Entries Tagged 'Albums' ↓

Obviously this odd release coincides with the release of Richards’ autobiography Life, which arrived at the McKeon household this week and is now in the reading queue behind Gravity’s Rainbow, The Stand, Chris Jericho’s book, and possibly Dave Mustaine’s.  Essentially this is a best-of compilation of the two studio albums and one live album by his side project The X-Pensive Winos, with an odd bonus track, the one minute and change song “Hurricane.”  Again, I realize this was put out as a cash grab for the book, but was anyone really demanding this?

As a best-of compilation, it’s fine, including the singles from the studio albums and some of the better tracks along with live versions of Keith’s Rolling Stones songs.  If you wanted an overview of his solo career this would do it and you wouldn’t necessarily need to hunt out the full albums themselves, except the live one which I love.  “Hurricane” is something interesting to listen to one or two times but I can’t see myself interested in it beyond that.  It’s a solo acoustic piece that doesn’t really go anywhere within its confines.

Back in 2007 Rhino put out a Mick Jagger solo compilation that was really nice, a combination of tracks from his studio albums and a fair amount of hard to find stuff like “Dancing in the Streets” with David Bowie and “Checkin’ Up On My Baby” with the Red Devils.  I don’t know how much of this sort of thing is available for Keith Richards but ideally this release would have been more like that.  At the very least I would have liked “Run Run Rudolph” on it.

Slayer is one of those bands - like AC/DC - where you have a general sense of what you’re getting when you buy one of their albums.  They’ve got their sound where you immediately know it’s them when you hear it.  When a band has such a distinctive sound that they’re sticking with, the main variable from album to album is the quality of the songs.

With World Painted Blood, Slayer has put together one of the best collection of songs in a long time.  It’s their second album since reuniting with original drummer Dave Lombardo.  Their previous effort, 2006’s Christ Illusion was a step in the right direction, but some of the songs on it didn’t deliver.  World Painted Blood feels like a continuation of the previous release, but with a vast amount of improvement.  Sure the usual things are present - Tom Araya’s ominous vocals and the monster guitar playing of Hanneman and King - but they’ve also come up with a group of memorable songs that rank with their best.

I wouldn’t rank World Painted Blood with my personal Slayer favorites Reign in Blood and South of Heaven, but this will probably end up being one of my favorite releases of 2009.

“You thought you were dead
Ha! I’m not done with you yet!
I’m going to the morgue to hunt you down
I’m going to the cemetary to find you
I’m going to your grave to dig you up”

- “Ultra Dead”, The Great Kat

In the heyday of shredding back in the late 80s any guitarist not signed to Shrapnel had to do something to make themselves stand out from the crowd.  Which is exactly what The Great Kat did.  The ads in various guitar magazines advertised her hyper-fast versions of classical songs combined with a dominatrix-type personality.

Needless to say, the younger version of me was dying for this album.  Now not so much that I was willing to pluck down however much they were charging to order it via mail, but I kept checking used music stores for it.

Nineteen years later I had a copy of Beethoven on Speed in my hot little hands thanks to my local Half Price Books.  When I paid for it the clerk told me that he had just put it out a couple of hours ago and thought that no one would ever buy it.

“I’ve wanted this for years,” was my reply.  I’m sure the hipsters working there think I’m a dick anyway so what do I care.

Anyway, the album itself is a combination of sped up classical songs like Beethoven’s 5th and Chopin’s Funeral March along with Kat originals such as “Kat-Abuse” and “Guitar Concerto in Blood Minor” (which sounds like something Dethklok would put together).  The whole thing is done pretty tongue in cheek with Kat’s dominating personality coming out in the linear notes (”I’ve got to live with this massive brain 24 hours a day!”).

Unfortunately it’s not very good.  The originals are pretty cookie-cutter and the classical songs lose their novelty after a couple of listens.  That being said I know that there are people who would be completely into this - it’s a very metal album and the guitar work is pretty good.  I think the 1990 me would have liked it a lot more than the 2009 me does.

The Great Kat has a very busy website here.

“The Stones hold the record for releasing the most ‘worst’ live albums:  five, excluding 1970’s worth entry, Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out.  What makes Still Life so abysmally still-born is that it will forever mark the moment when the Stones transmuted from rock band to Las Vegas music review.  U2, beware.” - “Not So Essential Live Albums”, Guitar, September 1997

While the author of the above piece certainly makes a point about the number of bad Rolling Stones live albums (and more bad ones yet to come), I’ve never felt that Still Life was never a bad live album although I wouldn’t put it on my best-of list.  The album starts off with an incredible version of “Under My Thumb” that rocks harder than the original ever did and continues on with some Stones classics (”Shattered”, “Let’s Spend the Night Together”) and some surprising covers for a live album (”Twenty Flight Rock”, “Going to a Go-Go”).  Things start to peter out toward the end which keeps this from being - in my eyes at least - a classic live album.

Reading the above article made me think about the number of bad and just boring Rolling Stones live albums that have come out over the years.  By comparison, a fair amount of live movies/videos have come from the same tours (Let’s Spend the Night Together showcased the same tour as Still Life) and they blow the recordings out of the water.  Despite the huge stadiums the Stones are shown playing in, their live show comes across incredibly well on Let’s Spend the Night Together.  While they’re obviously known for their live shows it never occurred to me before that the visual portion of the performance was so important to it.

On a similar note, I saw that a box set of Get Yer Ya-Ya’s Out came out last week that includes five Rolling Stones songs not found on the original as well as the opening sets by B.B. King and Ike & Tina Turner.  I’m torn about whether or not to get this.  Five extra songs isn’t a lot and part of me wonders if the money would be better spent on B.B. King’s Live at the Apollo.

As I previously wrote, I had high hopes for this album based on hearing “Modern Day Delilah”, and I have to admit that Sonic Boom doesn’t disappoint.  After the abysmal Psycho Circus and the subsequent departure of Ace Frehley and Peter Criss I had written the band off as another nostalgia act and didn’t expect them to release anything from this new lineup.

The first thing that struck me as I listened to it is how much of a band they sound like compared to Psycho Circus.  The addition of Tommy Thayer on guitar has improved the band immensely.  He manages to bring a new sound to Kiss while still staying true to the band’s roots.  In the world of Kiss you never know who is playing what instrument, but the bass sound throughout the album is great - if it is Gene Simmons then my hat’s off to him for bringing some great playing.

Standout songs on the album include “Modern Day Delilah”, “Russian Roulette”, and “Say Yeah”.  Tommy Thayer even sings lead on “When Lightning Strikes”, a song that fits in perfectly with the rest of the material.  Of course, this is still Kiss we’re talking about, so the lyrics aren’t exactly Bob Dylan quality, but that’s okay.  The music more than compensates for it. I sincerely hope this is a sign of things to come for the band, releasing music that lives up to the standards they’ve previously set.