Trollheart

Random Track of the Day
Wednesday, October 26 2011
As promised, since I wasn't here to update the journal yesterday there are two RTOTDs today. This is the first, ostensibly for Wednesday, and a surprisingly good track from the band who made me doubt the worth of “Chasing cars”. Yeah, it's Snow Patrol.

Tiny little fractures --- Snow Patrol --- from "Final straw" on Fiction


Yes, a decent track for once, or maybe “Songs for polar bears” was just a weak debut. Either way, this is a good little indie-rocker with a nice line in chorus and backing vocals.

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Random Track of the Day
Thursday, October 27 2011
And here's today's proper Random track, from Journey, one of my favourite bands. Title track from their millions-selling breakout album, “Escape”.

Escape --- Journey --- from "Escape" on Columbia


Proving Journey can rock with the best of 'em, it's a good rocker with odd elements of Genesis, of all bands, in the melody. Steve Perry on fine form, and although there are much better tracks on the album (including of course their huge singles “Who's crying now” and “Don't stop believin'”) it's definitely worthy of inclusion on the album. Nice guitar from Neal Schon near the end.

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And the worm, having had yesterday off, has to work twice as hard today to make up the hours. So here's his first selection, one of Prince's early hits, from the album “1999” (seems such a long time ago now, doesn't it?) and “Little red Corvette”.

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It's Friday and the worm wants to ROCK! Just as well those wild-eyed boys who had been away are back, huh? Better get down to Dinos...

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Random Track of the Day
Friday, October 28 2011
If the worm can rock, so can the random-o-meter! One of my very favourite bands today, cruelly underappreciated in my opinion, a band called Ten, with a track from their album “The name of the rose”.

Don't cry --- Ten --- from "The name of the rose" on Now & Then


Great vocal melodies as ever, Gary Hughes in great form and some truly killer AOR stuff on “Don't cry”, from their second album, released in 1996. As I say, a band who deserve far more recognition than they've got to date. Check out their catalogue of nine albums for more.

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Random Track of the Day
Saturday, October 29 2011
More rockin' today from the random-o-meter, this time from the unflappable Tom Petty, and a track from his most recent commercial success.

Into the great wide open --- Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers --- from "Into the great wide open" on MCA


I was never a massive fan of Tom Petty. I didn't --- and don't --- dislike him, I just was never that much bothered with him. I did enjoy “Full moon fever”, for the most part, which was his first real “chart” album, with singles galore, so when this was released I bought it. I find it more commercial than “FMF”, a lot less of the rock and a lot more of the pop side. This is the title track.

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Okay then, time to strap on your six-guns, tilt forward your hat in a menacing way, chomp down on that cee-gar (but I don't smoke!) and mosey on down to the Last Chance Saloon, to check out another album in my collection that really did not impress me on first or subsequent listens, and which I have filed away until now.

Personally, I feel it was a tragedy when the late Ronnie James Dio was fired from Black Sabbath. I like the Ozzy-era albums, but RJD really added a sense of majesty and wonder to the catalogue, bringing his own style of fantasy, epic songs, costume and great lyrics to a band which had, up to then, been pretty mired in a kind of ever-decreasing circle of similar black metal music. Which is not to say that I didn't like the previous albums --- “Vol 4” is a great album, and I love “Sabbath bloody Sabbath”, and of course there's the excellent “Master of reality”, not to mention “Paranoid”, but to me Sabs were stuck in something of a rut until Ronnie came along, and I felt he, in the parlance of TV and the movies, “revitalised the franchise”.

So I was sad to see him go, even though he would later make a triumphant return for one album nine years later. Sadder though was I to hear that his replacement would be Ian Gillan! Now, I'm a Purple fan, though not a big one, but I never liked anything Gillan put out with his own band, and his snotty claim on joining, at the second asking, mind you, Black Sabbath, that they should not be described as a heavy metal band, was a real slap in the teeth to their longtime fans (like me), in addition to being, well, how can I put this? Insane? Sabs not metal? You might as well say Maiden weren't metal!

So, the stage was set and the battlelines were drawn, and I was in a frame of mind, not surprisingly, to hate the new album, which turned out, as it happens, to be the only one Gillan did with Sabbath. I was not disappointed. Or I was, depending on your viewpoint. Essentially, I felt that Gillan had done as I had expected and feared, and ruined one of the godfathers of metal. I hated the album.

Born again --- Black Sabbath --- 1983 (Vertigo)


So, was I right to hate it? Did I give it a chance? Well, probably no to the second, with judgement (obviously) reserved on the first, as this is the main question we are here to find an answer to. To be fair, the first I heard from the new lineup and from the then-forthcoming album was at a rock festival in Dublin (yeah, we had the odd one --- think it was called Monsters of Rock. Or is that Donington? Well, something similar anyway) and it was a little hard to make out the music, but when I got the album I was almost glad I had had difficulty hearing it onstage, as it really sounded awful to me. Has time mellowed my opinion, changed it? Will this last listen redeem this lost lamb (well, wolf I guess) from the Black Sabbath flock? I wonder, I really do...

It starts off heavy enough, though I could do without Gillan's trademark annoying scream. Right from the off, I don't find his voice as strong as either Ozzy or Dio --- they're in a different class. I also note some similarities in the opener, “Trashed”, to a lot of Deep Purple material, particularly “Speed king” and “Highway star”. Is he involved in the writing? Let's have a look. Yes, but in collaboration with the rest of the guys. Still, you can certainly feel his influence on this track. Nice solo from Tony Iommi, little heavier and more contemporary than usual.

My concern, of course, is that Gillan would use Sabbath as a backing band, making it more of a case of Ian Gillan and Black Sabbath, but as the album goes on I'm getting that impression more and more. “Stonehenge” has a nicely atmospheric, dark opening, very reminiscent of Ozzy-era Sabbath, nice keys from Geoff Nichols, very prog-rock to be honest. It's a short song, and indeed an instrumental, but it at once fits in nicely and stands out from the usual Sabbath fare. Then we're into “Disturbing the priest”, a song written for the Madman if ever there was one. Gillan does an okay job on it, to be fair. It's very heavy, more screaming, a slower track than the opener, more a cruncher than a rocker. Although the title screams, as I say, Ozzy Osbourne, the song itself is pure classic Dio, and I could very easily hear RJD singing this one.

Another very short instrumental follows, more a collection of noises really, which goes under the title of “The dark” and leads into the longest song on the album, “Zero the hero”. At just over seven and a half minutes, it comes over to me as an attempt at a Led Zep copy, and I don't see it as a Sabbath song at all. Great extended guitar solo in the middle though. Very much overlong: the same basic melody goes all the way through, and there's little change as the song blunders on towards its conclusion. To be honest, I heaved a sigh of relief once it ended.

“Digital bitch” is a lot of fun, written apparently about Sharon Osbourne (sentiments I heartily concur with!), a more straight ahead rocker than really anything else on the album so far. A good song, but I would have to say not a great song. More than halfway through the album and nothing has really grabbed me by the throat up to now, as I would expect a Sabs album to. Whether it's the manic energy of Ozzy or the sumptuous vocals and sweeping lyrical themes espoused by Dio, I've always had my attention kept by any previous Sabbath album, and though I haven't heard the later ones with Ray Gillen or even Tony Martin, I find Gillan's vocal presence the least riveting I have heard on a Sabbath album.

The title track is a ballad, of all things, very bluesy, and the second-longest at just over six and a half minutes. Nice echoey guitar from Iommi and some really nice effective bass from Geezer Butler, and in complete fairness this sort of song does suit Gillan's voice, though I could just as happily hear Dio sing it (maybe not Ozzy); so far it's the best thing on the album, but is it too little too late? It is. “Hot line” is throwaway basic filler, while the closer, “Keep it warm”, is, well, more filler. Oh dear.

I would have to say that my original impression stays. While Iommi's guitar playing is as flawless as ever, the whole direction of Sabbath changed, for me, on this album, and not for the better. “Born again” can't hold a black candle to the likes of “Master of reality”, “Sabotage” or “Heaven and Hell”, and I'm not surprised Gillan didn't last as the singer: his style never seemed to mesh with the ethos and craft of Black Sabbath, and they soon parted ways. Hopefully before he had a chance to ruin the band.

Honestly, if this was Black Sabbath “Born again”, then I could recommend a backstreet doctor that could have performed a certain operation that might have saved us all some grief.

TRACKLISTING

1. Trashed
2. Stonehenge
3. Disturbing the priest
4. The dark
5. Zero the hero
6. Digital bitch
7. Born again
8. Hot line
9. Keep it warm

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The worm is certainly not averse to the odd dance song now and then, and this is one of the better ones, from D:Ream (see what they did there?), with “Things can only get better” --- surely an anthem for the times?

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Random Track of the Day
Sunday, October 30 2011
Although Norway is generally regarded for its black, doom and death metal bands, there has been some really good music that has come from the Land of the Midnight Sun that is not metal of any flavour. Case in point, a band I have heard a lot about, but not listened to their albums yet. They're called Gazpacho.

Snail --- Gazpacho --- from "Missa Atropos" on HWT


Believe it or not, “Missa Atropos” is the sixth album from these guys. I really must make a better effort to listen to some of their music. This is their most current album, though it comes from 2010, and there's a new one in the pipeline for next year. This is a track called “Snail”.

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We've so far featured two artistes in this section, and they've both been guys. BOO! I hear you ladies say. HISS! What about the girls? You sexist pi--- all right, all right! Point taken. There have of course been many successful female solo artistes, as as promised at the end of our last edition of “Gone solo in the game”, this time we're going to examine the solo career of that blonde icon of the seventies and early eighties


With a fairly prolific career in music, Debbie Harry is of course best known for her work with the new wave band Blondie, and has become identified with such hits as “Heart of glass”, “Atomic”, “Sunday girl” and “Hanging on the telephone”, but although she still works with the band she has over the span of her career branched out, both into solo ventures and collaborations, as well as guesting on many tracks, and indeed fronting the avant-garde jazz band The Jazz Passengers. As ever, though, it is her solo career with which we are concerned, and on which we will concentrate here.

Her first solo album was released in 1981, when she was taking a break from Blondie. With a sleeve designed by “Alien” artist and creator of visual nightmares, H.R. Giger, the album was moderately successful, though hardly broke the charts wide open like her Blondie output.

Koo koo --- 1981 (Chrysalis)


As I mentioned in the feature on Ric Ocasek a month and a half ago now, the debut solo album is always the hardest. The decision made to break out of the relative comfort of the band they're with, the artiste is no doubt faced with some trepidation as to how his or her own music will be received, not only by longtime fans of the band, but by others, who may not have liked the band. In short, the artist has to please both sides of their new fanbase: those who already know them, and those who don't.

“Koo koo” (strange title!) turns out, not surprisingly, to be a far cry from the pop/punk/new-wave rock of Blondie, much more influenced by funk and dance than rock or punk. The opener “Jump jump” does not, to be honest, impress, and were this not the Debbie Harry, this is probably where I might stop, as the signs are not good. But we're committed to checking this album, and her others, out in their entireity, so let's perservere. Decent keyboard solo, but very very lightweight, with little improvement for “The jam was moving”, which was apparently chosen as a single. Hmm. Nice but of guitar there from Nile Rodgers, from seventies disco band Chic, while his partner, Bernard Edwards, takes bass duties. Still very dance-oriented though.

Bit of rock tries to force its way through on “Chrome”, which does have more of a Blondie feel, and though I don't want to fall into the trap of rating songs as like-Blondie/not-like-Blondie, it is part of this brief that we compare the artiste's solo output to that which they produced, or produce, within the band structure. This is the least dancy of the tracks so far, and therefore my favourite as I listen. Harry and her Blondie bandmate and boyfriend, guitarist Chris Stein, write about half of the material on the album, with the other half penned by the Chic duo, with or without input from Stein and Harry. “Chrome”, perhaps unsurprisingly, is a Harry/Stein original.

Back to the funk then for another Chic-written number, “Surrender”, and the hard edge is gone, almost forgotten. I'm sensing opportunities missed here. It's almost as if Debbie is allowing Edwards and Rodgers to dictate the kind of music she records, and while they do produce the album, I think it's a pity that they exercise such tight control over the material. “Surrender” is, frankly, crap. Not much better is “Inner city spillover”, where Debbie goes all reggae. Interestingly, this is one of the songs she writes with Stein, and while weak it's at least devoid of the funk influence of her producers. In fairness, it's not too bad, but I'm not a fan of reggae music, so I guess I'm biased in that way. That said, I certainly prefer it to anything else so far, “Chrome” excepted.

And here comes the funk --- complete with horns --- for “Backfired”, which was also a single. I feel both of these releases perhaps would have given a false impression of Debbie's solo work, and something like “Chrome” would have been a better bet. This has elements of semi-rap in it, sharp, jangly guitar echoing the melody of her hit single with Blondie the previous year (well, that year --- 1981, but the album was released in 1980), “Rapture”, which itself was seen as something of a departure from Blondie's recognised musical style, the rap in itself intensely embarrassing and laughable. She obviously hadn't learned from that...

Having let Stein and Harry have their head, to some extent (STOP that dirty laughing!) on the first part of the album, the Chic duo keep something of a stranglehold on the second half, or side, writing or co-writing four out of the five remaining tracks. The first, and indeed only, ballad, “Now I know you know” is really not bad, echoes of Judie Tzuke in there, and Debbie on fine song, with some nice laid-back guitar and piano, but the following track, “Under arrest”, actually comes even closer to Blondie's own style, with a staccato, hard-edged pop/rock tune --- must be the input from Debbie and Chris on this one, although Edwards and Rodgers collaborate on the writing.

I fear for a song which has a title of “Military rap”! Still, it maintains the new-wave/punk style favoured by Blondie, even if there is a really bad attempt at a rap in there, along with some very Mexican-sounding bugles...! Fast, certainly, and not a funk lick in sight. The only track on the second side of the album without writing input for the Chic guys, and the better for it. But they're involved in the closer, “Oasis”. Hang on though: a promising start, with its eastern/arabic flavour and whistling keyboards, tom-toms and some very nice, if funky, bass.

So a decent end, then, to an album which started badly, but improved a little as it went on, until there was a final sprint for the finish line, and although I would doubt I'd listen to this album again, I'm a little more impressed with it now than I was when it began. As a debut though, I'd have to say that if this was someone other than Debbie Harry, with her already legion of fans to buy this record (whether or not they liked it is another matter), I doubt she would have secured a deal for a second album. Hey, fame is certainly handy when you decide to take that solo flight!

TRACKLISTING

1. Jump jump
2. The jam was moving
3. Chrome
4. Surrender
5. Inner city spillover
6. Backfired
7. Now I know you know
8. Under arrest
9. Military rap
10. Oasis

Personal problems prevented Debbie from releasing a follow-up to “Koo koo” until 1986. By that time Blondie had split, largely due to the illness contracted by Chris Stein, though they would reform fifteen years later in 1997. Debbie's next album was not under the control of the “Chic gang”, but was in fact produced by one of the J. Geils Band, one Seth Justman, and though he co-wrote some of the songs with her and Stein, this time they had greater artistic freedom, and Debbie and Chris wrote or co-wrote eight of the nine tracks on the album.

Rockbird --- 1986 (Chrysalis)


With a name like that, you have to hope this album would be more a rock album than a dance one, but let's see. Kicking off with a very frantic piano, “I want you” harks right back to the fifties, with a very Lewis/Richard fast piano melody, and a start/stop melody somewhat reminscent of the Jam, but definitely a step up from the debut. Although horns again feature quite prominently, this time they're used more in a jazz/ska vein than a dance mood: bold, brassy, exuberant. The opener certainly sets the mission statement, and though its 50s bubblegum pop/rock is still lightweight, it's closer to the sort of thing Blondie would be expected to produce.

“French kissin' in the USA”, ironically the only track on the album without any input from either her or Stein in terms of writing, turned out to be the huge hit single from the album, and remains one of her most popular solo songs. Very pop oriented, it's a lot slower than the opener, but not a ballad. It seems to feature a lot of programmed drums and synths, fitting well in to the sound of the mid-eighties, while “Buckle up” is more of a boogie, again replete with horns and brass, kind of Madness-like in style. “In love with love” is lightweight pop, very new romantic, close to the likes of Fiction Factory and the lighter moments of Depeche Mode.

Horns again feature prominently in “You got me in trouble”, with a pop/dance flavour, and things slow down nicely for “Free to fall”, a nice sort of mid-paced semi-ballad, and then kick back into high gear again for the rockin' title track, with some nice fast piano, some good hard guitar and decent backing vocals. Both “Secret life” and the closer “Beyond the limit” sort of pass by without making any real impression, and sadly do the reverse of “Koo koo”, which started badly but ended strongly. Still, on balance, “Rockbird” is a great improvement on the debut, and allows Debbie to spread her wings (sorry!) a little more.

TRACKLISTING

1. I want you
2. French kissin' in the USA
3. Buckle up
4. In love with love
5. You got me in trouble
6. Free to fall
7. Rockbird
8. Secret life
9. Beyond the limit

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