This is an All-Star Jam. For those new to Rock Town Hall, this is the free-form area in which you are encouraged to toot your own harp.
Apr 062012
Apr 052012
I know, I did it to myself. What did I expect? I listened to Classic Rock radio this afternoon and it’s just so stale that I swear, it sucks the very will to live right out of you. So my mind was wandering while they were playing “Start Me Up,” which is a pretty good song by my favorite band in the whole world. But I was just thinking, “maybe I should just turn on my mp3 player or NPR.”
Then I started thinking that the Oldies station doesn’t play a steady diet of Buddy Holly and Chuck Berry. In fact, they seem to have made these kinds of great artists almost invisible. I was thinking that wasn’t such a bad thing. If I were a big fan, I could listen to them until I couldn’t bear it anymore anyway. I started thinking that when Classic Rock radio became a format, it was pretty much just Rock radio, and they played old stuff and new stuff (much like people actually do in their cars and homes). Then I thought, “Program Directors need a Death Panel!”
But like our Nation’s Death Panels, these Panels need to be made up of people who care. People with a vested interest. People for whom cutting these songs out of the rotation to make some room for something new are actually going to be affected by this action. I figured if I were on this Panel, I’d have to make those hard decisions about my favorite band, The Rolling Stones, but I wouldn’t be able to chime in about a band like Led Zeppelin, which I can’t stand. It just wouldn’t be fair because I don’t have a vested interest.
So I thought members of the Hall would be good candidates for this heavy burden. We’ve got to do something! These Program Directors are obviously in way over their heads, too attached to their heroes to make rational decisions to help get some decent new Rock on the radio.
Will you step up and make the hard decisions? I’ll start off by making my own cuts. I’ll miss these songs on the radio dearly, but I understand we just can’t support them anymore. It’s for the younger generation. It’s for the greater good. Can you help cut 5 songs from your favorites?
- Start Me Up. There may be no song with more private support, with all the plays it gets in stadiums and on TV.
- Miss You. It’s great for dancing and parties, but it’s a pretty long song, and a lot of new artists will benefit from the amount of air time freed up.
- Gimme Shelter. A stone cold classic, and I truly love the song, but Martin Scorcese has promised to use it in every movie he makes anyway.
- Brown Sugar. I’m pretty sure a riff like that will never die. It doesn’t need any more help on the Public airwaves.
- Angie – I love it. I really do, but face it, there are plenty of other ballads every bit as deserving.
Apr 052012
Jim Marshall, creator of the famed Marshall amp (Marshall stack!), has died at 88. Fans of former Minnesota Vikings great Jim Marshall, the defensive lineman whose sterling career is only marked by the time he picked up a fumble and returned it the wrong way—to his own team’s endzone (ie, resulting in a 2-point “safety,” the closest thing in American football to an “own goal,” as our ex-US, soccer-loving readers call it)—need not worry. As of this writing the former “Purple People Eater” is alive and well.
May your recollections of the legendary Marshall amp creator and his creation commence!
Apr 042012
RIGHT: James McCartney aka "Chip Stills"
You may have heard this already, but the kids of the Beatles are talking about getting together and forming a group. Good or bad idea? Remember the hype that poor Julian Lennon suffered under?
Apr 032012
Sandwich Effect
Listening to The Jam‘s great Setting Sons, which may be my fave by them. But it never really got the spotlight it deserved, did it — due to being sandwiched between their two legendary LPs, Sound Affects and All Mod Cons.
Sure, there were some hits on this, like “Eton Rifles,” and I could do without their version of “Heat Wave,” but whenever The Jam comes up no one ever seems to talk about this album. Why oh why?
Are there any other bands who have a “lost” album — one that seems softer and more vanilla in between the crunchier bookends? Maybe I should listen to Give ’em Enough Rope again???
Apr 032012
UPDATED: Proof that it “happens to the best of them”: your Moderator forgot that he already included ELO in an earlier 1-2 Punch! For this offense, Mr. Moderator will spend the next 2 minutes in the Penalty Box. Mad props to tonyola for his pince nez. Feel free to leave your 2 selections for Fleetwood Mac.
Let’s try another 1-2 Punch, shall we? Top 10 lists are too much; Top 5 lists invite too many opportunities for throwing in a hipster, obscuro choice to distinguish oneself from the raging masses. What I’d like to know is what TWO (2) songs you would choose from an artist’s catalog to say as much about that artist that you believe represents said artist’s core as possible? In other words, if you could only use TWO (2) songs from an artist’s catalog to explain all that said artist is about to a Venusian, what TWO (2) songs would you pick to represent said artist’s place in rock ‘n roll?
I’ll pose two artists and you—love ’em or leave ’em—give me each artist’s representative 1-2 Punch. Dig? Here goes! Continue reading »
Apr 022012
It’s been said by old farts like yours truly that modern-day bands composed of people in their 20s and early 30s have a lot to learn. For instance, I see bands with bassists playing with their ankles close to each other. Not cool, man! But what happening band is going to listen to my advice on issues like proper bass player stance and soloing hair? Maybe it’s time the real kidz teach the so-called kidz a thing or two?
Check out the following video from Haunted by Heroes, “The World’s Youngest Rock Band.” What lessons might these musical mighty mites teach their parents, aunts, uncles, and older cousins—and the bands these adults dig?
Need more?
