie-detector test. So, it is easy for people’s thoughts on TIS album to be swayed by what they thought of the sophomore effort.
And to be perfectly honest, I have never really been a fan of “Bleach”. There are a few songs here that I enjoy, but for the most part, the songwriting and performance is light years better on the next album and trying to judge this album having listened to “Nevermind” for so long before that, always made this a difficult job. Especially as it really has none of the spark and energy that that album has.
So did this have much going for it? Honestly, no. It cannot be compared to the other albums the band released. It is a perfectly reasonable debut album, one that probably offered a glimpse into what could possibly occur in the future. For me though, it's an album that I might put on for a couple of songs. And that’s about it.

1248. Yngwie Malmsteen / The Seventh Sign. 1994. 3/5

The career of Yngwie Malmsteen as we reached the middle years of the 90’s decade had seen the extreme highs of playing to sold out crowds around the world and seeing his music videos plastered all over music programs across the globe, and posters of himself being pinned up in bedrooms everywhere. As a guitarist he was considered one of the best, one of the main influences and purveyors of the instrument in the modern age, and with good reason. He had a solo career with albums that were the envy of other musicians, showcasing not only his amazing guitar skills on these songs but an ability to write songs that were also catchy enough to make an impression on the charts, which was something that he had strived for over a long period of time.
The end of the 1980’s decade had seen four masterful solo albums and a live album and video to match, and it appeared that he was trending upward in every respect. The 1990’s however didn’t quite work out the way that he had hoped, with the advent of grunge and alternative music putting a big hole through his fan base. In the US especially this genre of music was sucking the life out of every other pursuit, including guitar gods who specialised in neo-classical guitar riffing and the power ballad in particular. The two albums Yngwie released in the 1990’s with new vocalist Goran Edman, “Eclipse” and “Fire and Ice”, were still popular, but trended down on the success that his initial albums had produced. And while the US and to a lesser extent the UK was moving away from his style of guitar and synth based music, it was Japan and Europe that continued to fly the flag for this style, and it found Yngwie retreating into their territory as the safe haven that his music required, where he could still retain his popularity without having to compromise to what was occurring elsewhere in the music world. It meant that his albums through the 1990’s were generally only released in Japan and Europe, something that probably did affect sales elsewhere in the world, but to what extent will never really be known.

It does take a special person to want to go out and buy every Yngwie Malmsteen album. There is a penchant for the song structures to become very similar throughout, a trend that really only started from the “Odyssey” album onwards.
This album, unlike most of the albums up to this point in time in the Malmsteen catalogue, does have what I consider to be three clearly defined sections when it comes to the type of songs produced. Michael Vescera, the new vocalist on this album following the release of Edman, has contributed lyrics to three songs on the album, and they strike out at you immediately. All three tracks have a different structure and are sung in a very different way. For instance, “I Don’t Know” has the sort of lyrics and vocals that are aimed at the audience the band is trying to attract. The fast double kick drum has gone and is replaced with a much harder rock hammering 4/4 timing, and the vocals are the hard rock standard as well, not soaring or screaming, but just at you in an almost conversational way. “Bad Blood” and “Crash and Burn” have the same tempo as this, completely different from what you would usually expect. Did Vescera take on these particular tracks to contribute to deliberately? It’s an interesting overview, that his lyrical writing came on the three songs that have this same style.
Beyond these tracks, we have the tracks penned entirely by Malmsteen himself which as always have his two usual styles coming at you – the fast paced guitar/synth based power metal that is punctuated by his amazing solo pieces that are the real reason we all come to listen to a Yngwie Malmsteen album, and then the power ballad slower tracks where he tries to suck us in to believing he could be a popular commercial success.
The former styled songs such as the opening track “Never Die”, “Hairtrigger”, the excellent title track “Seventh Sign” and “Pyramid of Cheops” which are the more immediately enjoyable, with the faster pace, backed by Yngwie’s great guitar riffing and solid harder styled vocals from Vescera that make the journey a far more enjoyable one. “Pyramid of Cheops” is certainly the heaviest song on the album, with a real driving beat and moody tempo that defies what Yngwie usually offers on his albums.
The other style is highlighted by songs such as “Meant to Be” and “Forever One” that drag out into infinity with the ballad vocals and Yngwie’s classical-styled guitar that is able to be appreciated for its intricacy but perhaps not loved for its output. “Prisoner of Your Love” in particular is extraordinarily painful, and yes, awful. With lyrics composed by Yngwie’s then wife Amberdawn, it is just the kind of track that should be thrown away in post-production or assigned as a last-minute bonus track to the Japanese release if at all. Yngwie also has two of his instrumental pieces here, “Brothers” and the closing track “Sorrow”, which as always hark back to his earliest work, though without the real originality that those songs and albums contain.

I loved all of Yngwie’s first four albums. His debut album was actually one of the first albums that I bought on CD when I first got my stereo with a CD player on it, and it was played a lot as a result. And I first got to see Yngwie live at the Enmore Theatre in Sydney on the Eclipse Tour, which was amazing.
It was the “Eclipse” album that I felt things started to turn for Yngwie, and the commercialisation that he was looking for at that time changed my perception of his music. When “Fire and Ice” followed and was in a similar ilk, I moved away from his music for about a decade, as other music genres and bands began to take a precedence over what I perceived to be Yngwie’s obsession.
A decade later, and in a different period of my life, and I decided to go back in time, and check out what the maestro had been doing over that period, and on the back of what I considered two very good albums at the turn of the century, I also went in to check out exactly what this album was like. And though there had been a change in personnel since I had last heard him, my ears were still biased against what he was producing here. I enjoy a few of the tracks, but overall I wasn’t amazed by the output. I thought Michael Vescera had a good sounding voice, but without the amount of amazing guitar work that Yngwie had always inserted into his earliest work, it didn’t grab me enough to really push forward.
Another two decades later, and I am once again revisiting this album. And it would be fair to say that if I wasn’t doing this podcast I very probably may never have listened to this album again. But I have, and I’m glad I have. Over a number of weeks, I have now listened to this album many times more than I have in the previous 30 years, and while this still has many flaws that would make it very difficult for it to be on a listening rotation with me, I’ve grown to enjoy it far more than I ever have. It’s still obvious that Yngwie at this time was still looking for a commercial success that had well and truly passed him by at this stage of his career, and was still not utilising his guitar enough. But there are some good moments here, and if you have it tracking in the background while you are pottering around the house or at work, then there is enough here to catch your attention along the way. It will never be one that I grab off the shelves when I want to listen to a Yngwie Malmsteen album. And there is now every chance that given this episode is almost over, I may never listen to it again. That in itself is perhaps the most incisive review I could offer you on just how engaging “The Seventh Sign” is.

1238. Mick Mars / The Other Side of Mars. 2024. 3/5

Keeping up with news from the band Motley Crue shouldn’t have been this hard, given that they very publicly decided to cease touring and all activities back on December 31, 2015. The “Cessation of Touring” contract lasted almost four years, at which point in December 2019 they announced that they would be taking part in a stadium tour with Def Leppard and Poison the following year. Well, contracts are meant to be broken, something that guitarist Mick Mars was about to find out for himself.
Due to covid, the tour was postponed a couple of times until mid-2022. During this time, the band insisted that they had no intention of recording new material and instead would only be a touring band. In October of 2022, a statement was released stating that Mick Mars had retired from touring due to his ongoing health issues but would remain a ‘member’ of Motley Crue. The next day the band announced that John 5 would be their touring guitarist. Of course, all of this then escalated, as by April of 2023 John 5 was not only announced as the now guitarist of Motley Crue, but that they WOULD in fact begin writing and recording new material with him. At this, Mars sued the band claiming they were trying to rid themselves of him and of reducing his percentage of profits from the band, while the band countered by saying they had NOT fired him, and that the status quo remained that he was not a touring member of the band.
Lots has gone on since then but let's move away from the politics of the situation.
While Mars would no longer tour, he did announce in October 2023 that he would release a solo album. At the announcement he released the lead single from the album along with a music video, a song that caught everyone’s attention at the time. Despite all of the turmoil and slanging match between Mars and his former bandmates, it was his music that most of the fans were more interested in. Just what kind of material would Mars produce away from the band he had been with for 40 years, how relevant would it be, and would it, as the title of the album suggested, show off a different side to his musical prowess?

The greater portion of the album is written by Mars alongside lead vocalist Jacob Bunton and Winger keyboardist and guitarist Paul Taylor. Bunton has an interesting background, mixing being an Emmy winning composer and producer with artists including Mariah Carey and Steve Tyler, but also being lead vocalist of other middling metal acts such as Lynam and Adler in the past. His modern and progressive sounding vocals on this album are a huge plus to most of the songs here, and his career path is certainly something that appears to have been drawn heavily upon for this album. Taylor, who used to be credited as Paul Horowitz, has a long career with Winger and other hair and glam metal bands, and his proficiency on several instruments and in writing help to add to the upside of this album.
Two of the songs, “Killing Breed” and “Undone”, have a different lead vocalist in Brion Gambona, who was lead singer and guitarist for the band “Third Mist” that achieved recognition when they became semi-finalists on the “Star Search” show is the US in the mid-1990's. Both songs are written by Mars and Taylor alone and have a different focus with Gambona singing. There is a marked difference as a result, a change in tone that makes them stand apart from the rest of the album. True to his word, Mick Mars certainly delivers on his promise of the other side of Mars, by which he meant that he had the Motley Crue styled side of his guitaring, and the Mick Mars side of his guitaring.
There are several songs on this album that have a similar vibe and sonics to the band Fall Out Boy, both musically and in the vocals, which could be attributed to the phasing that they have in places on those songs in the same way Patrick Stump does for that band. The above mentioned “Loyal to the Lie” is certainly one of them, but so too is "Ain’t Going Back” which is cast from a similar mould, albeit in a heavier mode than that band performs. On these songs Bunton sounds great and is a driving force, acting as a great combiner with the hard hitting rhythm and Mick’s tough sounding guitar. For me these are the songs that are the best on the album, alongside the second single “Right Side of Wrong”, “Broken on the Inside”, “Ready to Roll” and the closing instrumental “LA Noir” that was composed solely by Mars.
“Broken on the Inside” got me at the end every time for many listens, as the song starts to break up towards its conclusion, as if the wifi is cutting out and the song is being corrupted by the lack of signal. It does take getting used to when you listen to the album, and stop the tendency to reach for your player try to work out what the hell is going on. I’ll probably still be doing it with my CD copy of the album when it arrives.
The slower tracks on the album do reflect on Mick’s other style, and while it is done well, for me it is less enthusiastic. “Alone” is the slower paced hard rock ballad that bands believe they need but some of us think we would be better off without. “Memories” sets out on the same path, with keys and violin being the sole basis of the song. I do understand these types of songs making their appearance here on his solo album, in order to showcase that he can do these songs as well just like his former band did, but they aren’t for me.

I don’t know about you, but thoughts about a new Motley Crue release doesn't hold any great anticipation for me. If they do, I’ll listen to it, but I’m not looking out for it. On the other hand, I was really looking forward to hearing this album, because I wanted to know just what Mick Mars away from that setting could produce. Some of his riffs in those great Motley songs are iconic, and he knew how to get the crowd pumped with his guitaring. So, even though I was aware that it couldn’t really match the music that band made in its glory days, I was truly looking forward to what he may have had saved up all of these years.
For the most part, I think it’s great. In the same way as I felt about Ace Frehley’s new album, which was released on the same day, this has gotten better with every listen. The upbeat style of Jacob Bunton’s vocals, and indeed the songs written by the main three songwriters with him singing, are really good. To me, they are good solid songs. Mick doesn’t come out as the star of this album – he doesn’t stick out as the only good thing here, his guitar dominant over everything else. It’s the songs that are becoming more memorable the more that I listen, not necessarily Mick’s riffs and licks being the standout. And I think that makes this a standout album, because it seems to have been MORE about the songwriting than being a vehicle for Mars to show off.
Look – this isn’t going to blow your mind, and you aren’t going to be saying this is Album of the Year when we get to December. But for me, like Ace’s new album, like the Smith/Kotzen album and the Sunbomb album a couple of years ago, this is a pleasant surprise because it has enough elements that you will enjoy, and a few tracks that on repeated listens you will say, ‘wow, actually that’s really good!’
My opinion on this album will no doubt change over time, but I’m now into more than 20 listens, and I’m still finding new things to enjoy. Not all of it is great, but there is enough here for me to suggest that you give it a go and see what YOU think about it.

1236. Ace Frehley / 10,000 Volts. 2024. 3/5

Ace Frehley fans have been fortunate over the years in the amount of albums he has released, and his continued effort to have new material out there to showcase his talents and wares. While many people still hark back to that original solo album released in 1978 as a part of the four albums the members of Kiss put out that year, and suggest it was his best release, he has done far more than that which fans have enjoyed. There was the two-album stint of the band Frehley’s Comet in the late 1980’s that took advantage of that era of music to ride the wave, along with his second solo release “Trouble Walkin’”. Since then, there have been plenty of releases after his second tour of duty with Kiss, with albums such as “Anomaly” and “Space Invader” and “Spaceman”, along with “Origins Pt 1” and “Origins Pt 2”. So it’s great to have Ace back in the saddle, and still releasing new music.
Coming on board for this album to help... in every department really... is Steve Brown from the band Trixter. Steve acts as co-writer on all but two of the tracks, and is the co-producer of the album, alongside Ace himself. His Trixter bandmates – David Julian on guitar and PJ Farley on bass – also contribute to playing on several tracks, while Brown himself is also involved instrumentally and back up vocally throughout. Other musicians also help out along the way, including former Kiss contributor Anton Fig on drums.
So, let the listener beware. If you are going to come into this album, and expect some ripping guitar and breakneck songs like the Ace of old may have contributed to in his former band or on earlier albums, then you are coming in with the wrong attitude to enjoying this album. Ace is 72 years old as of the release of this album, and has been around music for well over fifty years. He knows where he fits, and he writes and plays accordingly. And that is the best way to approach listening to this album for the first time, because – and yes this is a spoiler alert – much like many Kiss albums, there are some very good tracks here, and there are some less exciting tracks here. You have been warned.

The album opens with the first teaser single released, the title track “10,000 Volts”. It is probably the hardest rock track of the album, the one to best present Ace and his new album to the world. It also acts as a way of dragging you into the album. This is an uptempo track, with a good hard rock beat, and an atypical latter day Ace solo to appease everyone who comes to the album, because we are all here for Ace’s guitar, aren’t we? The vocals are satisfying, though to me come across very similar to another lead singer who is not QUITE a lead singer, Chris Jericho from Fozzy. Still, a good opening.
For my taste, the tempo slips back to mid-range from here, which is slightly disappointing from a personal perspective. I would like to have heard more of the faster tempo in the album, but that is not the case. “Walkin’ on the Moon” has a good melody line throughout and nice solo lead break and keeps the vibe of the album motoring along. This is followed by “Cosmic Heart” that still resides in the midtempo, but also contains big chorused and phased vocals through the middle of the song, like it was written for an anthemic singalong in the live environment. It's fine, but maybe a bit too obvious in its arrangement. “Cherry Medicine” is a very candy pop rock song both lyrically and musically. The riff to open the song actually makes you think the song is going to break out into a real hard rock song, but it doesn’t develop that way, apart from Ace’s solo in the middle that goes against the grain of the song to that point. It isn’t unlikeable, indeed my feet tapping and head bobbing each time the song comes on suggests it is fine, but again, that mid-tempo riff needs a kick in the pants to get it cranking. Lyrics like “Cherry medicine, gotta get me some” are also a bit hard to swallow.
This is then followed by a real literal love song “Back into my Arms Again”, it could well have been dragged from any glam rock band in the 1980’s such is the sugar dripping off it. Again, lyrics like ‘looking at you, looking at me, could this really be” should suggest what is happening. Seriously, this is almost 1980’s like lyrics writing.
Better is to come. “Fightin’ for Life” returns with a faster pace, great Ace riff, and vocally he’s back trying to drag some energy into the album. I have to refer once again to the band Fozzy, because this track vocally and in some ways musically reminds me of them again. Ace has a great solo in this song, and this mirrors more to what I was hoping this whole album would be like. This is one of the best tracks on the album. Then comes “Blinded” which follows on in similar fashion, with a good underlying riff through the song and a great solo in the middle. These two songs restore some order to the album for those who are looking for a harder edge and energy. But it doesn’t last.
Far out. When it comes to lyrics writing, you can truly rip your ears off with what comes in “Constantly Cute”. No prizes for who Ace is directing this song at, and while it isn’t terrible musically it is a difficult road listening to the lines being sung. In fact, it’s another song with that resemblance to Fozzy (not lyrically). “Life of a Stranger” is the only song on this album where Ace hasn’t been involved in the writing, and to me it shows up immediately. There’s little imagination in the music or lyrics, it drags a blues base into the song and the phased, triple layered Ozzy Osbourne like vocals don’t do it any favours at all. If Ozzy was singing and Zakk was playing guitar it might be saved, but to me this doesn’t grab my interest.
“Up in the Sky” does redeem things a little, picking up the energy again with more power coming through Ace’s guitar here, invoking his enjoyment of writing about aliens once again. This is perhaps the most Ace-sounding song on the album vocally as well. The album then concludes with the instrumental track “Stratosphere” which is arguably the best moment of the entire album.

There’s no doubt that this album is more about writing solid songs than about showcasing Ace as a guitarist, which makes sense in the modern age given the lack of competition from his peers in this regard. While I, like you, probably came into the album hoping to hear Ace rip and tear through the whole album, the amount that that occurs on “10,000 Volts” is not as much as you would like. And Ace is definitely not reinventing the wheel here, but why should he? He has kept writing new material consistently over the years, and he has his own style that he doesn’t try to change. I like the fact that the songs are short, sharp and to the point. They don’t overstay their welcome, they don’t become progressive rock pieces that think that being longer is better. Steve Brown’s influence in both writing and producing does seem to flow into the songs on this album, giving a different flavour to what Ace has offered over his last couple of solo releases.
Obviously you can take or leave what I’ve said about the songs produced here for “10,000 Volts”. As with all new albums, initial reactions can end up being completely different the more or less you listen to the album. As I record this podcast episode, this album is only a few days old, and my impressions in six months time will definitely be different to what I have to say here at this point in time. The comparison made here between the sound on some songs and those of the band Fozzy are just what I have gotten from the first time I listened to the album, but they have stuck.
So I have listened to this album now a total of 23 times over the past few days, and I enjoy it more every time I listen to it. I enjoy Ace’s vocals, and most of the tracks are above average. Some aren’t, as I have described, but when I have had the album on, I haven’t felt the need (especially) to skip any of the songs. When Ace does let rip, it mightn’t be 1978 but it is still inherently Ace Frehley, and that is always great to hear. The lyrics are also typical Ace topics – gangs, space, girls... and a couple that ride the edge of the plane.
The verdict? This isn’t going to blow your mind, but it is a really enjoyable listen, even if that is in a nostalgic kind of way. I have found myself smiling in places when certain songs and stretches of songs have played, and after all, that’s what we want from our music. It isn't “Destroyer”, but for fans looking for something new in your life, this should fit the bill nicely.

1229. The Clash / Give 'Em Enough Rope. 1978. 3/5

On the back of their self titled debut album in 1977, The Clash had begun their rise in the punk scene of the UK in particular. In and amongst the plethora of bands that seemed to crop up one day and be gone the next, The Clash and contemporaries the Buzzcocks were the driving force of the movement where it wasn’t necessarily the shock of the music and lyric topics that caught the attention, but the maturity of it. Touring behind that first album The Clash played on their own ‘Out of Control’ tour, which apart from a small riot when their first gig in Belfast was cancelled at the last minute due to the insurance being pulled from the venue, created a storm of the music kind. They also played at the ‘Rock Against Racism’ carnival in London later that year, which was attended by 100,000 people. In between this they released two non-album singles to great acclaim. “Clash City Rockers” was played on a BBC children's morning show after its release, alongside the unreleased (at that time) “Tommy Gun”, while “(White Man) in Hammersmith Palais” became a favourite with Clash fans and was voted single of the year in the 1978 NME Readers' Poll.
Before the Clash began recording their second album, their American based record company asked if they could produce an album with a 'cleaner’ sound than their debut, in order to reach American audiences. Sandy Pearlman, known for his work with Blue Öyster Cult, was hired to produce the record. Bass guitarist Paul Simonon later recalled, "Recording that album was just the most boring situation ever. It was just so nitpicking, such a contrast to the first album ... it ruined any spontaneity."
When the album arrived, it received mixed reviews in the UK music press, where some complained about its relatively mainstream production style in comparison to that debut album. Despite the backlash from sections of the music press, NME readers voted it the second best album of 1978 and The Clash were voted the best group in the same end of year poll.

"Give 'Em Enough Rope” is often overlooked in the band’s discography. It opens with the track “Safe European Home,” which is a fast-paced punk rock song that features Mick Jones’ guitar work and Joe Strummer’s vocals. The song describes Strummer's and Jones uneasy writing trip to Jamaica and their experiences with racism and violence. Jones later commented on the trip by saying, "we went down to the docks, and I think we only survived because they mistook us for sailors”. The song also contains references of Jamaican culture and buildings like the Sheraton hotel in Kingston. This is followed by “English Civil War,” which is a slower song that features a catchy chorus, and which is derived from an American Civil War song, "When Johnny Comes Marching Home", that was popular among both sides of the conflict. Guitarist and vocalist Joe Strummer had learned the song at school and suggested to his bandmates that they should update it. The Clash’s version is about the state of politics in the UK at that time and warns against what things may come.
“Tommy Gun” is one of the most well-known songs from the album and from The Clash’s entire catalogue. The song features a driving beat and lyrics about gun violence. The lyrics especially deal with Middle Eastern terrorism, specifically the hi-jacking of aircraft. It is an especially interesting beginning to the album, with the band not shying away from what was going on in the world at home and abroad at this time, and not afraid to exhort their opinions on those matters. Listening to it today is just as revealing and important as it was when these songs were written all those years ago.
Continuing in this vein is “Julie’s Been Working for the Drug Squad”, a fast-paced punk rock song that features lyrics about drug enforcement, and acts as a commentary on the infamous "Operation Julie" drug bust that saw the largest LSD production ring in the world, based in Wales, dismantled by an undercover police operation. Side one is then closed out by “Last Gang in Town,” which is a more mid-paced song about gang violence.
Side two opens up with “Guns on the Roof,” a great song that is set up beautifully by Mick Jones and his excellent guitar riffs and solo work, as well as the rumbling bass of Simonon and terrific drumming from Headon. It is a song that talks about global terrorism, war and corruption, which in part was inspired by an incident that resulted in the Metropolitan Police's armed counterterrorist squad raiding The Clash's Camden Market base. Paul Simonon and drummer Topper Headon were arrested and charged with criminal damage for shooting racing pigeons with an air-gun from the roof of their rehearsal building. Strummer’s vocals here leave no doubt as to the band’s feelings about the whole incident.
“Drug-Stabbing Time” is strongly anti-drug lyrically with another great riff through the song and combined vocals that describes the paranoia of being caught in the act, which is somewhat ironic given the band's (specifically Mick Jones's) drug usage at this time. “Stay Free” moves back in style, and feels like a song that was written for that American market the band’s record company was looking for. “Cheapskates” is dominated by Strummer’s chanting thoughts firing out of the speakers, and the album then concludes with "All the Young Punks (New Boots and Contracts)" to round out the band’s second LP.

The Clash came to me, like many of my generation, through the radio hit “Rock the Casbah”, and the splash it made with one of my oldest school friends at that time, who then chased down every release by the band, which in time then found its way into my hands as well. And this all occurred at around the time that I was beginning to move away from just radio singles, and taping them off Kasey Kasem’s American Top 40 every Sunday arvo, and looking to move into whole albums by bands. Compilation tapes were still important in that, because it was a way of discovering multiple bands. So The Clash was a band that I listened to when I went around to this particular mate’s house, but were still some way away from me having a huge interest in them. That is a long winded way of saying that while I enjoyed The Clash, I didn’t really listen to their albums often or a lot.
In many ways, that is still the case, but the order I would choose to listen to them would be from first release to last release, meaning “Give ‘Em Enough Rope” rates very highly for me as a The Clash album. It is the punk sound I enjoy from them most rather than the reggae or rockabilly or straight rock they utilised in pieces later in their career. And while the producer of this album apparently felt so little about Joe Strummer’s vocals that he tried to have the drums drown them out on this record, I actually think they are quite good here. In fact the whole band sounds great. Mick Jones on guitar is wonderful once again, while I am still extremely impressed at how the bass and drums of both Paul Simonon and Topper Headon still hold up today. To me they often get overlooked for their contributions to the band, and certainly on this album I believe they are excellent and an important part of the success of this album. The reviews of the day were generally critical of the more produced sound of the album, and it is obviously a difference between the first two albums by the band. I have been listening to it now for a couple of weeks, and it still sounds great each time it comes up in my rotation. I enjoy the music, but it is the lyrics that I enjoy the most, the shaking of the fist at authority, and the standing up and telling it as they see it. Whatever else this album may be, its commentary on the era it was released is as fascinating today as it must have been on its release.

1225. Whitesnake / Trouble. 1978. 3/5

By 1976, Deep Purple had finally collapsed in on itself and ceased to exist after ten years of amazing albums and several personnel changes. One of those had been lead vocalist David Coverdale, who had presided over the final three albums the band had released. Following their demise, Coverdale went out and immediately got to work on his own solo work, releasing his first solo album titled “White Snake” in 1977, and then “Northwinds” in early 1978. In an effort to distance himself from the hard rock sound that had been synonymous with Deep Purple, his solo work combined elements of blues, soul and funk to give it a different sound, and also characteristics that suited his vocals well. Long term friend, guitarist Micky Moody, had played on both albums, and when Coverdale started to assemble a backing band for his project he was the first to join. It was Moody who suggested the group needed a second guitarist, and through this they found Bernie Marsden who had started out as a member of UFO. Marsden then facilitated the recruitment of bass guitarist Neil Murray as they had recently played in another band together. Drummer Dave Doyle and keyboardist Pete Solley also came in to round out the initial group, which at the time was dubbed David Coverdale’s Whitesnake. Coverdale had not wanted his name attached to the band’s name, but record company interest was only fanned if it could be promoted in such a way.
The band were offered the chance to record for EMI, but only an EP rather than a full album. The four track was released in June 1978 (which included a cover of the song “Ain’t No Love in the Heart of the City” which became an unofficial fan anthem of the band) and the reaction was so positive that Whitesnake was offered the chance to record their full length debut soon after.
During this recording, keyboardist Pete Solley’s contributions were re-recorded by a man who had been chased and coaxed for some time by Coverdale to join the band. After much back and forth, his former Deep Purple bandmate Jon Lord agreed to come on board and provide his ample talents to the band. Thus came together the first outing for the band Whitesnake, and the debut album titled “Trouble”.

“Take Me With You” is a jaunty opening number, with a great bassline that is the mainstay throughout. It is a real rollicking rock song with a bluesy underbase, and immediately sets itself apart from what Coverdale’s previous band had been producing. This then moves into Coverdale’s slower paced “Love to Keep You Warm”, dominated by his smooth vocals and the more soul and funk sound that had come from his solo albums. These two tracks typified the direction of the music that this album brought to the table, and where the band would go over the next couple of albums as well. This is followed by “Lie Down (A Modern Love Song)” that is dominated by Jon Lord’s piano, an upbeat song that is a great counterpoint to the genre, with Micky Moody and Bernie Marsden combining perfectly to draw attention in the middle of the song, and finishing off in style.
It’s a brave move at any stage by any band to take on covering a Beatles song, and this is no different. “Day Tripper” is the one that gets the Whitesnake treatment here, and on first impressions you feel as though it doesn’t work. The energy and great vibe of the track is extricated on this version and replaced with a staccato and bluesier version of the original. Once you get used to it (after several dozen listens to be honest) it comes across better, but compared to the other tracks on the album it is a little out of place musically. “Nighthawk (Vampire Blues)” lifts the action again, with a great blues playoff between Marsden and Lord on guitar and keys respectively, and a rollicking pace throughout as Coverdale’s vocals play great games in a fun atmosphere.
“The Time is Right for Love” is a familiar tune and theme to any Whitesnake fan with a great drum beat setting the scene from David Dowle and super rumbling bass line again from the amazing Neil Murray that is the base of the song again. The secret to the enjoyment of this track is the tempo it is played at. It would have been destroyed if it was a slower paced ballad, but here as the excellently written up-tempo blues-based track, it is a beauty. On the other side of the coin, the title track “Trouble” IS that midtempo track, slowed back from the previous song, and with Coverdale crooning rather than belting, and the rest of the band dialling everything back. Another example of the two sides of Whitesnake on this, and to be honest, most of their albums.
“Belgian Tom’s Hat Trick” is a terrific instrumental where everyone has their moment, but it is the trade off between Marsden and Moody again that is the star of the show. Once again the faster tempo of the track is what brings it all to life, and as per usual whenever Jon Lord’s keyboards come to the fore it is a fun and frantic time. “Free Flight” finds that mid tempo again, before the closing track “Don’t Mess With Me” moves forward again and finishes the album on a high note.
The album tends to mix up the tempo of the songs throughout, which perhaps could have been altered slightly in order to keep the energy up in different spots, but the overall flow of the album is excellent still to this day.

Being in high school through the mid-1980's, it probably isn’t hard for you to believe that my first initiation to Whitesnake was their multi-million selling album ‘1987’, or self-titled, whichever way you know it to be called. That album is still such a massive part of my life and is so tied to that time of my life it is a difficult thing to get past. The other part of that is that ‘1987’ is such a different album musically than the band’s first albums were, but I didn’t discover that for a few years down the track, when I began to go back and find the albums of bands that I loved that I just hadn’t discovered. So you can probably imagine just how I felt the first time I heard this album, given how different every part of it is to those albums I knew of the band from the late 1980’s. This album is amazingly different, so much so that it was a real shock and something I didn’t process well on that initial discovery. Indeed, this album went away to collect dust for some time after that initial foray.
Thankfully though, I grew older, and more open to the changing musical styles of bands and the times they were recorded, and I went back to Whitesnake's “Trouble” for a second time. And this time around, I discovered exactly what I had missed that first time around. Because this is a very underestimated album, even within the Whitesnake catalogue. Most people know “Ready n Willing”, and “Saints n Sinners” and “Come an Get It”, and “Slide it In”, but how many people of my generation and younger have really appreciated the early Whitesnake albums? And “Trouble” in particular?
In my early twenties I was incredulous that there were fans out there who claimed that the early albums were so much better than the band’s later albums, that Coverdale had sold his soul to conquer America, and that Marsden and Moody outweighed anything that Vandeburg and Sykes and Vai had done in the latter years. I laughed. And then I really began listening to the albums of this era, and discovered that, even though I still love the albums from my era, that those people were right. That this band lineup is superb, their writing and playing is magnificent, and that they deserve to be on that pedestal as well. And this album Is a major part of that. In particular, Neil Murray on bass is just superb, in his element really in this genre of music. His bottom end to support the guitars of Marsden and Moody, and the leys of Jon Lord, is magnificent. And of course there is Coverdale himself, with those amazing vocal chords that are the star attraction of what the band does.
It took me a long time to get around to giving this album the time of day, and the time it deserved, to discover how good it is. And though there are a lot of years there that I have wasted due to not appreciating it sooner, the time since has been well spent. “Trouble” may not get the accolades of other great albums in the Whitesnake discography, but in my opinion it deserves them as much as any of those other albums.

1221. Kiss / Psycho Circus. 1998. 3/5

Even for Kiss, the three years leading up to the release of this album was turbulent, with the twists and turns of the band and its fortunes being played out publicly as the unfolding story took place. Most of that began with the band’s appearance on MTV Unplugged, where the four band members were joined on stage for the end of the concert by original members Ace Frehley and Peter Criss, which got a huge reaction from the fans. Following this, as the public rumours of a possible reunion grew, the band went into the studio to complete the recording of their follow up album to “Revenge” titled “Carnival of Souls”, an album which certainly messed with the prototype Kiss sound to incorporate the more modern rock sound that was around in the mid-1990's. Though it was completed in early 1996, the release was shelved, as Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons then confirmed that a reunion tour with Ace and Peter as the original foursome would take place, and did so in the full makeup and outfits of the Love Gun era, to the rapturous accolades of their fans everywhere. As the ‘return of make-up’ tour wound through 1996, both Bruce Kulick and Eric Singer were paid a weekly salary as they sat on the sidelines to cool their heels, no doubt to assuage just how everything would play out once the tour was over. By the end of 1996, Kulick had left the band, obviously seeing the writing on the wall with the success of the reunion tour, and Singer also found his place had been reverted back to Criss.
The band continued to tour worldwide throughout 1997, with “Carnival of Souls” eventually seeing the light of day in October of that year. But the tours were only playing songs from the era prior to 1982, when this foursome had been the band, and the question from the fans now was; would this reunited line up go into the studio and record a new album? The eventual answer to that question was; yes, they would. But it wouldn’t be Kiss if there weren’t any further twists and turns in the story, and it is fair to say this was true once again of the writing and recording of the album that eventually became “Psycho Circus”.

For an album that was touted as the return of the original awesome foursome, the actual amount that was contributed to the writing and recording of “Psycho Circus” by both Ace and Peter was minimal. Peter only played drums on one song, the Ace Frehley penned “Into the Void”, with the remainder being done by session drummer Kevin Valentine. Peter did sing lead vocals on the Paul Stanley and Bob Ezrin written ballad “I Finally Found My Way”, which was apparently especially written for him to sing. Peter also sang on the song “You Wanted the Best”, written by Gene and featuring all four artists on lead vocals, the only song in the Kiss catalogue where that occurred. Beyond this, Peter Criss was non-existent on this reunion album. For Ace’s part, he co-wrote “Into the Void” with Karl Cochran, and also played lead guitar and sang lead vocals on the track, and also played lead and sang on the collaborative track “You Wanted the Best”. As with Peter, Ace was not involved with any other part of the album. He was quoted some years later as saying he had written quite a bit of material for the album, but it was rejected by Paul and Gene for various reasons. In his book, Peter Criss stated that both he and Ace were paid an enormous amount of money to stay out of participation of the album, while for their part Paul and Gene have suggested different reasons over the years as to why the other two were kept at arm's length, ranging from their not being capable, to them not showing up when required, to their wanting new financial deals, and to its being the producer's choice to not use them. Most of these reasons conflicted with each other at different times over the years, and indeed have changed over time. Even producer Bruce Fairbairn, who has cropped up a few times in recent episodes of this podcast, stated that he wanted to stay away from gimmicks and trends such as guest appearances, and just stay true to what Kiss does best and what people remembered them for. This being the case, why was this not followed? Tommy Thayer, who would eventually replace Ace as lead guitarist a few years down the track, played most of the lead guitar on this album, while there were a few other who contributed either instrumentally or creatively.
Logic would suggest that Paul and Gene felt THEY were in fact the band, and that the return of Ace and Peter was only as hired guns, paid contractors there to do their job of playing on stage and little else. And this was accurate, as both had sign short term contracts to play in the band once again. Thus, rather than have a collaborative effort such as the band did back in their glory days together, now it was not so much a band as four individuals who appeared on stage together.
Would this album have been better if they had played and written as the band? It’s difficult to say. Tommy Thayer is a skilled guitarist as he has shown in the past two decades as the band’s lead player, but he is also different. When you listen to “Into the Void” you immediately know it is Ace playing guitar as it is so distinctive, but that doesn’t make Thayer’s guitaring on the other songs less excellent, it’s just that it isn’t Ace, which sort of defeats the purpose of labelling this a Kiss album. And Ace does write some terrific songs, so surely at least one other of his tracks could have been used?
The album itself has its highs and lows. The ballad “I Finally Found My Way” does nothing for me, while songs such as “Journey of 1000 Years” and “We Are One” and “Dreamin’” are in that average section of Kiss songs that are inoffensive easy listening portions. Ace’s “Into the Void” is one of the better tracks here, as is the title lead off track “Psycho Circus”, a perfect concert opening song that gets the masses on their feet and first pumping from the very start. Why then it hasn’t been utilised as this opening song at their concerts for the last 20-odd years for me is very strange. This holds its own as one the bands best songs since the original foursomes demise. Of the rest, “You Wanted the Best”, that utilises all four members both instrumentally and vocally, reminds you most of the way these four used to be regarded.

Over the years this hasn’t been an album that I have given a great deal of listening to. I didn’t buy it on its release, judging at the time that it was a money grab from a band who were using the gimmick of going back to their original line up and donning the make up again. I don’t think that observation was far off the mark. I heard it a couple of times before I saw the band on their first farewell tour in 2001, where the only song they played was the title track, which did indeed sound great. From that point, it wasn’t for another decade that I heard it again, when I went on my mission to acquire all of the Kiss back catalogue that I didn’t have, and give it all a fair listen. And then we come to the last 12 months, where I saw the band again on their latest farewell tour, along with my son Josh. And it was Josh’s growing love of Kiss in the last six years that convinced me to delve deeper into the albums I didn’t know as well. Which then led me to a new appreciation of “Psycho Circus”.
The more I listen to this album, the more I think it was a missed opportunity. There are some terrific songs here, ones I still sing along to whenever I put the album on. And some great moments. My ears honestly still prick up on the two songs that Ace Frehley plays lead guitar on, because the two solos in those songs remind me of that early material so much, and it really triggers something when I listen to it. And like I’ve said, Thayer is a good guitarist... but he isn’t Ace Frehley. Whatever the reason was to exclude Ace and Peter from the recording of this album, I still think it was a mistake. It didn’t matter when it came to selling the album, because it was still Kiss and the Reunion, even if it really wasn’t in the long run. The “Revenge” album actually stands out more because it had both Vinnie Vincent and Bruce Kulick writing songs, and Kulick’s stand out guitaring. Here, Thayer is actually the hired gun, but is not significantly outstanding in his lead work to command the songs like any of those other three guitarists would have. Along with the other two dozen albums I have spent the last month listening to, this has received plenty of airplay, and I probably enjoy the album more now than I did when I started. The good is great, the average is average. In many ways, that sums up almost every Kiss album in existence.

1217. Paul Stanley / Paul Stanley. 1978. 3/5

In 1978, Kiss and their management, in their wisdom, decided that each member of the band would record and release a solo album, with all four to be released on the same day. It had been mandated in the band’s contract, but the recording and releasing all at once was apparently not specified. None of the members were to be involved in the other’s albums, this was a chance for each member to express themselves in their own way. The style of all four solo albums were completely different from each other, which could be seen to be either a good move to be that counterpoint to the main band’s normal sound, or one that maybe went too far.
In many ways, Paul Stanley had the most to lose from this solo album arrangement. For all intents and purposes, Paul was the face of Kiss, the main lead singer and guitarist, the one with the moves and hips and that voice that screamed out of the speakers at you. While the fans would have been interested in what the other three produced on their own, they EXPECTED Paul’s work to be brilliant, which would have made the process for him a difficult one. Of the four albums, Paul is the only one who does not include a cover song on his album, with all of the songs written by himself alone or in collaboration with Michael Japp. Given he was by now renowned for his voice and his persona, how far did Stanley dare to drift from what the fans knew on this album that was supposed to portray all of the elements of the individual that they could not necessarily show in a band of four?

From the outset, the album allows you to wonder if you will get something old or something new. The opening track “Tonight You Belong to Me” almost without fail reminds me stylistically of the Kiss track “Sure Know Something”, a song that Stanley wrote for the next Kiss album “Dynasty”. I’ve often wondered if this track was the forerunner for that. This song is sung with less toughness than that song does. It’s still a good song, whether any of this is true or not. It is followed by “Move On” which could easily be a Kiss song, with an Ace solo and the band doing the backup vocals rather than the girls that do so on this song. Both of those things are where there is a difference with this solo album. The fact Paul plays most of the guitars apart from the odd solo from guest Bob Kulick, brother of Bruce who would eventually join the band, does actually give it a poor-man's-Kiss feel on occasions. Perhaps not necessarily on “Move On”, but definitely on “Ain’t Quite Right”, where the title of the song actually explains it pretty well. Something is missing from this song to make it either ballad or rock, and it sits in purgatory as a result.
“Wouldn’t You Like to Know Me” is a pretty simple straight up and down pop rock song with few bells and whistles, aimed at the audience it is composed for. This is followed up by the rock ballad stylings of “Take Me Away (Together as One)”. This seems like a strange composition, not for the style of the song, but the lengths of the song as a result. It is the longest song on the album at five and a half minutes, but it is already dragged out by the softer slower style of the song.
“It’s Alright” opens the second side of the album with more energy, gets us back closer to what most of us have come into the album for. Unfortunately, this is then immediately brought back to earth by the straight out ballad "Hold Me, Touch Me (Think of Me When We're Apart)", complete with the backing crooning of the back up singers and the atypical ballad guitar solo that proliferated these types of songs through the 1970’s and 1980’s. Perhaps not surprisingly, this was the single released from the album which to me is a real shame as it indicates that Paul's best work is this kind of track, and it patently is not. But perhaps my view is not shared by others. “Love in Chains” is a much better song, more of the real Paul attitude in both vocals and guitar. “Goodbye” closes out the album with a certain amount of style, giving the album the pleasant ending it deserves.

Despite my enjoyment of Kiss, I did not hear any of these four solo albums until about 20 years ago. I just felt no compunction to go and find them and listen to them. I didn’t know anyone who owned them, so it wasn’t until the years of downloading that I decided to get around to checking them out.
This album is the one of those four that I expected would be the best, and perhaps that expectation was misplaced. Like I said earlier, there always felt as though more would be expected from Paul’s contribution to the solo albums because of his stature within the main band, and looking back I would say that it would be accurate to say that I did have that expectation and that it harmed how I felt about the album when I first heard it.
I’ve listened to this a fair bit over the last couple of weeks, trying to form an opinion now that would be a more accurate one than perhaps I formulated 20 years ago. And in the long run, it hasn’t changed a great deal. It’s a 50/50 album, one when half of the songs are good solid 70’s hardish rock tracks that have the bones of enjoyable music, and the other half are... a bit soft. They sound under-developed, like they are missing a bit of oomph in order to have them complete. Whether or not this is what Paul was looking for when doing this project, or whether the tracks just lacked the final finish that perhaps they wuold have received in the band environment, I don’t know. For me though, it still rates as a slight disappointment. Indeed, almost 30 years later Paul released his second solo album, “Live to Win”, which is a damned sight better in all departments. Perhaps he had learned from this effort that more energy and grunt makes for a better overall album. It certainly showcases his talent better than this first effort did.