Minggu, 04 Mei 2008

wolfmother

In a complex designed with the glazed, somnambulatory gambling patron in mind, it’s hard to tell things apart. The eye swirls at the epileptic lighting within the gut of Harrah’s Casino. In fact, after we ran through the revolving door at the main casino entrance, my friend Derek was almost fatally drawn in by the rapturously patriotic bright lights outside of Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar and Grill.

By contrast, our destination, the VooDoo Lounge is a cool blue affair adjacent to TKILTBG (as we came to affectionately call it) and, as it turns out, the place adheres rigidly to published concert start times.

wolfmother

Wolfmother had already taken the stage and launched into their prime radio hit “Mother” when we came in. I forget what a good song it is, a pounding-mallet-type hymn to femininity at its most elemental (“Yep, you’re a woman… you’ve got a vagina and all that junk,” per Derek).

Singer Andrew Stockdale has a cosmic yowl that makes the band all the more reminiscent of Uriah Heep. Sure, the motifs are hackneyed and tropish as a punchbowl billowing with dry ice – steaming cauldrons and repeated invocations of “The Mind’s Eye” stick out. But the Heep pulled the same contrivances, and pulled them off well. And Wolfmother pins the rock anachronisms more than musically – Stockdale regularly applauded himself and made what seemed a genuine effort to engage the crowd. The band’s also extraordinarily good at the woeful Wolfmammy ballads – celestial, string-my-tears-‘cross-the-firmament ballads that long to dream a non-extant ladylove into flesh.

snipal tap

Spinal Tap

This is just off the wire: Spinal Tap will reunite for a concert on global warming in July. As the group is not known for social awareness, this is something of a surprise. Nigel Tufnel is quoted as saying about global warming “I thought it was just because I was wearing too much clothing, if I just took my jacket off it would be cooler.” No word on who the drummer will be for this concert or what the odds of survival for that band member will be.

Since the band’s breakup, Nigel has been raising miniature horses, though he has been having difficulty finding miniature jockeys to ride them. David has become a hip-hop producer and runs a colonic clinic on the side. Derek has been in rehab for addiction to the Internet.

van halen

Van Halen

According to published reports:

Van Halen will announce a 50-date American reunion tour with original singer David Lee Roth during a news conference in Hollywood next week, sources said.

The arena trek will begin in early October.

Roth, who split from the rock group in the mid-1980s in hopes of solo stardom, will reunite with co-founders Eddie Van Halen on guitar and brother Alex Van Halen on drums. Eddie’s teenage son Wolfgang will sub for Michael Anthony on bass.

A proposed summer amphitheater tour by the group never got off the ground, with Eddie Van Halen entering a rehabilitation facility for undisclosed reasons in March.

In the months since, the guitarist has been seen publicly looking healthy and fit.

Van Halen last toured in 2004, with Roth’s replacement, vocalist Sammy Hagar, grossing nearly $40 million, according to Billboard Boxscore.

I’m bettin’ that either

a) the tour will be cancelled before it even gets started after rehearsals; or

b) the tour will be cancelled after only a handful of dates.

I just don’t see it happening. Between the huge egos of Eddie Van Halen and David Lee Roth as well as the huge grudges each of them carry plus the well-publicized anger issues of Eddie Van Halen, it’s going to end badly once the fighting begins.

dick dale

Supporting Dick Dale @ Patronaat

We are proud to announce that we will be supporting “King of the Surf Guitar” dick daleduring the only Dutch show on his upcoming European tour; Friday November 9th @patronaat / Haarlem.

DickDale

We are looking forward to sharing the stage with the legendary Godfather of Surf.

ozzy osbourne

November 5th, 2007 by Evan

Ozzy Osbourne MTS Centre, Winnipeg

Halloween came early for heavy metal fans at MTS Centre last night, where monster rockers Rob Zombie and Ozzy Osbourne delivered a demonicdouble-bill of campy thrills and macabre chills. The co-headliners proved a perfect match for the pre-Hallow’s Eve weekend, whipping a crowd of 11,500 into a frightful frenzy with their riff-heavy head-bangers and devilish hard rock.Emerging from the mouth of a sharp-toothed beastie sitting under the drum kit, Zombie immediately kicked things into high gear by barking out the throat-shredding lyrics of American Witch while flanked by a three-piece band and two fetching burlesque dancers. Zombie’s stage set-up is a veritable freak-show of terror-inducing trappings, among them the requisite pyro blasts and sweeping strobelights, but also a giant robo-alien and massive video monitors broadcasting old Bettie Page clips and snuff-inspired footage from his own films.

Osbourne, meanwhile, may not have the same manic energy as Zombie, but give the guy a break — he’s almost 60. Blistering versions of I Don’t Wanna Stop and Crazy Train left us confident his portion of the show would also prove to be more treat than trick.

Rob Zombie


Where have you gone, Matthew Sweet? The man who reinvented pop rock in the '90s with the release of his opus, Girlfriend, and its hard-rocking follow-up, Altered Beast, just seemed to disappear from the music landscape, only to pop up in some of the wildest places, including as a member of Austin Powers' rock band, Ming Tea, and as a member of the singer-songwriter supergroup The Thorns.

kansas

Image
The first Kansas band is formed when Phil Ehart of White Clover and Kerry Livgren of Saratoga decide to form a new band. This new band consists of members drawn from both Saratoga and White Clover. The first Kansas band featured Phil Ehart on drums, Kerry Livgren on guitar, Larry Baker on guitar and saxophone, Don Montre on keyboards and flute, Dan Wright on keyboards and guitar, Dave Hope on bass, and Lynn Meredith and Greg Allen singing lead vocals.

allman brother

NYC Album Art?: The Allman Brothers, Live at Fillmore East

2007_02_arts_allmans.jpgIn the past we've told you about New York album art from The Doors, Bob Dylan, The Ramones and more. You can read the past posts here, and now we move on to The Allman Brothers Band: Live at Fillmore East.

The album was recorded at a show in 1971, the year the venue shut its doors. With the cover art shot by Jim Marshall, it looks like the photo shoot took place in the back alley of the fillmore (there are even guided tours in New York which visit the spot). While many have suspected that, and that The Allman Brothers Band are the only band to have a photo of the venue on the cover of an album (which would be fitting since the Allmans played so many shows there they were often referred to as "Bill Graham's House Band"), it's not true. In actuality, the album cover shots were taken at the bands headquarters in Macon, Georgia. Marshall explains here.

About the venue: Bill Graham opened it as a counterpart to the Fillmore West in 1968, a venue known also as "The Church of Rock and Roll". The New York establishment was in the East Village at 105 2nd Avenue (map).

Currently the former entrance lobby is a branch of Emigrant Savings Bank, which includes photos of the venue. The rest of the space is an apartment complex. There's a tribute on the street pole at the corner still, mosaics make up logos of bands and music note. Here's an old torn photo of what the scene looked liked outside of the venue before the last shows.