Love from the Emerald Isle

00:00:00There's a podcast that's sure all that rocks hard is gold. And they're climbing the stairway to 11. When they get to there they know the record stores are all closed. But online they can get what they came for.

00:00:33And they're streaming the Stairway to 11.

00:00:40Hello and welcome to Stairway to 11. My name is George.

00:00:44This is John.

00:00:45And I'm TR.

00:00:47This here is Jay.

00:00:48And we are joined today by our friend and longtime listener, Derek Weston. Where are you, Derek?

00:00:55I'm in Ballybrophy in County Leash, as we speak, sitting in my kitchen, propped up with a glass of red wine and a list of 10 bands, or albums, rather. All right. Very happy to be here. Can I give a geographical description of Ballybrophy? Sorry. So basically, Ireland's, the Republic of Ireland, I suppose, 26 counties. Leash, we're bordering Tipperary, which is kind of like,

00:01:49Yeah, I've been to Tipperary twice, actually.

00:01:54And I,

00:01:56my wife almost divorced me when I said,

00:01:57Hey,

00:01:58it's not such a long way after all.

00:01:59So I'm probably.

00:02:00Yeah.

00:02:02Yeah.

00:02:02It's certainly not a long way for me.

00:02:03It's 10 minutes on the road.

00:02:04So.

00:02:06Wow.

00:02:07Yeah.

00:02:07We're,

00:02:07I was just talking to John yesterday about the fact that,

00:02:10uh,

00:02:11I am apparently not too far from where Robert Duvall just died and lived in

00:02:17Virginia.

00:02:18Yeah.

00:02:19Yep.

00:02:19So,

00:02:19uh,

00:02:20that was,

00:02:20that was neat to learn.

00:02:21I was in his hood yesterday. I loved him, man. I'm so sorry that he's gone. He was old, so I mean, you know, but. Yeah, but he was great. He was awesome. Boo Radley, man. Well, I like, you know, his, the Apostle. He was so good in that. And, well, he also plays Gus from, which I won't watch, from Lonesome Dove, because it's like one of my favorite books. I can't watch it, but, yeah, too bad. Yeah. Do you know how many times I went back and watched that famous scene from Apocalypse Now when I heard the news?

00:02:51I love the smell of napalm in the morning. But you gotta watch the buildup to it also, though. You know, before he takes off his uniform and everything, when he's talking about surfing, you know, and being from California, I was like, oh, man. Charlie don't surf. I can't believe they put this in there. What I really appreciate is the last line of that speech. Yeah, it just hits so hard. And he says this, with disappointment, he says, this war's gonna end someday. And he just looks at them, nods,

00:03:21gets up and walks away. And then the party will be over. Yeah. That is a brutal. There's two lines in that movie. Just a quick side. That one and extreme prejudice. Those two lines say more than anything in the whole film. I don't know if you remember the extreme prejudice. Yeah. Yeah. So great. All right. Well, now that we've gotten our rabbit hole out of the way early. That's the fastest we've ever done. I'm happy to pay. I'm happy to play second.

00:03:54So back to you, Derek. Tell us more about you.

00:03:59So I suppose how I came to the podcast, well, obviously Stairway was easy because it was Metal Heads, obviously, that I listened to first. And I think it was around lockdown, I'm going to say, probably when a lot of people kind of caught on to various podcasts. I hadn't already listened to many music podcasts before that, actually, just mainly sports and stuff.

00:04:20So I was just out doing a lot with the garden. We just kind of recently moved into the house. So I had a lot to do with a bit of a heat wave in Ireland, unbelievably. So I was kind of taking advantage of that. And then at the time, actually, it's a funny story. It sounds like one of those stories I've kind of shoehorned in because it's like a running joke with you on the podcast. I had actually been listening to a lot of Woods of Epre. Keep talking. What happened was I used to live in Canada. I worked over there for about a year, year and a half.

00:04:50And we had these insane, I worked up north, I'm a surveyor by profession, and we had, you know, insane drives up north. So I ended up like stocking up in West Edmonton Mall and like, you know, 20 or 30 CDs I could take with me. And I just because Canada obviously the HMV or whatever, stocking, you know, its own stuff, and there was plenty of woods there, I'd heard about them. So I eventually got around to listen to them more in Ireland than in Canada. But then I realized that

00:05:20David Gold, David, isn't it? Gold had passed or died tragically in the car accident. And then I was like, shit, you know, maybe there's an offshoot. And, you know, because I like the guitar tone on the on the green album. Woods 4, I'm going to say. Yeah, I love the guitar tone. Then I realized Joel Violet was a guitarist. Then I found Throssenblatt. And I was looking up, to make a short story long in this case, I was looking up, you know, Throssenblatt, maybe those interviews. And I found you.

00:05:49And the very first episode I listened to was you in the fucking woods or something. Ah, with Joel. Yeah, that's one of my favorites. So I listened to that and then I just rode back. I'd listened to a few podcasts and some were okay, but I definitely, I liked the kind of vibe of your one. So I stuck with it. I went all the way back to the beginning and then just kind of burst my way through all the episodes. Nice.

00:06:19You're a glutton for punishment. No, no, but it's amazing. Sorry, John. That's fine. No, I was just saying to George last week that it's very difficult. People think podcasting is easy, but it's very easy to get it wrong because especially when you have five or six people, the personnel is everything. The topic is less so. You could talk about fucking baking apple pie.

00:06:49It doesn't matter, you know, but if you, if you have the wrong, if you have the wrong people on the podcast or the chemistry isn't there, it's just not going to work. But fair play, George, like somehow you've, you've managed to, you know, cobble together a good team of guys there. So yeah. Yeah, they're all right. Yeah, there you go. You know, I have to tell you, first of all, you're very understandable with your accent. So no concerns there.

00:07:19I'm watching right now. How to get to heaven from Belfast. Are you aware of this on Netflix? No, no. I haven't been watching. Are the same people who did Dairy Girls, which you mainly have done? I do. Yeah. Dairy Girls. I almost have to use subtitles, man. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, that's. Yeah. Sorry, George. Go ahead. Oh, no. I was just agreeing. Yeah. Subtitles. Yeah. No. Yeah. That accent is like, it's amazing. Like the country of Ireland, including the north, you know, you've got so many variations in

00:07:50for a small country, it's insane. The UK is similar, but it's a much larger country with a much, much bigger population. But Ireland, you can move from Belfast. It starts off up the very north around Fairhead in Antrim. It's almost like a Scottish kind of little. It's not Northern Irish, it's more like Scottish. And then as you work your way down, it kind of gets harsher around Antrim, Belfast. Then as you move out to Donegal, it gets a little bit different.

00:08:19softens a little bit then as you get down towards Monaghan and then whether you go west or east you know you've got Dublin, Midlands, then you've got kind of Calair, Leash, right from then you go down south, Cork, Kerry, that's another accent like you can look understanding them half the time that's a real it's a real you know accent onto itself as well so like for a small island it's incredible the amount of kind of variance you know that you get I don't know if TR if you manage to travel around much but yeah a little bit I

00:08:49So I did some travel in Cork. That was back in 2005. And it was, I can't remember, it was like a city of culture, I think. It was named as a city of culture that year. And so there was like a lot of things kind of associated with that. So I got to Cork and Cove and just that region there. I rented a car both times and started in Dublin and did a clockwise.

00:09:19ring around the country.

00:09:21Yeah, you're dead right.

00:09:22A lot of people get stuck in Dublin.

00:09:24And to be honest, it's the last place I'd want to stay.

00:09:27I mean, you know, I'm from there originally.

00:09:28It's my capital city, blah, blah, blah.

00:09:30But really, there's so much more to see.

00:09:32You know, I always say, I think I said it to UTR, you know, I had put together an itinerary that was kind of Dublin centric because I knew you didn't have a lot of time.

00:09:39But like, if I thought you had a week, I'd be saying, get the hell out of Dublin.

00:09:43Don't be spending 10 quid on a pint in Temple Bar.

00:09:46Yeah, no, and actually, thankfully, yeah, and I appreciate the insights you gave me for that trip. And of course, for that trip recently, I was just there for a couple of days. So and that was kind of our final destination before we went home. So it was more and I had never been to Dublin. So for me, it was it was just right. Like we, we, you know, got around and saw the sights in the city. But we also got outside of the city, as I told you, of course, and we went to

00:10:17Newgrange and some of the other locations outside of there which were really nice. I went to Newgrange. You had your Jethro Tull on Spotify as you're traipsing around Newgrange. Very good. Glad you enjoyed it. Okay. So I want to know how so so Derek you had been listening to Metalheads and

00:10:45And then when you saw George had this other podcast, you checked in on that, and that was how you came here? Sorry, yeah, I suppose for people who only exclusively listen to Stairway, yeah, like just so obviously it's a sister podcast, but because I religiously followed the Metal Heads podcast, I knew, because I remember even you mentioned there was some sort of like wink wink nudge nudge comments about like doing another podcast at one point that I kind of picked up on, and I think George, I was texting you back and forth,

00:11:16and I think you mentioned it to me so then I knew it was coming down the line so I was quite excited about it to be honest you know because I'm pretty much you know I'm 50 like a love metal but you know I love rock as well and since I've had the kids especially in the car like you know I can't really as I was in St. George I can't really flick on bloodbath or you know cradle of felt like so it's kind of get away with that you know it's like yeah exactly yeah I need to be more like Will you know I just don't have that kind of hard ass marine fucking quality you know

00:11:47I'm too soft, you know. But no, because I have my daughter and son in the back and the missus beside me. And, you know, more often than not, it's probably going to be the Lemonheads or something, you know. Oh, Christ. As far as my wife is concerned, George Jones is my favorite everything. You know what I mean? Like, that's, I have to make things. I don't want to kill her, you know. Yeah, yeah. I have to take it easy on her. Yeah, I really expanded my knowledge of 80s pop music.

00:12:16after getting married.

00:12:19That's pretty much what we listen to in the car is

00:12:22Sirius XM 80s on 8.

00:12:25So

00:12:25and I'm not complaining. I like that stuff.

00:12:28My wife used to be

00:12:30great for going together.

00:12:32We went to see Maiden together

00:12:34actually. It was her

00:12:36first time away from the kids actually

00:12:38since they were born. So we went to see Maiden

00:12:39and Malahide there last summer.

00:12:41That was just brilliant. They were absolutely

00:12:44I don't want to sidetrack but that was just amazing they they were I can't believe it you know but that's we'll talk about that again at some length but um but she and then she used to go Paradise Lost um where else she went we went to Crozier and Go Formity like she used to go to anything you know and she quite happily kind of stand through it and put up with it but she did like it you know but it's just I suppose since the kids were born you know little baby years and stuff like it's just kind of oh yes I feel a bit more kind of subtle

00:13:11Right.

00:13:13If you squint, John, if you squint your eyes,

00:13:17we're talking to Pete Townsend here.

00:13:19Yeah.

00:13:22Just a little. It's a bit weird.

00:13:23Yeah, I think it is.

00:13:25I saw Pete on a TV show the other day, and man, he's looking old.

00:13:28Yeah, he is.

00:13:29Well, he is.

00:13:30Yeah.

00:13:30He is.

00:13:31I probably look more like Pete Townsend than you do, so don't take that as an answer.

00:13:34Sort of is.

00:13:36Yeah.

00:13:36I can't remember what Pete Townsend looks like.

00:13:38I got his nose.

00:13:39Do you have any favorite bands, metal or otherwise? I'm just curious, what's your rock? All right, band-wise, well, I suppose My Dying Bride and Athma and Paradise Lost would have been the three. I got into metal around 1991, I suppose, so all those bands were coming out. I love Amorphous. Then black metal-wise, I suppose, Satyricon, Primordial, whatever.

00:14:09I was enslaved of course.

00:14:12He's a big into a slave from the get-go. Opet took me a while. I love Opet now, but I listened to, what was it, The Debut Orchid when it came out. It was advertised in Terrorizer magazine back in the day. So I listened to it, but I was kind of disappointed. It wasn't more Death Doom. So it took me a while to get, I was like, what is this progressive rock or metal you speak of? Although not that it was a hugely progressive album, the debut, but I just found that,

00:14:42A bit difficult to get into at first, but then after a few more lessons, it really worked, you know. But in the beginning, I suppose just to kind of chart the beginning, I would have gotten, like most people in Ireland, Guns N' Roses would have been a gateway drug into metal, you know. They were massive over, still are, like I think in 2016, they played a Slain Castle festival and it was just like you couldn't get a ticket for love nor money, you know. And then there was Def Leppard. This is back like when I was,

00:15:1214, 15 Leopard. And then Metallica, obviously, I mean, huge, big into the American Bay Area stuff. Megadeth less so. But I loved Slayer for me, or just the ultimate American. If I could only pick one American band, metal band, it would be Slayer, you know, I think. Wise decision. Yeah, good choice. Did you guys notice? They just changed it. As soon as he said Paradise Lost, I got up to get a glass of water. I don't know if you guys noticed. I didn't notice that.

00:15:42I noticed Matt and I and the other pot are famous for going to the bar when

00:15:50Paradise Lost was playing during the fest but the Las Vegas it was great it was a long day anyway sorry pardon the interruption yeah you're smart but no Slayer like Metallica obviously were you know massive band at the time you know we had like dubbed copies of Justice for All and Master of Puppets and these are like huge

00:16:12We don't need to go on about these. They're legendary albums. But Slayer, for me, this was just different gravy. I remember buying a copy of Metal Hammer. I know it's turned into a shit rag now, but it used to be pretty good back in the day. It was. Yeah, it was. In the late 80s, early 90s, it was decent because all the good writers were there. They hadn't left for Terrorizer and all the other mags. They had a good stable of writers back then. But I remember seeing a picture of Slayer and I was kind of going, this is different. When I heard the music,

00:16:42There was a darkness to it and there were cool looking bastards too, you know, you had like Tom Areia, you know, Chilean American guy, you know, the hair and the gear, the black, the leather trousers and then Jeff Hannibal. They just looked like I just said I want to be these guys, you know, and then the music, I suppose the videos as well. What was it? Seasons in the Abyss that video, you know, the Egyptian motif, you know, the theme there that was just for me because a young guy that was like this is us. This is amazing. It's just Slayer.

00:17:11were just that there was a darkness to them like that Metallica and Megadeth and any of these bands like we'd grown up on thrash and suddenly the likes of and I hate to say it you know even the likes of the end the new wave of British heavy metal stuff like Iron Maiden and Priest who you know I'd initially gotten into suddenly there were just like cartoon bands because Slayer like you couldn't have Slayer beside if you think how comical Eddie and you know the themes it's nothing against Maiden who I love a lot but it's just that Slayer

00:17:41This was a portal. Slayer were like the portal. They did death metal, I suppose. That's probably the best way to say it.

00:17:47Yeah.

00:17:48You know, I don't think you can appreciate it because you lived through it.

00:17:53It's not that that lens is changing now if you look back on it.

00:17:56And if you're a 20-year-old kid now and you get into this stuff, you don't understand necessarily.

00:18:00But at that time, that step forward was massive.

00:18:03And also, it was also around the time when Priest and Maiden were kind of spinning their wheels a little bit for my money.

00:18:09You know, they were really...

00:18:10Yeah.

00:18:11You know, and so, oh no, I couldn't agree with you more. I mean, especially since I had the exact same experience with Slayer. They were my band once I found them, you know, and it was, and I think you just described the rationale perfectly, you know. Alrighty then. So I'm going to let Derek explain what we're going to be talking about today because he chose the topic for the episode. So what are we doing, Derek? Thanks for passing the hospital pass.

00:18:40that is. That's what they call it in rugby. Right. So I'll get cracking on. So yeah, basically. So the idea was when we decided that it was going to come on, I was trying to think, what could we do? A couple of ideas. But I thought, as I said, for the listener, maybe they'd be interested in hearing about side projects by artists, well-known, famous artists, obviously from respected parent bands.

00:19:09But maybe side project, my take was anyway, and I don't mind what anyone's take was, because the more varied the takes, the better. But my take was, you know, maybe obscure, more obscure side projects that although got a commercial release, might have slipped under the radar, or maybe people had only given them, you know, one spin, and that was it. And a couple of artists are in metal bands, and it's a couple of rock projects that they had that people may or may not know about.

00:19:39Plus, I have a good blend. I deliberately veered away from the prog because I know John and TR might take care of that angle a little bit. And then Jay and George, I know you're massive classic rock fans and I wouldn't dare compete with your knowledge. So I said I'd stay in not my lane, but a lane. So I basically stuck with a hard rock. There's a couple of proggy ones, some blues rock, psychedelic,

00:20:09and alternative rock and some grunge. So basically, it's 10 picks from alternative artists and relating to their side projects or a solo project. I've probably made a bags of explaining all that. No, that's perfect. I don't think you did it all. And I think probably, and just to talk about it, we talked about this briefly before we turned the microphones on, but I, or the recorder on, but I think, I don't think we all went obscure necessarily. Is that correct? Not really, no.

00:20:39I can guarantee you. And actually, some of mine are bands or albums that, like I said, were actually bigger than what the original band was that these guys came from. Or, you know, was fundamentally, I mean, wasn't obscure in any way, really. So there are a few, my choices, they're going to be like, oh, yeah, that's not obscure at all. But some of them, I do have some obscure things.

00:21:09on here that people would be like yeah i don't know what that is so yeah i'm a mix too and so

00:21:14that's just a i'm just a little addendum for anybody who's listening that this is really

00:21:18what we kind of morphed it into was side projects and or you should know about and possibly do and or bands that came about after

00:21:28yeah like the original band yeah like the guy that or the people that came from the you know a band did something later

00:21:37and this is that.

00:21:39I'm going to hold on to the fact too that

00:21:41in a lot of the ones I've chosen,

00:21:43it's really the first one or two albums

00:21:45from the side projects I like the most,

00:21:47which is when they were their most obscure.

00:21:49So even if they went on to get huge,

00:21:51I'll use that as a loophole.

00:21:53Yeah.

00:21:53My split in thirds.

00:21:55I got a third that everyone knows.

00:21:58It's obvious.

00:21:59And kind of mid-tier for known status.

00:22:04And then I've got some obscure ones.

00:22:05I think they might be known if you're in my circle for music but some people may never heard of them so I think I've only got one that maybe nobody's heard of but I bet somebody has perfect so yeah and then yeah a couple of big ones couple of mid-tier ones so we'll see and just to be clear when John says his circle he means him his girlfriend and his cat so and no it's just me the circle of me he's the only one in the

00:22:35I turn around and I see myself. It sounds like dialogue from Meet the Fuckers. The circle of trust. Wow. Matt said with an English accent or with an Irish accent is fuckers. So that's nice. He just went straight. Yeah, I just ruined the whole thing. Meet the Fuckers. The whole reason he got a green light from the studio is like, oh, it's not Meet the Fuckers, right? Yeah.

00:23:05All righty. Well, let's get into this. Derek, what's one of your items?

00:23:12Okay, so I'm going to start, as I said, they're in no particular order. It's just more, as I said, kind of couplets, but I'm going to start off with a side project from a very well-known, I suppose a fairly reclusive but very popular artist from the 90s we all grew up with, and that's Maynard James Keenan.

00:23:33And we're all pretty much aware of Tool and Perfect Circle, but Pusfer was a man who I hadn't really kind of given much truck. You know, I just thought it was more of a kind of a irreverent kind of throwaway kind of place for all those mad ideas, which he had claimed originally was the case. I think when he started, he said it was his creative subconscious. I'm just reading here from some notes. So don't worry. A playground for the various voices in my head, a space with

00:24:03no clear or discernible goals. And I suppose the debut V for Vagina pretty much says it all in terms of how seriously he was taking it and whatnot. But the album I've chosen today is Money Shot, which is the third album from Pussifer. It was released in 2015. And at this point, he was kind of starting to take the project a little more seriously. You know, he's kind of maturing into it a bit.

00:24:32Because I think at that point, Tool hadn't released an album since 2006. This is 2015. Am I right? 10,000 days was probably the last one. Yes. And A Perfect Circle had been busy touring. So I think he needed a project just to kind of get away from all the madness, you know, from the Stadia kind of scene. But Money Shot, what really kind of makes it stand out is the addition of Carina Round, who is a British singer.

00:25:03who he brought in. She's now a permanent member of the band, but her voice, the texture of their two voices working together through this album is just amazing. It's really good. So the album itself, like it's far from irreverent or, or puerile. It's actually quite atmospheric. The first three tracks really roll along in a kind of, there's a nice rumbling baseline. It's kind of alt industrial, you know, there's, there's, but there's ambience kind of hypnotic kind of rhythm all the way through and a couple of loops.

00:25:32But it never kind of gets jarring. When I say industrial, I don't mean like nine-inch nails, you know, it's just more very atmospheric and textured. But what makes it are both our voices. Vocally, excuse me, sorry, I just have a bit of a cold. My voice is scratchy. Both their voices. The first three tracks are the best, Galileo, Agustina and Grand Canyon.

00:26:01There's a cinematic feel to Grand Canyon, which was released as a single. And you kind of get the feeling that you're kind of driving into the desert, you know, that kind of way. It dips a bit in the middle, but then picks up again for a track called The Remedy, which is very funny. Like Maynard, James Keenan, at his lyrical best, he's a very humorous guy. He's got a wave of words that few can match. And the chorus goes, you seem like someone who's never,

00:26:31been smacked in the fucking face. That's okay. We have the remedy, you know, so it's clearly better when sung by him, but it's amazing song. And it kind of, it brings to mind a perfect circle, kind of the outsider tracks like that, you know, and then the album wraps up with a beautiful little number called Autumn, which is Keenan at his absolute best. And as I said, Kareem around the two of them together really make this, but like, I don't know what age Maynard James Keenan was doing this album.

00:27:00I can't imagine he was maybe in his 50s or whatever but his voice is just honey on this you know absolutely so it's it's a band I got into late um I'd always kind of steered away from them because I didn't think like a Mr. Bungle or something I just thought it was some sort of you know zany kind of yeah so project but now I'm very much into them and they've a new album out as well so that's something that we're going to check out you know yeah so uh yeah that's pretty much it so if you guys want to uh add to that I uh I do

00:27:30I do have the new album on my list to listen to. I haven't gotten to it yet. And yeah, they've always been a band that I was just kind of like, eh, kind of like you were saying about Mr. Bungle. I was like, I didn't really take him seriously. But I think now I am going to have to go back and check it out again. They're touring right now, and I think he's doing sort of a 60th birthday tour right now. I believe he's turned 60 this year. Really? Wow. I didn't think he was that old.

00:28:0060 years old yeah and um he's he's well he's a deeply creative guy there's no question about that i he i saw an interview with him recently and i kind of appreciated it because he was he was strangely apologetic for the lyrics on some of the early tool records in which he because he was he used to be kind of snide and i think owning the winery and the other stuff he does has kind of softened him now and he's a lot less sarcastic and interviews and all that kind of thing so a i haven't heard the new record

00:28:30I think he's sort of become more of a well he matured I mean you know he was a punk kid when when those you know the original opiate and all that stuff came out I mean he and and yeah he was very contrary and just like would say inflammatory things just to piss people off but yeah anybody that grows up kind of has to mature and I think I agree like he definitely

00:29:00has mellowed quite a bit.

00:29:04Which is to say nothing of the music.

00:29:06I watched his documentary about his winemaking.

00:29:12And there was a beautiful post-oper song on there called The River or something.

00:29:15I think it's called The River.

00:29:17And anyway, that's deep in the lyrics.

00:29:20And you were talking about the last song on the record you were just talking about.

00:29:22He's super capable of doing these kind of like very sweet.

00:29:27I assume it's sort of an acoustic thing you were talking.

00:29:29Is that the last song you were singing?

00:29:30Or what kind of theme? Autumn, yeah. Well, it's kind of... It's not really acoustic as such, but it's very ambient. It's very gentle. The great thing, what shocked me about the album was how seamlessly the ambient stuff, the electronic stuff, and the guitar is blend, you know? So it works really well. You know, he did... There's a famously unavailable project he did with Trent Reznor from Nine Inch Nails, which I've never...

00:30:00It had a name and everything. I've never run into it anywhere that might be findable on the internet. And I always appreciated the fact that he said about Nine Inch Nails the Fragile. He didn't understand why everybody didn't freak out over that record because it was so good. And it was right around then that I was kind of learning to love him because well first of all they opened a perfect circle open for them on that tour before that record was even out. I think one of the songs was on the radio or something.

00:30:28I saw that tour.

00:30:32And a perfect circle was great on that tour and everything,

00:30:34which obviously not what we're talking about, but.

00:30:40Okay.

00:30:40All right.

00:30:40We've got a lot of records to go.

00:30:42All right.

00:30:42Well, Jay, why don't you go next?

00:30:45All right.

00:30:45Mine's kind of obscure.

00:30:46I think John will know it.

00:30:48Probably TR will know it.

00:30:50I did go through a massive yes phase and probably,

00:30:53and they might be the kings of the side project,

00:30:55even if it was just because it was yes under a legally allowable name like Anderson,

00:31:02Bruford, Wake, Winnenhow, shit like that. Pardon my language.

00:31:06Now, and there's a lot I appreciate about yes.

00:31:10You know, Steve Howe being one of the big obvious things and other things.

00:31:13I love John Anderson's vocals.

00:31:14He's got a solo record called Elias of Sunhillow, which is so pretty and beautiful.

00:31:20And it's a kind of a concept album.

00:31:23It's got a yes like cover. Meaning I think maybe even Roger Dean did the art. I'd have to look at look that up. And it's just this big acoustic. It's kind of refers slightly back to things like all good people and that record. And it's just this pretty thing. And you get to hear John Anderson sing, which I just love John Anderson's voice. I'm not going to overdescribe it except to say that it's a hippy dippy.

00:31:58Yeah, sunshiny. Yeah. It seems to me, and I confess I haven't listened to it in a little while, but I think it's about dying resources and them having to maybe go off planet and find another planet or find another country or whatever it is. I don't recall, but it's perfect for like 73 or whenever the heck it came out. But it's just a very calm, window open afternoon album to listen to. So highly recommend.

00:32:23if you're at all yes adjacent in your fandom or john anderson adjacent it's one that i think

00:32:29it was his first solo record and it probably what made a little splash at the time but

00:32:33i'm sure 90 of the listening public has no idea it exists unless you're a yes fan well right and

00:32:40actually i've definitely heard of that album but i i have never listened to it and so now that you've uh

00:32:48now that you've tipped me off there i really do need to go listen to that one

00:32:52It's the acoustic folk rock parts of Yes is what it is. I might check it out. In terms of Yes, I'm more of a no. That's it. I don't have any other comments. It's worth checking out if you need something to calm me down. All right. TR, what you got? Okay. So my list kind of goes from the most obscure to the least obscure. So I'm going to start with something that's pretty obscure.

00:33:21And this is the Azure Vault. And the album is called The Trials of Alexander Black. Released October 2016. The Azure Vault is the post-rock duo of Tim Cooper from the post-rock band Signal Hill. And Steve Molter from Beware of Safety, also another post-rock band. The Trials of Alexander Black is a mere 31 minutes long.

00:33:51But it's packed full of cool atmospheres, hard-crushing riffs, and mysterious, lonesome textures. Portions of the four songs on this EP range from cinematic to contemplative. It's all instrumental. I like the choices of instruments used, especially the Rhodes piano. So if you like an electric piano sound from like the 70s, like, I just, I don't know what, there's something super nostalgic about that sound for me, and I love that sound.

00:34:20And that's fairly well used on this album. If you like post-rock at all, I think you'll like this. They are on Bandcamp, so if you look up the Azure Vault, A-Z-U-R-E, you'll find them there. And if you like vocals, try somewhere else. Take a walk because you won't find any. Pounce sand, buddy. Yeah. I don't know how post-rock fans sing in the shower, but...

00:34:51They don't. How does that work? They just bob their head. Yeah. It's just an epic cinematic masterpiece. So yeah, the Azure Vault, that's... I mean, I don't know how well-known Signal Hill and Beware of Safety are, but those two post-rock bands were very big in the mid-2000s. If you're a post-rock fan,

00:35:21I really enjoyed this collaboration between these two guys. And, you know, sadly, I don't think even most post-rock fans would even know about this. It's more of an EP, but I just feel like it's a beautiful piece of music. It's multiple songs, but it's, you know, the whole thing is just really great, I feel.

00:35:45It could be so obscure that even the drummer was like, oh, yeah, I was on that.

00:35:53Right on. John. All right. So my order is not really in any order as well, except probably my top two or three are would probably have made the top two or three had I ordered these from a one to 10. So my, I found this one to be interesting putting on the list, but I wanted to put it last just for this reason actually started out as a solo project.

00:36:19that morphed into a big, bigger name band.

00:36:23And then he went back to solo project because the bigger name band was inactive or not doing anything.

00:36:30And so my number 10 is the phenom guitarist, Michael Romeo from the band Symphony X.

00:36:37And I actually do have albums listed, but I didn't put them as the focus.

00:36:42I put the artist.

00:36:43So I have an album that I like from each one of these, so I can do both.

00:36:47But I chose him because he filled the gap when Symphony X decided not to release an album. From 2015, he released his second and third solo albums. And they're basically, I wouldn't say they're Symphony X, but they're about as close as you're going to get if you're a Symphony X fan. Symphony X being a kind of prog power metal band from New Jersey here in the States that are pretty well known if you're in that world that you like.

00:37:17for Prague and power. And they've been a mainstay at the actual festival, both of them, both in Europe and in the U.S. But they weren't really known early on. They were only really known probably in Europe and in Japan. Nobody knew who they were in the States. So it morphed from him leaving his band. He was in the early 90s and he went solo. And his solo tape kind of caught the attention of a Japanese, I think it was called Zero.

00:37:47Zero Something was the label from Japan. They kind of liked it, and they wanted him to kind of fix up the demos that he sent, which is how he ended up forming Symphony X, because it's when he met with the keyboardist Michael Piniella, and then the band formed. But it actually started out as a solo project. That was in 92, 93, 94. Symphony X starts, they blow up for them, and then we don't get another solo album until 2018. And that's the one I'm going to go with, which is War of the Worlds Part 1,

00:38:16which is more of a symphonic version of symphony x but still the heavy guitars are there and his blazing technically sound playing is there and he has all these great musicians that uh are part of the project with him so but with that one because i'm a big symphony x fan but there has been no album for or one album and they're they're kind of becoming like tool a little bit one album since 2011 so the last one was 2015 so one album in 15 years

00:38:46is not cutting it for me. Firstly, so that's why Michael Romeo filled that void. So that's my first one that I'm going to mention. Nice. Yeah, and the thing is, every time they interview a member of Symphony X, they're like, oh, the music's coming. We've got a whole bunch of stuff. We're working on it. It's just like, come on, man. Supposedly the album's coming out now. Yeah, that's right. At that point. All righty.

00:39:16So the first one I'm going to mention, I don't have a lot to say about it, but this is a Phoenix band, and I don't mean Arizona. I mean, this is a band that came out of the ashes of another band that ended because the singer passed away. And that is the band New Order that came from the ashes of Joy Division when Ian Curtis hung himself.

00:39:46Not when they were actually around, but afterward. And New Order, their first few albums were a little more post-punk before going like full synth pop later in the 80s, 90s and such. So I kind of prefer the earlier albums to the later albums, but honestly, it's all pretty good. Yeah, that's about all I got to say is that, you know,

00:40:15They're a band that I'm still continuing to find neat and interesting things about that I enjoy. So. Alrighty. Nice. I haven't listened to them in a while outside of hearing them on Sirius XM. They come on. Yeah. It's like they'll play Blue Monday or something and or some of their more popular hits or whatever. But I like the I like the older stuff. You know, it reminds me of like early cures.

00:40:45as well.

00:40:47You know, I like current Cure and more contemporary Cure, but I really like old Cure where it's just like a bass guitar and a drum kit and Robert singing and, you know, some guitars here and there.

00:41:00The more minimal Cure.

00:41:01And that's what I like, the more minimal New Order as well.

00:41:06So.

00:41:07All right.

00:41:07All right, Derek, what else?

00:41:09Right.

00:41:10So my next one, I'm going to dip into the kind of blues rock scene.

00:41:14This album was released in 2011. It was two members, one of which was ex-Thunder guitarist Luke Morley. Thunder, now I'm not a big, I'm not a huge fan. Well, it's not that I'm not a fan, I just don't know a whole lot about them. But they were kind of part of the UK hard rock scene that features little angels, the almighty Wild Hearts, all that kind of troupe, maybe the choir boys as well. So they were kind of like successful,

00:41:44but kind of deeply unglamorous I suppose is kind of the best way to describe that kind of scene but this is Morley hooking up with a much younger incumbent actually Peter Shoulder of the band called Winterville no idea never heard of them but the name of the band is The Union and the album is Siren Song which is their I think it's their sophomore release yeah and then so this is kind of unapologetic blues rock but it's not the kind of generic you know it's not totally generic

00:42:15There's a good kind of the opening track. The title track is insane. It's brilliant. The switch from acoustic to electric is one of the best you'll hear. The chorus is amazing as well. The singing is really good. Shoulder, the younger guy actually sings and he kind of has a, he's not a kind of a gravelly voice, but Luke Morley adds that to the chorus, you know. Then it kind of moves into a kind of more, a kind of a less Southern Black Crowes kind of kick then in the second track.

00:42:44I'm a big fan of Black Crows, yeah. But not so much the kind of the southern, you know, staying in the kind of soulful blues side of the Crows. And there's even the opening riff of the second track reminded me of Audioslave. Just initially, just briefly, just when I heard it, it was like that, you know, especially from the debut, you know. Then you've kind of got big Led Zeppelin influence. I mean, Led Zeppelin's footprint is all over this, but what blues rock album isn't. And then there's a little bit of kind of,

00:43:14Black Keys too. But the Black Rose and Zep would be two big influences. And I told you I'd get the Rush mention in. What's it say here? Siren Song was nominated for Album of the Year in 2012 by Classic Rock magazine. Or no, it was nominated, but it lost out to Rush's Clockwork Angel. So there you go. Told you I'd get the mention in. John. That's how good this album is.

00:43:46I came into them late, like Pusiver, like I think I heard a track on a classic rock sampler back when they were doing the CDs, you know, pre Spotify and all that jazz. And I was just, it stood out really, you know, on the sampler. I was kind of going, I have to, but it's so hard to get. I mean, the physical copy not, but streaming wise, good luck, you know, because anytime it's on YouTube, it gets hooked or it doesn't exist on Spotify. So there must be some sort of, maybe the guy's

00:44:16I don't know but anyway if you can try

00:44:18get your hands on it definitely do you know

00:44:20yeah I just wrote it down I'm going to definitely check this out

00:44:23yeah siren song by the union so

00:44:26number nine nice

00:44:28excellent

00:44:30Jay what else you got

00:44:32all right well this is the most

00:44:34obscure album of the least

00:44:36obscure artist

00:44:38and it's not that obscure

00:44:40some people will know it but it's not

00:44:42mainstream by any strange sense

00:44:44It is a record John Lennon made and it's called John Lennon Plastic Ono Band. And I know a lot of people kind of know it, but that's you guys. Trust me, a lot of people who have roots in the Beatles and roots in John Lennon and Imagine and all that. And especially with, I think, these many years on, the bad connotations of Yoko Ono are less, especially since she's really actually kind of a talented artist and stuff. And frankly, she's not exactly hooting and howling on this record.

00:45:12But there's this,

00:45:13which she does,

00:45:15hoot and howl.

00:45:15Which she does.

00:45:17She can squeal.

00:45:18But it's,

00:45:19there's this,

00:45:20a bunch of deep introspective songs in here.

00:45:22There's one called Mother,

00:45:23and that's how the album opens.

00:45:24And it's such a good song,

00:45:25in which he does kind of scream therapy at the end of the song.

00:45:28But to a bluesy,

00:45:29raspy voice,

00:45:30it's really good.

00:45:31This does have working class hair on it,

00:45:33which you probably know if you are even a vague John Lennon fan.

00:45:37I just don't think many people probably really have gotten this record

00:45:40and walked through it.

00:45:42Oh, yeah. And it's a really quality record of somebody who's trying to work themselves out mentally after being in the best or biggest band in the world, you know. And that's pretty cool. And, you know, I don't know how many copies sold. I don't know if Working Class Hero was kind of a hit or not. I mean, I think it was sort of, but he does drop a couple F-bombs that make it radio not friendly.

00:46:10Yeah, let's go through it real quick and just see if there's hits on it.

00:46:16Yeah, be surprised if that wasn't.

00:46:17No, I don't think so.

00:46:18Be surprised if that wasn't a hit.

00:46:21It's got, and it's got God, which if you've ever heard U2's God Part 2 is based on that song, and this is God Part 1, I guess you could call it.

00:46:28And it wraps up with the fabulous title, the song titled My Mummy's Dead, which, you know, John could be a little bit of a I sure feel sorry for me kind of guy.

00:46:40But it's a great record and it's kind of cool. It's the only thing that could have happened around this time, which is 70, 71 or something like that. If it came out now, everybody would just be like, what a self-indulgent prick. And maybe they'd be right. But it was John Lennon after all. And if you've never heard John Lennon, Plastic Ono Band, I recommend it. Nice. Good album. All right. Yes. So my next one is a band called Chroma Key.

00:47:10and the album is called You Go Now, released in November 2000. And Chroma Key is the solo project from Kevin Moore, the former keyboardist of Dream Theater. This is the second album after the debut Dead Air for Radio. I like Moore's kind of down-tempo songs along with his unassuming vocal technique. Typical of Moore's songwriting, you get his music played

00:47:40alongside audio recordings of such things as NASA moon missions or self-help tapes about how to stay calm while driving. Moore makes it sound seamless, but I'm sure it takes a lot of effort to match the music to what is being said and the cadence of it all. He does this with aplomb, and there is a coolness to it that is hard to describe. Not all the tracks have this. Some are just straight-ahead songs with his vocals and lyrics over them. His keyboard playing is always tasteful,

00:48:10and he never goes overboard like some keyboard players that came later in Dream Theater. He combines the NASA overdubs with his own vocals on the track Astronaut Down, my favorite track on the album. In some of the more clever and funny lyrics on the album, he bemoans being in the single scene and says he feels like an astronaut in a submarine, which I can relate to. Highly skilled, but at times completely out of place.

00:48:39It's definitely worth checking out. I actually, I like all his Chroma Key stuff, but this is my favorite album that he did. I mean, the debut is really good, but I like the tracks on this album, You Go Now from 2000. Yeah, it's good. I flip-flop between this and Dead Air all the time, which ones I like. He only has three, quote-unquote, Chroma Key. Then he goes under the solo name after that.

00:49:11All right, John.

00:49:13All right.

00:49:14So, Derek, you made reference to something that you got into when you started listening to metal at the time.

00:49:21And it so happens.

00:49:23This kind of ties back to that a little bit.

00:49:25My next artist or group that I picked actually started out.

00:49:31It's not out of the ashes of a band, but it's when one member left that band and hooked up with someone who was already solo. They were both doing solo projects, as I understand it, and they ended up forming a band together and did three albums together before the guy who left the first band left that band and left it kind of, I guess, a solo project going forward. I guess it's still under the same name, but the band I'm going with is Any Matter, and they come from,

00:50:01One of the members comes from Anathema, Duncan Patterson. Yeah. Who now I believe lives in Ireland, if I'm not mistaken. That's right. Even though he's from the pool, Liverpool. So yeah, if you're not familiar with Animatter, they originally started out, it was Duncan Patterson and Mick Moss. And it was kind of a trip hop acoustic art rocky kind of, the first album a little more trip hop, more band oriented, I guess, on the composition.

00:50:31But then they've kind of got real trip pop with their next album. Then they became quite acoustic. And one thing to Mick Moss's credit is he's very good at taking his songs that are full band and playing them acoustic and vice versa. Having acoustic songs he starts with and turning it into full band composition. So, and I guess the album that I would pick is the first album he did by himself after Duncan Patterson left where he incorporated kind of

00:51:01an anathema feel from the late 90s but kind of added a little bit of the Pink Floyd guitar sound to it some of David Gilmour's playing a little bit and just made it as depressing as anathema to the point where you're like yeah not catatonia depressing but still but still very good though and that album is Leaving Eden from 2007. Beautiful, beautiful album, love it. Yeah and I believe

00:51:31Danny Cavanaugh actually guests on that album and on the very first track you know it starts out and you're just like this is going to be a trudge this is going to be rough and then he just rips into this very David Gilmore-esque guitar soul and it's just like wow so I think that's a great album if you're not into the trip-hop stuff you know you might like the first album Savior because that's a little more song structure oriented but if you're not into that or them doing mainly acoustic songs

00:52:01this would be a great place to start because this is when it becomes actually a band even though it's still mick moss is the main composition writer singer plays he has a band that he plays live with which i'm so bummed we'll never get to see them in the states i'll have to come over to see them in europe somewhere but uh great i love antimatter and i get everything from them he releases a lot of compilations a lot of like rarities and acoustic stuff and live acoustic show stuff and he'll play some anathema from

00:52:31Still some of the anathema stuff that was involved with when Duncan Patterson was there. So which is all the stuff that I prefer the most, even though I like a lot of anathema. Yeah, I second your enthusiasm for that band, John. Yeah, like Mick Moss is the man, you know, his vocals are amazing. Yeah, like you could kind of say it's kind of Eddie Vedder-esque, but not in that kind of not in the Creed way. Yeah, it's not like the nasally kind of

00:53:01Yeah. But he has that type of deep voice. He's got that timbre for sure. Yeah. But it just works with the music, like the smokiness of it, you know. And I think, and then Duncan's, you know, the acoustic stuff, I think the Weight of the World is another album. So good. Like, if you're trying to get people, I always think, you know, they say, what would you make people listen to if you wanted to get them into prog rock or metal or something? I'd always start with something like that and go, okay, it's going to get a lot heavier, but this is just kind of like, you know,

00:53:30what we listen to as well you know this is also us i'm glad you mentioned that's a unique album

00:53:37because the way they they structure the album is each one of them would write a song and they would play like a duncan song then the next song would be a mcmoss song the next song would be a duncan song they alternated on the album and you can hear there's a significant difference in their writing style even though the songs all kind of sound this similar you know for the style that they're doing that's a great album yeah so

00:53:59I'm going to pause for topical information real quick. And it's just an honest question. George and John, are you guys in line of this bomb cyclone that's coming through? Oh, yeah. I mean, it's been raining all day. Supposedly for us. Supposedly around five o'clock, it's going to get cold enough to switch over to snow. Yeah. So I'm hoping it'll stay rain. Yeah. I may escape more than George or TR on this one. That's all they're talking about on CNN. Yeah. Well, it's because New York is going to get

00:54:29They had absolutely drilled, they said. And Boston. Philadelphia and Boston. So we might, they're saying anywhere from us between one and two to four inches, which if that's the case, and it's not ice, like the snow crete we had three weeks ago. Yeah. Yeah. It's currently 38 degrees. That's a good sign. So if it can just stay, I mean, I know it can snow at 38 degrees, but. But that'll be nice and fluffy. Yeah. So we've had, we've had something like, not specifically where I live, but.

00:54:59down in Kerry in Ventry. I think the weather station down there has recorded 51 consecutive rainy days in Ireland. We've just had fucking great clouds over us. You know that October Tide album, like, you know, 12 days of rain. I laugh at that, you know. It's like, you know, try 51 days of rain, you know. Time to build an ark. It just won't stop. Like, it's just incessant, you know.

00:55:28Not to keep going, just real quick, Jay, did you see Tahoe got freaking pounded? Yeah. Brutal. How much snow they got up? The avalanche was up there in Truckee or something. Just northwest of Truckee, yeah. Yeah, they got trounced, man. Oh, man. I had seen some live footage of the Truckee Pass and all that stuff, and it was just... And that's already the area, you know, that Alpine area is already, like, the heaviest snow packs every year are usually up there.

00:55:58for the whole country. Most people don't know that. It's actually in California, but this time was brutal. It was brutal, yeah. It was brutal. They need the water, but yeah, so it's like the whole place is shut down. Yeah, but now it's going to be all runoff, and they're going to lose most of it. Yeah, it's going to flood. It's going to flood, yeah. Where there's burning scars and stuff, it's going to be brutal this spring. Anyway. I've had enough snow, thank you. Yeah, I don't mind fluff. That ice that the three UTR and I got, that was brutal. That's the worst ice I've ever seen since I moved back. You needed like,

00:56:28a hard metal tool to bust it up. Just to be able to bust it up to shovel it. You couldn't shovel it as it was. I think it was about this on our driveway, about that thick. It's getting down to... We've actually had some cold wind events here and 40 degrees and stuff, but I am not rubbing it in when I tell you the poppies are blooming in my front yard right now. Thanks a lot, Jay. I appreciate that. I went out to do something the other day. I came back and they bloomed.

00:56:58in the time I was gone. It was like 20 minutes. I came back and my whole yard was covered with poppies. Oh, Jay, real quick. I'm sorry. I'll have to get with you later. I watched a show where Portal came up. It was a documentary. Yeah. What? Yes. Somebody got murdered. So I think that's what it was all about. It wasn't Jay. I saw this. He has an alibi. Yeah, if you can remember the title or something. I'll see if I'll ask Jay. We were watching. I was like, wait a minute. Jay lives there. That's awesome. Wow. Yeah. Alrighty. Where is everyone based?

00:57:28Stateside there. I presume everyone's in the States. Yeah. Maryland. And for me, yeah. Those guys are all on the East coast. I'm in Northern Virginia, just out, just like six miles from DC. Yeah. I'm about maybe 35 minutes North East of Baltimore. And I was in San Francisco for years, but now I'm about 50 miles North of the Mexican border in Arizona in about two minutes. Um,

00:57:58of the new Mexican border.

00:58:01You've been kidnapped.

00:58:03It could be at any time.

00:58:06Jay, how far are you from Tucson?

00:58:09They're feeding you well.

00:58:11Yeah.

00:58:12It takes about an hour 45 minutes to get to Tucson from here.

00:58:16Okay.

00:58:17My mom's there, so I'm up there.

00:58:19So you're close to the new Mexican border.

00:58:21So you're near, there's a national park there, the Bowie National Historic Site.

00:58:26Yeah.

00:58:26Yeah, that's right.

00:58:27That's on the other side of the mountains for me.

00:58:28but I've been there a couple times. Okay. Yeah, that's in the middle of nowhere, dude. Oh, I'm in the middle of nowhere. Yeah. Derek? If you get in a car accident here, there's a helicopter involved. If. To the hospital. Jay has way more things to worry about than that. He's got to worry about the dangerous livestock and animals that come through his property that he finds curled up in the corner that are like six feet long with big fangs. And quite frankly, I would be more worried about what's above me than what's below me.

00:58:58Well, I went for a hike this morning, and my wife and I, and I did say, you know, with these warmer temperatures, we've got to start watching for rattlesnakes now, because I saw my first lizard yesterday. And they're not pups out there. No, no, it's like a mini Australia. You kind of... It is, yeah. It is. You wake up in the morning and wonder, like, is this my last day? Because of some microscopic fucking insect, you know? You're right, yeah. Just derail your whole day, you know, you end up in the morning.

00:59:30Since we're off the rails, are there any snakes in Ireland? Well, no. Some... Apparently some Roman slave paid to them. I don't know why, but yeah. Because that was the... I was going to say, New Zealand and Ireland, if you're like me and you have a phobia of snakes, that's your place to be. I could never go outside of a big city in Australia because I'm like, I'm taking my life in my own hands.

00:59:58I wouldn't make it past three grades of grass before I was in danger.

01:00:03I'd be worried.

01:00:04I mean, snakes in of themselves, I have no problem with.

01:00:08I've handled them before, but non-biting, non-venomous snakes, obviously.

01:00:12But I mean, it's a different thing.

01:00:14It's like saying being afraid of a non-venomous snake.

01:00:19It's totally different.

01:00:21Yes.

01:00:22Still afraid.

01:00:23There's no comparison.

01:00:24If you live here as I do, you have, and everybody has, and I have, a bucket with a screw top on it and a handle about this big that is like one of those dinosaur toy grabbers. Yep, and you grab them and put them in the bucket. You catch the rattlesnakes on your property and then you put them in the bucket and you drive them down to your neighbor's office. Put them in your mailbox. Jay pulls up, he's on camera, pull it up, get out, get out, get out. Choke it into your neighbor's

01:00:55Well, we all drive them down to the Wash, which is what a river is known here, since there's no water in any of our rivers. But it's, yeah. And is anything protected? Like, you obviously, like, I'm not, I'm not about, all about killing things, but you can't, you probably have to be protected. Some, some species are protected, I'd imagine you have to be careful how you handle them. Gila monsters are, and you don't see them very often. That's the only venomous lizard in the United States. They're about this big, really beautiful.

01:01:24I've only seen one since I moved here two years ago. Rattlesnakes are not protected. You can kill them if you want to. And people frequently do. Most of the people who live near me wouldn't do that, though. They try to keep our ecosystem going. And if you've got a rattlesnake walking through your property, I know walking is a weird term, they free you of almost every other vermin or varmint. So they're really kind of nice to have around. It's just when you turn a corner and don't expect to see one and they rattle at you. That rattle,

01:01:53is written into our dna man it scares the dog it's rough dogs not out of here i think the

01:02:01heli monster is the only protected one and then there's hunting seasons for so you can't kill deer or

01:02:07javelina which is like a wild boar or other things during certain times of the year but yeah i always but you know but by and large the people who live out here are sort of

01:02:21I mean they're all the ranchers so the ranchers will kill a wolf if they see it but

01:02:25that's a pity yeah because you know what was the kind of remember when I was in Canada I mean obviously be from Europe the Canadian guys used to wind us up and say like oh you know the bears they're everywhere like I mean we I think the only time I saw a bear was it was it an arse of a black bear bounding off as he smelled as he smelled the diesel from the quad you know like these things have no interest in

01:02:49Hanging Around as four or five sweaty guys come rumbling through their habitats, you know? They don't. We've got a black bear that comes down here, eats our bird seed, and if I open the door, he runs. What we do have, and I'll probably never see, and boy, would I love to, is Mexican jaguars are caught on trail cams from time to time, and they won't ever even tell you where they caught the picture, because they don't want anybody messing with these things. Getting eaten? Well, or killing it, you know?

01:03:19I mean, it's so rare at this point, but two or three sightings a year. Boy, I would love to see one of those. Yeah, but see from inside your house. Yeah. Right. Yeah. Those things are. I don't care. I don't need to see it. They're so big and fast and strong. And I feel like that's a great place to move to big, strong, and fast for George's next pick. Oh, yeah. That's my fault, I think. No, not at all.

01:03:49It's totally embellished. It makes this all more interesting. What a transition. Actually, we can go right back to it, but I would say this. More than any animal that lives here, the thing I worry more about is mules, drug runners. Oh, yeah. The migrants don't worry me because they don't want to get caught, but the drug runners can be dangerous. When you go down certain canyons that say... You don't want to go to your own episode. It's like, oops. Exactly.

01:04:19That segues into something that I've been holding on to for the last 5-10 minutes because I didn't get a chance to say it. But, you know, whenever I hear a certain Eddie Money song, I think of you. Any guesses? Let's see. First of all, he was really into cocaine, so it could be any number. No, no. It's Give Me Some Water. Give me some water because I shot a man on the Mexican border. Right, right, right. Thought it was going to be Take Me Home Tonight.

01:04:49It's always take me home.

01:04:49I'm out tonight with Jay.

01:04:52But.

01:04:53All right.

01:04:53Now I'll get into mine.

01:04:55And this is the one that I don't know if anybody's going to have heard of them.

01:05:01And this is like the greatest cover band ever.

01:05:06It's a super group.

01:05:07A punk rock super group.

01:05:11Featuring.

01:05:12Well.

01:05:12The band is Me First and the Gimme Gimmes.

01:05:15Anyone?

01:05:15Anyone?

01:05:16Yes.

01:05:16Oh, dude.

01:05:17I have all their stuff.

01:05:18Okay.

01:05:18My band did cover versions of their cover versions. Yes. So this is a punk rock supergroup. It's got Spike from the Swing and Utters, Joey from Lagwagon, somebody you might have heard of, CJ Ramone from a band called the Ramones. Wait a minute, who? He's a more recent addition to the band, but also previous members were Fat Mike from NoFX.

01:05:48Chris from the Foo Fighters and no use for a name. And so basically Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, as I said, they're a cover band and they did all these punk rock covers of famous songs mostly. And each album sort of had a theme. Like their first album, which is my favorite, Have a Ball from 1997, is Hits of the 60s and 70s. And you've got Danny's song by Kenny Loggins, Leaving On a

01:06:18The Jet Plane, I Mean Julio Done by the Schoolyard. Those are great choices for cover songs. One Tin Soldier. The Surveillance Hills, Tongue in Cheek. Uptown Girl, I Am a Rock, Sweet Caroline, Seasons in the Sun, Fire and Rain. Me Sweet Caroline. Huh? You know what? Hey, I just watched that Neil Diamond thing with Wolverine in it. It was pretty sweet. Yeah? I expect it probably is, yeah. I mean sweet as in like touching. I recommend it. It was fun. All right. And so,

01:06:48They have different themes. Their second album, ARA Drag, where they did show tunes, Blow in the Wind. I think that was more 60s stuff. Love their country. Country covers. And it's really good because it's all these songs that you're like, oh, I know that song. But it's faster and heavier. Way faster. But still quite melodic because Craig can sing. But rockin'. Yeah. Absolutely.

01:07:18this energy and just fun and yeah it's it's a blast so yeah and they're still around it looks like they've got like one two three four like it looks like a dozen albums anyway so yeah i saw something recently where it was like but it wasn't it was me first and something else or like yeah somebody in the gimme gimme's or me first and somebody else i i can't remember yeah i remember i saw something recently and i was like wait a minute what the heck's

01:07:48What got changed? I don't really know what's going on. It's so funny you should mention them. I was in a cover band about 10 years ago. We would actually play some of their songs. It was a lot of fun. It's songs people know, so they get excited about it.

01:08:18But they're sped up and rocked out. And it's a lot of fun. Yeah. And which one is it? I think it's our. They're a drag. They do. Science fiction double feature, man. From Rocky Horror. So good. And yeah. So anyway. Oh, Rainbow Connection. You know. Muppet movie. Just such good stuff. So love these guys.

01:08:49And with that, I will pass the microphone back to Derek. Check that out, actually. Which Ramon is in that again? CJ. Okay, he's the youngest. Yeah, he was the bass player that replaced Didi. He's the only one alive now, is he? Marky's alive, but all the original members are dead. Yeah. Okay, so moving on then. So this is the first pick of my next kind of couplet. So this is

01:09:19Concentrating on grunge artists. And this band, this was one I missed back in 93. And I got into it. And when I finally got into it, it was a gem. It's a bit of a hidden gem. And this is the side project of Stone Gossard of Pearl Jam. Now, it's not Bayleaf, his very worthwhile solo album. But this is a band called Brad. And the album is Shame.

01:09:48I don't know if you've heard this, this was released in April

01:09:52in 93, so think about this

01:09:54this was released at the height of Gossard's

01:09:57fame with Pearl Jam

01:09:59the stadia, the

01:10:01sheer touring schedule

01:10:03and everything, so it was obviously something

01:10:05for him to ferret away and hide

01:10:07from all that

01:10:09because they were the biggest band in the world

01:10:11I'm sure at that point

01:10:14arguably

01:10:17so originally

01:10:18shame, but in an act of pre-internet trolling, some guy called Brad Wilson objected. So they took his name instead. So, and then they call the album shame. And this is not what you'd expect. It's a fairly kind of soulful funk. So it's kind of like Prince kind of meets Stevie Wonder with a little bit of Jane's addiction. There is grunge in there, but the grunge that kind of permeates the album is more like a mother love bone, kind of malfunction type.

01:10:48sound. Remember the kind of what I call kind of proto grunge, the kind of non-metal grunge, you know? So. Hair grunge. Yeah, exactly. The big selling point for this album, though, is the singer, Sean Smith. This guy, he passed away in 2019, but he's got a voice like Absolute Honey. It's unbelievable. He kind of sounds like a mixture of, I suppose, Andrew Wood crossed with Stevie

01:11:18He used to be in a band called Pigeon Head and another band called Satchel. But I hadn't heard of him. Like, I mean, Mother Love Bone are one of my favorite bands. I mean, Andrew Wood was legendary. One of the few songs that makes me cry profusely is the one, the track off of the single soundtrack. I'm going to say, what was it? Chloe Dancer? Crown of Thorns. Yeah. Oh, man. Like that song just absolutely makes fucking bits of me, you know? Yeah, I love that. Yeah. So he's

01:11:48He's got this, just the timbre, I can't describe it, but I definitely recommend anyone listening to check the band out. They're on Spotify, so it's an easy one to find. Some of the songs sound a bit unfinished. It was only recorded in 20 days, so it's not the full article, which you expect. I'm sure the touring schedule for Gossard was mental at the time. What's interesting is

01:12:19Mike McCready probably gets more of the plaudits for being more virtuosic I suppose of the two you know in Pearl Jam but um Gossard brings a very interesting kind of guitar sound to this album and I really love it because I am a Prince fan you know uh growing up in the 80s I always liked Prince but uh but more so Sean this guy Sean Smith and he died tragically in 2019 as I said I won't go into the details of his death because it's actually quite horrific and I don't want to kind of I don't want to go down that lane because

01:12:48I just want to think of the guy alive to be honest it's a sad loss but definitely check it out anyone listening for sure. All right I got to share something weird with you guys is it just me you can't tell looks like TR more and more like Paul Stanley he looks down he looks like Paul Stanley at this age yeah there you go you see it yeah eyebrows and everything you're freaking me out man.

01:13:19There you go. From me. Pick it up. That's the other podcast. Has anyone heard of Brad? Heard of it, yes. I remember when that came out. I didn't really look for it or get into it, but I do remember that. I'll have to look and see. I might have it, but I have everything right. The album cover is from some Seattle cafe. It's got those weird faces.

01:13:49Yeah.

01:13:49Kind of like, remember, remember Michael Fassbender was in a film called Frank and he had some weird head. It was good. It's kind of like that. Very freaky looking, actually.

01:13:58I will say this. I find Stone Gossard the most endearing member of that band for what he likes in music, what he likes in guitar playing, what he likes in guitars. He's just, he's the kind of guy I think I could sit around and have a good conversation with.

01:14:12Yeah. He's the unsung hero, definitely, of the band. And that's kind of why I picked it. You know, I didn't want to, like, obviously, McCready,

01:14:18He had Mad Season. That was a super group. But this kind of little gem was something else. I can get through mine fairly quick here. It's been mentioned by me on the other podcast under some circumstances. I cannot remember which. But it is a category of, I'm not going to call it side project, but of in the late 70s through the 80s, there were a lot of really quality guitar players that sort of

01:14:48showed up as replacements in bands and then went off and had mid-level careers of their own and i could if i tried hard enough i could think of a bunch to mention i mean and i think one would be um who's the white snake guy i certainly can't think of his name the singer oh sykes john sykes like john sykes was involved in some pretty high level shit and then he kind of you know he was still out there and guitar players knew him he would do something interesting everyone saw right and um and now and so the guy i'm going to reference

01:15:18is actually came in very late to a band called Thin Lizzy went off and had a mid-level but very well respected career this would be Gary Moore and just a really favorite guitar player of mine who went off to do a lot of really great blues stuff that I love but just for a little while in the 80s he fit into this sort of guitar hero hard rock niche open for a couple probably pretty

01:15:48big bands but you know his tours would always have been smaller theaters the record in particular is called quarters of power worth mentioning especially under the guise of what we're talking about here because it has a guest spot by jack bruce from cream on it who sings a really great song and plays bass on said song it's called the end of the world um but there's a lot of guys that that kind of floated in like that like i say like john stiggs um gary moore and they were involved in these kind of big bands at the end of their careers or

01:16:18was they were going down in some cases or up, in Whitesnake's case, and then went off and just kind of did this sort of like Joe Bonamassa thing. You know what I mean? Like some people know who they are and some people don't. So Gary Moore has a lot of interesting records. Quarters of Power is probably my favorite one, and it's highly recommended for hard rock and guitar hero fans out there. Cool. Cool. All right. My next one is maybe a little more overt.

01:16:49This album is called Arch Matheos Sympathetic Resonance, released in September 2011. Basically, modern Fates Warning with John Arch singing on it. This album was a welcome surprise when it came out. Even though John Arch's EP, Twist of Fate, had come out in 2003, not much really came of it, and it seemed that he had receded into dormancy again. But then this came out, and it sounded so inspired, and his vocals sounded strong,

01:17:18and vital. For the Fates warning fan, this was having your cake and eating it too, since Fates didn't break up to do this, and there was no drama in the band while they recorded this with Arch. Just two years later, they would release another album with Ray Alder. This album, however, was heavy and pretty much everything I was looking for in the return of John Arch. Powerful songs, his unique singing style and melodies, and the whole band firing on all cylinders. Thankfully, they played a live show with this lineup,

01:17:48which was totally satisfying. John and I went up to Hartford, Connecticut to see the show at the Webster Theater in May of 2012. Arch Matheos, Sympathetic Resonance. Nice. You get extra points for that one because I'm going to say that Sympathetic Resonance was an offshoot or a project from John Arch's Return. John Arch did that EP and then they just kind of kept that relationship going. So it really wasn't even a product of Fate's Warning so much as it was just

01:18:18And Mathias just having done his... Well, yeah. I mean, I guess he kind of was like, hey, I'm writing this stuff and these are the guys that are in Fate's Warning now that could play this with me, right? So, I mean, yeah. It was actually written as the next Fate's Warning album. All that stuff. Yeah, all that material was written. Yeah, and actually you're right because none of it resonated with Alder, right? And that's why he kind of went to John Arch with it.

01:18:47I would contend it's the second Arch Matheus release because in all reality the John Arch EP is really Arch Matheus because those are the two primary writers on the album and Joey Vera's on the album. I guess what? Portnoy's on there. Portnoy's on the album. I thought John claimed to have written the EP in total though certainly he's not the gifted guitar player that John is so that's probably what he brought to the table. I actually prefer the EP or not but I think

01:19:17Sympathetic Resonance is great.

01:19:19Yeah, that's awesome.

01:19:21I had looked for the EP forever on vinyl until John finally told me, dude, if you get Sympathetic Resonance, it's the last side.

01:19:29Right, but they finally did release it, though.

01:19:31Well, yeah, they did.

01:19:32And actually, yeah, it was just re-released.

01:19:34And so you can get a nice copy of that with the, I think it also has the edit of one of the tracks, too.

01:19:41I mean, both tracks are so low.

01:19:42The first track, that DNA thing about, what's the name of that record?

01:19:48A Twist of Fate.

01:19:49Twist of Fate.

01:19:50That track.

01:19:52It's just one of my favorite metal tracks post-2000.

01:19:54That song.

01:19:55Yeah.

01:19:56I must check out Arch Mateus.

01:19:58Actually, I've read a lot of reviews, you know, through magazines or online.

01:20:02You see articles and reviews, but I have a few.

01:20:06I like Fate's Warning quite a bit, actually.

01:20:09They're one of the American progressive bands that I really have a good opinion on. Queensryche, like a kind of hit and miss for me, but fates tend to be a bit more consistent, you know? Oh, for sure. Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. I mean, yeah. The two Queensryche now, I suppose. You've got two face warnings now as well. Yeah, yeah. They're all splitting up. Okay, John. All right. So,

01:20:39I'm going to bend the rules of music, meaning this has nothing to do with rock whatsoever. But a lot of the music that I'm going to mention is used actually in this artist's primary band or former primary band. A lot of the style, a lot of it, he kind of took from that band and started this project for it.

01:21:07And that project is called Base Communion. It's an ambient, electronic, dark ambient project. And it features Stephen Wilson from Porcupine Tree. And I took this because this kind of, I thought, fit in perfect with Derek's suggestion that it's a side project. It's pretty obscure, albeit not rock at all. But a lot of the textures and experimentation he uses in Base Communion, a lot of it actually is in Porcupine Tree's music.

01:21:36And so there's a connection that way. But I took it just because I do like this project a lot. He's got a whole slew of other projects. I could have talked about IEM if anyone's from, I mean, I'm guessing most people have never heard of IEM that are listening to this podcast. George, I think I've suggested IEM to you because they are a Krautrock. Or it is, you know, for the three or four releases that came out.

01:22:06in the late 90s, early 2000s. But I wanted bass comedian just because I love ambient, dark ambient music. And there is a tie for this back to the albums with Porcupine Tree where some of this stuff was used. And it's just kind of morphed into its own side project and was somewhat prolific for a while. He was releasing a lot of this until he took a little bit of a break because he was doing 8,000 different projects and remastering and remixing another 42.

01:22:362,000 projects. Sorry to cut it across. I just don't know where this guy finds time to breathe. Yeah. Apparently, it's almost like if you added up all the hours, it would be more than actual, like, is humanly possible. Yeah, yeah. He owes life hours. Yeah, right. It's almost unbelievable because it's like, wait a minute, how is it possible that this guy did this many album remixes and remasters? Yeah. Well, if you study your

01:23:06Harry Potter,

01:23:08you will know that her had this little gadget that let her be in two places at once.

01:23:13Yeah.

01:23:14That would do it.

01:23:15Apparently that's about it.

01:23:17He said in an interview,

01:23:19he works super fast when he remixes those albums.

01:23:23It just,

01:23:23he sits down,

01:23:25it just gets it done.

01:23:26And I'm like,

01:23:27that is nuts because it's at first it was like one album a year.

01:23:31Then it was two.

01:23:32Now it's like four or five.

01:23:34And you're like,

01:23:34oh my goodness.

01:23:35And it's not like they're easy albums to remix some of them. Some of those Tull albums and some of those Yes albums, that's... Yeah, yeah. And he's needle dropping some of those too on top of that, you know, and going... And now he's... There's big responsibility there. Like, I don't care what anyone says. I know he's Mr. Prog or whatever, but like, if you go back to the original fan base for Tull and all those bands, like, maybe he doesn't think... Maybe he works so fast he doesn't think about the consequences of messing it up. But, you know, because otherwise I...

01:24:05If it was him, I'd just be a nervous wreck. At the same time, I think that he's got... I think he naturally probably gravitates toward... I think he's lucky enough to have a good ear to be able to just naturally go in and go, this is what sounds right to me. And I think that's how he gets through it. Because you're right. A buddy of mine just let me...

01:24:35Heavy Horses. And that's a Tull album from like 78 or whatever. And Wilson just did the remix remaster of that. And I don't know anything about this album. My buddy just was like, hey, check this out. But I can see how if you've got a devoted fan base who has an idea of what they think this album is supposed to sound like, and somebody comes out and says,

01:25:05Oh, I'm going to make it better. You better darn well be right about it. You know, with that fan base, because they're going to let you know if you didn't. And he's managed to do that pretty well across the board on pretty much. I don't know. I've never seen anybody go, Oh, this Stephen Wilson mix is crap, or I don't like what he did. It's out there. Is there? There's a few.

01:25:33I have just two comments to contribute to this one is Heavy Horses Needed It

01:25:38that's the record that comes out directly after Songs from the Wood and it was this and it just had no space in it like and and Songs from the Wood had all kinds of space in it so I think the diehards probably were glad he touched that one but I also think the diehards know that he's a diehard and like yes he's touching records he holds in awe I'm positive he's a Jethro Tull like oh yeah big time oh big time yeah and so I think at least going

01:26:03to it, most of the fans are sort of like, well, if they're going to have somebody do it, let's have it be him. You know what I mean? And then we'll let the chips fall. Yeah, he's a fan. His background also, his strongest suit is not his making music. It's in the studio. It always has been. And he's talked about how his father got him excited and involved in working with all that equipment.

01:27:00I'll be it.

01:27:03it and see what happens. If you guys look over my

01:27:06left shoulder,

01:27:07you can see some of the books

01:27:10up there on my top shelf

01:27:11and some of those are the

01:27:13Tull ones that he worked on.

01:27:15We have to do an episode about

01:27:17Jethro Tull, by the way.

01:27:19Maybe so.

01:27:19Do an episode about John's CD collection.

01:27:21Right there?

01:27:23That's the Yes stuff he did.

01:27:26He did improve

01:27:28some Yes stuff.

01:27:29I don't care what Yes fans

01:27:30are the worst

01:27:32I think Crimson fans are bad, but Yes fans are even worse. I say that as a Yes fan. Yeah. Like what he did with the third album, kind of drawn a blank off of a sudden. Fragile? No. No, no. The Yes album. Yes album. Of course, it's the name of the band. Yeah. It's so easy. I thought he, because I always thought that sounded kind of, eh, it's maybe because it wasn't.

01:28:01at the time when it was released. But I thought he improved it. But anyway. Yep. That's my next one. Stephen Wilson's Bass Communion. Nice. Oh, and the album. Sorry, forgot to put the album. Ghosts on Magnetic Tape, which came out in 2004. Yeah. Which kind of started the whole Porcupine Tree Opeth ghost thing that happened around that period because then Ghost Reveries came out the next year from Opeth. Yeah.

01:28:33All righty. My next one is a side project of sorts. It's also a super, super, super group side project. A one and done album from 2004. This is Probot. Oh, I was wondering if someone was going to bring that up. Nice. Yeah, this is Dave Grohl from Foo Fighters.

01:29:00Which I'm actually going to use this as a nested doll of Nirvana to Foo Fighters. Foo Fighters is the result of the end of Nirvana. And then Probot comes from Foo Fighters. But this album, completely out of character for Dave Grohl's type of music, it's a metal album featuring a host of metal legends.

01:29:32So he clearly has a good metal pedigree because he got some of the best of the best. He had Kronos from Venom, Max Cavalera, Lemmy, Mike Dean from COC, Kurt from DRI, Lee Dorian from Cathedral, Kim, however you say his last name from Soundgarden, Pile, yeah, Wino from St. Vitus and

01:30:02A little guy named Tom G. Warrior. Snake from Voivod. Eric Wagner from Trouble. The Mighty King Diamond. And Hidden Track with Jack Black. A lot of doom singers in there. Wow. Yeah. A little bit of proto-doom royalty there. Big time. I saw something out of the corner of my eye accidentally.

01:30:30some years back now, and they must have had some sort of contest or something, and they, two fans got to go to Dave Grohl's house, and this was well after the large success of Foo Fighters, and they got, I think it was sort of like, come and watch us record a song or something, I don't know, and of course, they were all freaked out, and they loved it and everything, and they were down in the basement of his house, and they were getting ready to leave, and I think he gave them a couple t-shirts or something, and then they were leaving, and he said, hey, wait, do you guys want a couple boxes of ProBot albums?

01:31:02Speaks to the sales figures on that one. I've got the CD somewhere. Nice. That's a good one. They probably didn't even intend to call into Dave Grohl's house. It's just that he's everywhere. He happened to be in the house they were in. It was like, oh, I'm not here. I can't get away from this guy. It's true. He's a lovable guy, but he's so ubiquitous at this point that he's kind of getting on my nerves a little bit. Yeah, exactly. I'll give Steve

01:31:31I think it's a week off man, go somewhere. Nice. Alrighty. All right, back to Derek. So into the weeds we go. So you mentioned Kim Tile, but this one's kind of slightly related to him. This is side project by original two Soundgarden members, Shepard and Cameron, Ben Shepard and Matt Cameron, and it's the Wellwater Conspiracy.

01:32:01So they originally started a side project called Hater, which came out in 93, which was kind of more kind of mainstream grunge. But Wellwater Conspiracy was more kind of a psychedelic rock, garage rock kind of, what would you say, philosophy. So the album I've chosen is the self-titled one from 2003. And it's a complete like flower power, psychedelic,

01:32:30Space Rock album. It's also John McBain. Actually, I need to point out it's John McBain from Monster Magnet, who is the chief songwriter in it. Oh, boy. You can tell. Track 8 is pure John McBain. It's fuzz rock, right into the desert, Jay. You can play this one all day tomorrow. But yeah, a lot of it's kind of flowerpour. It's very psychedelic. It's not everyone's cup of tea. I just kind of found it kind of interesting. There's a good cover of Thunderclap,

01:33:00Neumann's Something in the Air on it as well, which has to be heard. That's pretty trippy. So yeah, that's Wellwater Conspiracy. I think Kim Tile was in the band for a brief period, but I think he left then. So it's just basically it was just Matt Cameron and John McBain. So if you're into trippy psychedelia, kind of garage rock, you should check this out for sure. That's really nice.

01:33:31Wellwater Conspiracy. All right. Mine is, for a while there, in the 90s, the band Nevermore could do no wrong, and they, for a good stretch of records, that's well agreed upon by several members of the two podcasts, and they're also Central Media's favorite band, apparently, because they always put good money into their production and their record covers and all that kind of thing, and then they must have said to them at some point, do some solo records, guys.

01:34:00You can talk about Jeff Loomis' as you want. That's for guitar nerds. But Oral Dane made a really good solo record called Praises to the War Machine that kind of came out, I think, after Obsidian. I think it was after This Godless Endeavor. I think it was between those two records. Okay, couldn't remember. And it really, I'm not going to say it flopped, but it kind of disappeared pretty quick, you know, and it's got that Nevermore sound to it, and it's got Jeff Loomis on it playing a couple solos.

01:34:30Chris Broderick's on it and a bunch of other cool stuff. It's got that Nevermore level of production. Worrell was still one piece, as it were. He was in one piece, I should say. And it's just a really solid record that I think probably is way down in the cracks at this point. Yeah, it was. You're right. It was nestled in between those two last Nevermore albums. The two last Nevermore records. And it's good. It's a really good record. And I listened to it a lot when I got it. And I probably listened to it in a little bit.

01:35:00a little while but it's got a really neat cover of a Paul Simon song that's called Patterns which is a really pretty song that he kind of does the Sound of Silence thing which they did you know highly recommended if you're a fan of Nevermore and you don't have that record it's the Lost Nevermore record you can go listen to yeah you know it doesn't necessarily have Jeff Loomis's stamp on it which really mattered those two voices together the guitar and his voice but it's still it's just the Lost Nevermore record really and it's a good one and it's better than Obsidian

01:35:32Yeah, I'm still struggling with that one, even when I go back to it. And I want to like that, because I love everything from Nevermore. The problem is its predecessor. That's all there is to it. Well, yeah, and then you factor in that they remastered and remixed. Yeah, and it was a reality, which to the original is just brutal.

01:35:59And so there's just a whole slew of just standout albums before that. Like big time standout, you know, from Dreaming, Neon Black, all the way through. So yeah. Sorry, you guys, let me just cut across. But which album? I've never really checked out Nevermore. Which album would you recommend? Like as a jumping in point? Sanctuary. Well, yeah, actually, I'm sorry, Jay, not to cut you off. Yeah. If you really want to do the whole from start to finish, start with Sanctuary,

01:36:29work your way up. Because it does evolve. I would call

01:36:33this godless endeavor

01:36:35their master of puppets, personally.

01:36:37But Dreaming Neon Black

01:36:39and

01:36:41what's the blue

01:36:43Black Heart and a

01:36:45Dead Heart and a Dead World.

01:36:48Yeah, that is a very good album.

01:36:49Those three are like where they

01:36:52really got their own unique thing

01:36:54going and they were killing it.

01:36:55But Sanctuary is awesome, too.

01:36:57I'll definitely put Sanctuary on tomorrow. There's only three albums. So it's... Into the Mirror Black is the one you want. Yeah, but... Say again, George? Into the Mirror Black, the second album is the one you want. That's the most popular. I'll listen to them all. I'll get through this. But I love the first album. I might even like it more. But it doesn't have the production, that's for sure. But they are... Battle Angels. Yeah, it just does. And even the third one. You gotta do that.

01:37:27when you do it. I need a beanie, too, because remember he was wearing a beanie for a number of years. I do want to impress, though, that I do think in Godless, this Godless Endeavor by Nevermore is the definitive statement. Like that. Yeah. That song alone. Straight to the best thing. Try that. And it's there's just no dead space on the record. That album's awesome. It's Sentient Six on that. Yeah. Yeah. That album is tremendous. Have you guys heard the new stuff? No. I think all it's out is practice. The new vocalist. Yeah, a little bit.

01:37:57I can't it's poor recording so I can't I know yeah yeah what they posted was not clear because it was just you know and it's like a microphone in a room with them jamming and it's on YouTube on top of that so the quality is not going to be good but but still clearly went out to find a guy who could kind of do world name absolutely and you kind of have to if you want to kind of pay tribute to the earlier stuff but man what a like I'm kind of excited John I I

01:38:27I'm excited about Prague Power to see these guys play. I mean, I think that's going to be really cool. Yeah. I just want to see Jeff Loomis and Van back together again. Yeah. I get it. Some people aren't interested because Worel's not there, but Jay, you kind of hit it on the head. It's a rare case where you need both the vocals and the guitar player to channel the band. And we have one of them, at least. I mean, it'd be the same if it was just Worel Dane out there. I'm telling you, this guy, like I saw interviews and he seems very,

01:38:57Like,

01:39:02obviously,

01:39:03World Dane was a big influence to this guy,

01:39:05and he is very dedicated,

01:39:07and I don't know.

01:39:10I think it's going to be really cool.

01:39:11I'm looking forward to seeing them live.

01:39:13You know,

01:39:14George,

01:39:14I did the same thing with Sanctuary.

01:39:15I kind of went into it like,

01:39:17all right,

01:39:18let me see what it's like,

01:39:18and I think we saw them,

01:39:20didn't we,

01:39:20at Prog Power with the new singer?

01:39:23Sanctuary?

01:39:23I just thought you were there maybe not yeah could be and it was great you know it's

01:39:29obviously never going to be the same without world because he's one of the very few rare singers out

01:39:34there but I was glad to see the most of the guys from the band were together still I mean it's going to be kind of like Crimson Glory right now same thing I mean I really want to see them the new guys good but we should also warn you Derek a little bit because Worrell is kind of a divisive figure as far as his vocal

01:39:53stylings go and it's one of those bands where people just like could never get into the singer and then there are people who love them which i suppose it's the rush conundrum isn't it kind of yeah so keep going derek i'm liking it yeah i love them you know i i mean clearly i think based on what we're saying here we like them and love them but yeah that's probably the most common comment i've heard i don't know fair enough like like i'll give it a shot like a vocalist it depends sometimes you know the more you listen the more the voice

01:40:23the music, you know, and so I don't kind of write off a band straight away. So I'll definitely give him a spin and see, see how I feel, you know. One that comes to mind for me, too, and Rush was a good call out there, but I think Saxon's the same way. I think Biff Bifford, I think a lot of people are just like, I just don't like that guy, you know, and I like him. Somehow he works. Yeah, I don't have a problem with him. What are you going to say, George? I think there are people who do. He's just, he wasn't Rob and he wasn't Bruce, you know. Yeah, there's lots of examples, like Tom York for Radiohead is another example, you know. Sure.

01:40:53Some people either love them or loathe them. Absolutely. So it's kind of... Dave was David being on that one. All big time. Yeah. Oh, huge. Yeah. Oh, fuck. Yeah. Oh, God. I hate him. Yeah. Yeah. I was actually... I was at... Sorry, going off another tangent here, but I was at the Sonosphere Festival in Prague. I lived in the Czech Republic for a little bit. In 2010, it was the kind of the rehash of the...

01:41:23from 91. So I was Slayer, Metallica, Megadeth, because obviously Megadeth and Metallica had patched up Anthrax. And then there was a whole heap of other bands on different stages. And Alice in Chains as well, the new one with the new chap. So Megadeth came on and I couldn't. I don't mind early Megadeth, I like it, but just, he's such a fucking idiot, you know. I had to walk away. I had to walk away. I just couldn't.

01:41:52I couldn't. Sometimes front men ruin it. Therapy were playing down the road, so I was like, I'm going out to watch therapy. There was no question. But the same thing happened when we went to see with Aerosmith. And I don't mind Aerosmith either. I can take him or leave him. But we went to see Chris Cornell was supporting the Marty Park in Dublin. So we went up and we're all big Soundgarden fans. We're absolute Soundgarden nuts. So the chance to see Chris solo was just enough. So we went in.

01:42:22loved great gig by Chris Cornell all the solo stuff that he audio slave soundguard and a whole lot he touched ticked all the boxes then fucking and we hung around for probably one song Aerosmith your man comes up what's his name I can't even think of his name he's even Tyler yeah Tyler he comes on and he's like he's giving all the snake hips and everything's like okay we're out of here

01:42:51I have a Stephen Tyler story that is worth telling. I probably told it to some of the people here. I don't know, but it's I think you'll enjoy it. And it's a true story. But I used to work at this bookstore years ago in Tucson, Arizona. I'm back to Arizona from California. But years ago, I lived in Tucson. Anyway, and I'll make this as brief as I can. Stephen Tyler comes in. And it's this huge place like the size of a grocery store. And it's all used books.

01:43:12And I see him before any else does. And I admit I'm kind of starstruck. I'm like 22 years old or something. So I walk straight over and I'm like, hey man, do you need some help? And he's like, yeah. And he's looking for all these different things, you know, and we don't have one single thing he's looking for. And he's looking like for a Zydeco CD and some other stuff. And as we're walking around the store looking for things, people are slowly noticing him and looking down the aisles. And some of the other employees are trying to catch my, you know, vision.

01:43:42they can get something autographed, whatever it is. And I'm like the cool guy. I'm like, hey, back off, you know, whatever. I have this friend who worked there who was the biggest misanthrope you ever knew in your life. He can't stand this. He can't stand the fact that Steven Tyler is in the store and everybody's making a big damn deal about it. And my friend works at the greeting desk. So as soon as the big sliding doors open, you walk in and there he is. His name's Steven. And I'll just leave it at misanthrope. I love the guy to death. That was hilarious.

01:44:11And so finally, we finish up shopping, nothing to be found, can't find anything. Steven Tyler is walking out the store by now. Everybody in the store knows he's there. And there's probably 50 to 100 people in the store. And every soul is watching him walk out. And it's quiet because nobody wants to say anything or anything. And my friend who's sitting at the information desk waits until the thing's open. And then he goes, he shouts at Steven Tyler. He goes, hey, man, when's Zeppelin getting back together?

01:44:39Oh, brilliant.

01:44:46I was like, because it was Steven, my friend Steven, I just thought, you're a god, that was so funny. And Steven kind of looks so annoying. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant. He was a god to me, that guy. I loved it. Oh, yeah. Okay. Where are we, John?

01:45:10It's Jay. No. No. Is it me? I think it's you, Len. Sorry to put you out. My next one? No. No problem. I really thought it was going to be Jay. I'll go if you don't want to. I got confused. All right. The next one for me is OSI, the Office of Strategic Influence, released February 2003.

01:45:40This prog supergroup consisting of Jim Mathios from Faith's Warning, Mike Portnoy, and Kevin Moore of Dream Theater, with guest appearances from Sean Malone from Cynic and Gordian Knot, and Stephen Wilson from Porcupine Tree produced what ended up being one of my favorite albums from that period. As with any supergroup album, there's incredible potential that oftentimes is not achieved, and thankfully this album, in my opinion, lived up to that potential.

01:46:10combining the best skills of each musician

01:46:13and distilling it into this excellent progressive metal album.

01:46:18I understand Portnoy wasn't totally satisfied with working with Kevin Moore

01:46:23and eventually did not return to OSI after the album that followed this one.

01:46:28And while I like what they did with Gavin Harrison,

01:46:31there's something about this first OSI album

01:46:35that I feel is better than everything that came afterwards.

01:46:37And I see in, I'm looking in John's man cave there and I see the fire make thunder albums sitting there. That's pretty cool. So that's a OSI is my next pick. Nice. Good one. Okay. You're listening for me. Actually, I've got a, I've got a shopping place. I do not know half of these. I mean, I know, I know some of the, the core members,

01:47:07but I've never heard OSI. I've heard OSI in the Jupiter. There's some kind of like American folk, neo-folk. Yeah, yeah. OC, maybe it's not an acronym. OSI stands for Office. Maybe you already said that. Yeah. Office of Strategic Influence. Yeah. And for a while, Jim Thales was just doing everything. So there was a lot of weird kind of miss and match groups that he, well, and all those guys.

01:47:37Yeah.

01:47:38So it would be easy for you to not know them.

01:47:41That's my point.

01:47:42Well, that's true.

01:47:43Because in the early 2000s, there were a lot of various like I can't remember

01:47:49the record company, but they were very big on mixing and matching all their artists

01:47:55together to like see what would come out of it.

01:47:58And it was like it was kind of really cool because and I can't remember if that was

01:48:05The name of the art record group is failing me at the moment. I don't know if it was Century or Roadrunner. I can't remember who it was. For that one? Yeah, what was it? No. Inside Out, I thought. Oh, yeah, that's it. Yeah, it's Inside Out. And they would mix and match their dudes. It was like, hey, go make a record and see what you think. And they would just have everybody get together and see what they did.

01:48:32what came out of it. That was more Magna Carta that did that. Oh yeah. But that was yeah. Okay. That's that's what it was. Oh yeah. That was like the early 2000s before. Yeah. Before they all got on Inside Out. Magna Carta. Yeah. Because that's what the liquid tension and all that stuff was too. Yes. They were on Magna Carta. It's Mike Varney. That was Mike Varney's label I think from. Yeah. And that they were very very very encouraging of their artists to work amongst themselves.

01:49:02and get together and try things.

01:49:05And it was kind of cool because, you know, there were a lot of these little offshoot bands and things that came out of that that were pretty interesting.

01:49:15So, yeah.

01:49:16And this was one of those things that came out of that period.

01:49:22Right.

01:49:22But I don't I don't remember if that was on.

01:49:24I'd have to look.

01:49:25I don't know if it was on Magna Carta, though.

01:49:27I don't I don't remember either.

01:49:29I have to admit I'm not sure.

01:49:31Yeah, it's Inside Out. Maybe it was. No, it was. I know. It was Inside Out. Okay. So, yeah. All right, cool. That's a good one. All right, my next one. I won't go too long because this would be a bigger name, albeit in metal, but it's a bigger name. This person is kind of an icon in this subgenre that his band came from.

01:50:01from. And it's, we're going to dip into the black metal scene a little bit. Although this guy's releases aren't all black metal, but he's somewhat of a fan favorite with some of us on the Metalheads podcast. And my pick is Eson of Emperor, but also Solo Career, which I, heresy, here it comes. I like Eson way better than Emperor, to be honest with you. And I like Emperor. Me too, me too, yeah.

01:50:31I like him experimenting. Which is what I like about him. And he'll do about two or three albums that are the same. He's got, I think, nine solo albums. He does kind of, every couple albums, he does something, then he starts drifting to something else. And that's what I kind of like. I don't like everything he's released. Some albums I'm like, eh, they're okay. And some of them just like, I could play it all day long. So I thought he was a good person to pick because while he's a big name,

01:51:01I don't know how many fans that are hardcore black metal fans like his solo work just because the first two have probably the most black metal on them and they're still it's still prog black metal you know it's still it's very art rockish all his stuff yeah but but John sorry again I just quickly interject like you're right but those people don't realize that when he made the debut album he was a child you know and like

01:51:31That was written probably at age 50. The material itself, before it was even released, was written long ago. By the time he got into his stride, he's been prog probably from the beginning. It's not like it took him 10 albums to go, oh my god, I think I like King Crimson a bit or something. I'd say he could have easily have had a concurrent solo career from the earliest possible.

01:52:00If it wasn't such a... I mean, every black metal musician had about 10 projects anyway. I know. I'm surprised he didn't go solo earlier. You know, that kind of way, because his output is monumental. But in terms of quality, too, I'm a huge fan of Ishan. I never know how to say if it's Ishan or Ishan. I never know. Yeah, everyone says SH. I don't know. I don't even know. Is it from Lord of the Rings or something? It's HS. So it is not SH. It is Ishan. Yeah. Is it from Lord of the Rings or

01:52:31I don't know. It says here it's an Arabic term meaning excellence, perfection. That's probably not where he got it. Well, no. Highest level of faith, worshipping Allah, blah, blah, blah. I'll do some digging. That's a good question. But I don't think it's a... We'll call him Tveitn. He's an interesting... As his mother, you know, Ishaan, your dinner's ready. I don't know what his mother must call him. There you go.

01:53:00And he's an interesting person because he's,

01:53:03if you're not familiar with the people would think if they think Sweden,

01:53:08Norway,

01:53:09Finland,

01:53:09Denmark,

01:53:10that Northern Europe sound that,

01:53:12Oh,

01:53:12that's all the same.

01:53:13Norway couldn't be any polar opposite than Sweden.

01:53:16When it comes to their take on Prague music,

01:53:20it all sounds like Prague,

01:53:22but Norway is just very distinctive.

01:53:24It has its own style and which I actually gravitate more to than Swedish

01:53:29Prague.

01:53:29And even though Swedish Prague is probably bigger names come out of that, out of the country, but. Norway is, yeah. Wins, winds and throws of dawn. Oh. Leprous, you know. In the woods, you know. Yeah, yeah. Well, Green Carnation in the woods. Back to Green Carnation, back to in the woods. I mean, the way they did that. 100%, yeah, 100%. And it's just uniquely different. And I love Swedish Prague, but in Norway, they just seem to go their own way.

01:53:59They just don't sound like anybody else.

01:54:08Anyway, that's my pick.

01:54:09I think if...

01:54:12I've been really lucky to see him solo twice, which is funny.

01:54:15I saw him twice solo before I got to see Emperor George, and I saw Emperor a few years back, however long it was.

01:54:23It was just like, wow.

01:54:24It was last year, I guess? I can't remember.

01:54:26I think it was the tour of Dublin as well I think enslaved it was I'd only because with the kids and stuff I only have a kind of it's like Willy Wonka's factory when he got a golden ticket once a year so I had to pick enslaved for the time between the two but like I'd love to see Emperor because of the cinematic you know event that is Emperor you know like in a way they're almost bigger than the band you know in terms of the scope but I tell you what I'd love to see Isan solo like I mean if you offered me an Emperor or if you took an Emperor

01:54:56take it off me and gave me an e-san ticket i don't know fair enough i'm okay with that you know that kind of way i wouldn't i wouldn't well i hate i hate to say this then so uh in 2011 arcturus was supposed to play prog power and they punked out and bailed on on glenn and their story sucks and i've had a hard time getting back into them because how they they pulled out uh so he's like so i'm gonna replace him with e-san and i was like this couldn't be any better for me right exactly yeah but here's the crazy thing lepros was his backup band

01:55:26That's his brother-in-law. Yeah, it's his brother-in-law. But that was back when he still had, when Einar still had the dreads. You know? Oh, yeah. So he was playing, and he just saw dreads going back and forth the whole show. Morton Harkett with dreadlocks. Yeah, I'm like, wait, who's the main person here? You know? Because Einar is such a big presence on stage. So anyway. Yeah. There you go. Eson's my next pick. All righty. I'm going to walk us back to the punk rock neighborhood.

01:55:55In the wee old days of American punk rock, there was a band called Husker Du. Oh, wow. Oh, yes. And from the ashes of Husker Du, we got the band Sugar and also the solo work of Sugar mastermind Bob Mould. I haven't heard of Sugar. I haven't heard that mention in years. Wow.

01:56:25He did get the attention he deserved. Nobody really talks about it anymore. Bob is massive, dude. He comes up with some of the coolest riffs. He's such a great songwriter. I loved everything you've just mentioned. But honestly, in particular, I like Bob Bolt's solo albums. Yeah. Yeah. Dude is probably high up. If I had a list of unsung heroes, he would definitely be near the top of that list. Yeah. That's a nice selection.

01:56:55Thank you. I think he was involved. I have to look this up. Well, it's funny because you mentioned Sugar, but then I immediately go to him first. I would think of After Husker Do, which is kind of funny. Yeah, because I mean, there were only two Sugar albums and he's got like probably seven or eight solo albums. Sure, but I guess the point being it fits really nicely into the theme of this episode, how you selected it. He also, and I had to confirm this because I couldn't recall what his

01:57:25this connection was. But there's a movie I love, and it's going to sound off-putting if you don't know the movie. It's called Hedwig and the Angry Inch, and it's such a good movie. I just love it to death. And it came out of a Broadway, off-Broadway musical, and it's about this guy from Eastern Europe, back when the wall was still up, who has a sex change, sort of, before he comes to America, but they botched the sex change. It's the best movie with the best songs, and Bob Mould plays guitar on this.

01:57:54And if you've never seen the movie, I cannot recommend it enough. Like the songwriting in this movie is amazing. And the story is so good and so funny and so grand. But Bob Mould, when I, and I think that's why I saw it was because I heard Bob Mould played on it. It's its own amazing thing, but yeah. Nice. Yeah. Bob Mould's the real deal. He's getting up there too. I saw him not long ago on some, under some setting and he's looking pretty 65. So he's looking pretty 65. Yeah. Yeah.

01:58:24It's crazy

01:58:25All right

01:58:26Power just dimmed here

01:58:28Uh oh

01:58:29Apparently it's turning over

01:58:30It's yeah

01:58:31It's

01:58:32I'm told it's turning over to snow

01:58:36No

01:58:36It was raining up until just

01:58:39Recently

01:58:40Okay

01:58:41So we'll see

01:58:42I'm in a room with no windows

01:58:43So

01:58:44I can't see it myself

01:58:46This is the side project

01:58:47I'll just quickly run through it again

01:58:48It's Mariusz Duda

01:58:50The Polish

01:58:53Singer

01:58:54and behind his main band is Riverside, but this is called Lunatic Soul. So this is the second album. I think it's the sophomore effort that came out in 2010. So it's had a good while. So basically, this is kind of a more genteel. It's a very, it's influenced by a lot of kind of Middle East, not Middle Eastern music, Eastern music rather, because he uses, there's the Chinese Gu Zhang or something, Tubular Bells, the Cach.

01:59:24I've never heard of it and the kalimba instruments I can't say I've ever heard these are all on the album but it works really well the first album I listened to his singing he's a great vocalist and he's got a great he's got a great register a great timbre but he never quite hit you know any kind of any heights you know the vocals were quite samey for the first album but on this one he definitely kind of gives it a bit more of a workout you know there's tracks where he kind of sometimes comes across maybe like a Stephen Wilson or a Danny

01:59:54Kavanagh. There's definitely shades of

01:59:56anathema post-Find A2

01:59:58exit on this.

02:00:00There's definitely a bit of

02:00:02Porcupine Tree, but the main influence would be

02:00:04a bit of Peter Gabriel, I think, on this.

02:00:07I definitely got a...

02:00:09I'm a big fan of

02:00:10Peter Gabriel, but I wouldn't be an expert

02:00:12on his back catalogue, but from

02:00:14his initial stuff post-Genesis,

02:00:17there's definitely a good influence there.

02:00:18Maybe a little bit of Dead Can Dance as well.

02:00:22It's very

02:00:22melodic, and the

02:00:24He doesn't use the extra instrumentation pretentiously. It's hewn in well to the overall sound. But it's really pleasant, isn't it? I really found myself liking it more than I expected, if that makes sense. So I don't know, John, obviously you're the main expert there on Riverside. Jay, no offense, the haircut's not withstanding. No one's going to know what I'm talking about because we're a part out.

02:00:52You must have been talking about Poland. Yeah, he was. Getting kicked out of a record shop does not a Mexican make. Riverside, hey Jay. Come on, Marius, he's alright. Yeah, that's a great pick. I'm a big fan, and I think it's a great side project because it's an LF for stuff that he probably couldn't get into Riverside, so he'd still get that out, and it doesn't affect Riverside whatsoever. Which, Riverside,

02:01:22It has a very unique... That's a band of brothers, that band. When they lost Peter, I guess is how you say his first name, when he died, that was a major blow to that band. And they were close to breaking up. It was almost kind of the John Bonham effect with them a little bit. And they powered through, and now they're... It's almost like Voivod when they got Chewy, George. You were like, well, what's going to happen here? And he came in, and he's the same for Riverside.

02:01:51those two guitars have respected the bands that they joined to such a degree that they've made the band stronger going forward even though you miss those two guitars who are very unique guitar players they're two completely opposite bands but yeah i love lunatic so and i'm a huge riverside fan tear and i've seen them together at least twice i think yeah i think at least a couple times yeah for sure and we've been lucky that they have uh come to the states not as much as i would have liked

02:02:21but it's nice and i don't know if you remember i had their last album or his last uh album the world under unsun which is kind of a weird title that was when we did our uh year end for this oh that's right there's a new album out yeah yeah i saw that there is a magazine dedicated to prog john i don't know if you know that oh yeah yeah this could be the best this could be the best day of your life no we'll see yeah i get it we get it here in the states but it's expensive as hell

02:02:57Yeah, it's a certain

02:02:58times I like certain things in hard copy.

02:03:00We get it at Barnes & Noble, the bookstore chain, but they're always behind.

02:03:05Is this the Prog Rock magazine?

02:03:07Yeah, it's a sister publication of classic rock.

02:03:11Classic rock.

02:03:13And the good thing is, actually, this is going to tie into something I'm going to talk about later,

02:03:19But like if you're a member of your public library, you can actually take out the latest issue of Prague and all the previous issues of Prague through an online thing that's connected to the public library. So I've been totally taking advantage of that and looking at a bunch of episodes because you're right, John.

02:03:49We get them here. You can get the magazine. And I agree, John. There are times when you actually want to have the physical product and you want to keep it and it's something you want to have. But it's really nice to be able to check it out digitally, read it, and then just be like, okay, I didn't have to pay $18 for this magazine. That was terrible. Yeah, we get drilled. Yeah, it's huge.

02:04:19Yeah, and you get drilled even more in Canada. But that was like, remember when Terrorizer went digital? And I was like, okay, I used to buy Terrorizer all the time. Same thing. And then it went digital. I was like, all right, this is fine. At least I'm getting it. And then they bombed out. But yeah. They screwed me. Yeah, me too. I lost a lot from them. Do you get rock candy or zero tolerance for any of those? Yeah. I like zero tolerance, but it's hard to read because the print's so small. Yeah, it's A5. Yeah. They were trying to keep it.

02:04:49Sorry, yeah, they were trying to keep it that kind of, it was a bit kind of nostalgic. They were trying to keep that kind of A5 zine. Zines were huge in Europe, you know, and so they were trying to keep that kind of, you know, shitty typewriter kind of going. Yeah, right, so like the early 90s production on albums are like, ugh, but you're like, I still love it. Yeah, it's not necessary, guys. Like, we have the zines, just make a magazine that we can read. So real quick, before I got into Procter, used to be a magazine in the States called Progression.

02:05:19which was really good but it kind of faded away and they screwed me on on stuff too

02:05:25unfortunately i know the guy got sick but anyway so yeah it's nice to have prog now because i don't have

02:05:31progression but they're expensive yeah so but that's a great pick well check check out the your local

02:05:36library john because you may be able to get online and read that stuff it's just that's like such a

02:05:41public service i'm serious dude i'm all about i probably am about the public library now dude because

02:05:48And I've got plenty more to say about this later, but it is amazing what the resources that you can have for free. Oh, no, no, dude. I was the manager at a public library. That was my career. And I probably maybe tried Guess and Three Guess is the one you're talking about. I just used to do commercials on here for something called Underwater Audio. I think I remember that. It just sort of slipped back into that. I'm going to blow the prog off.

02:06:18All the way out of the room here. Sorry. No, with my next pick. And it's akin, I guess it'd be akin to a couple of George's picks because its roots are in punk rock. But it's not a punk rock album. There's a famous punk rock band from Los Angeles called X. Oh, yeah. The one I'm talking about with John Doe and Exine Zervanka. But that's not what I'm talking about either. Those two particular members of that band formed a side group with Dave Alvin.

02:06:48from the blasters, who might not be familiar on this podcast, but he's a big deal in Americana type music and that kind of thing. And they formed this really great country rock, rockabilly band called the Knitters. And they have a record called Poor Little Critter in the Road. And I cannot recommend it enough. It was right around the time that like Reverend Horton Heat was coming out. You know, I think I heard that recently. It's really good. It's really fun. It's got a punk rock aspect to it. It's not just a straight

02:07:18Yes, because I was... Prior to the list that I'm going to give you at the end of this episode, a few weeks back, I also did a real deep dive on cow punk. This would be cow punk. Cow punk? Cow punk. Yeah. It's basically punk country. This might be the proto record for cow punk. It really is more a rockabilly country than it is anything else. I mean, it's a pretty legit record. And it was one of the ones that came up, and I was like, oh, it's the...

02:07:48They sing great harmonies and the songs have a certain amount of dead milkman fun to them. That's how I got the cow punk thing because I'm such a big dead milkman fan. Jay, you realize how funny that was, right? Kind of fun from the dead milkman. You don't usually see those words together. But you know where I'm coming from. I know you do.

02:08:18I guess it falls into a specific little genre that maybe George and I are probably more interested in than anybody else but it's a lot of fun and if you have any kind of punk or punk adjacent and it was kind of like a record at the time and if you worked in a record store which I did it was playing in every record store you know because every record store has its cool punk clerk and stuff so.

02:08:41Well my list just got a little longer now because I'm going to add my cow punk stuff to it at the end.

02:08:47I think George,

02:08:49what was it?

02:08:49Chris Novicellic of Nirvana.

02:08:51He had a kind of a cow punk band,

02:08:53eyes adrift or something.

02:08:54I think.

02:08:55Yes.

02:08:55Yes.

02:08:56Left.

02:08:56Yeah.

02:08:57Was that any good?

02:08:58I have that CD,

02:08:59I think somewhere.

02:08:59I just bought it cause he was on it.

02:09:01I was thinking maybe,

02:09:02you know,

02:09:03it came up while I was looking at the cow punk stuff.

02:09:06And I,

02:09:06I think I listened to like a second,

02:09:08but it wasn't like readily available.

02:09:12I mean,

02:09:13I probably could have listened to it on like Spotify or YouTube or

02:09:17Yeah, I don't think he cared much about availability with any of the things he's done post-Nirvana, which has been very little. I think he's like, I got the money, I'm just going to do extremely underground things. Or run for office, if I remember right. Good work if you can get it. Yeah, you can afford to have your album bomb, right? You can afford to, yeah. No, that's a good feeling to know that you don't have to worry about that. I should think so. All right, TR.

02:09:46All right, my next one, and like I said, these are going to get less and less obscure, so my next choice is a supergroup, and it is Hagar, Schoen, Aronson, and Shreve, also known as HSAS, with the album Through the Fire, released March 1984. This is another supergroup that lived up to the hype, albeit for just a short time.

02:10:16time before they disbanded and everyone

02:10:18went their separate ways.

02:10:22I see what you did there.

02:10:24But don't stop believing.

02:10:25I couldn't stop believing in this.

02:10:27I'll tell you that because

02:10:29Hagar had been in Montrose and done solo work.

02:10:32Sean was in Journey.

02:10:34Aronson had played bass for a couple of bands

02:10:36including Rick Derringer.

02:10:38And Shreve had been in Santana with Sean.

02:10:42They wrote the material for this album in 1983

02:10:44and then, unconventionally, went about playing it live for a number of dates in November of that year in San Jose, California. It had to be strange for the people that went to those shows back then. None of the material had been released or recorded, so they were going purely on the names of the artists. Shows from this short run were recorded both for MTV and Westwood One, and some of the tracks that were played were put onto the Through the Fire album with the crowd noise,

02:11:14and with some overdubs.

02:11:17Why they didn't put out more of the tracks on this album,

02:11:23or why this wasn't released as a more complete concert performance,

02:11:27I have no idea.

02:11:28Because the other material is really good.

02:11:31Although Sammy does drop a bunch of four-letter words all over the place.

02:11:35I like Sean's playing a lot on this material because he plays things that were harder

02:11:40and in some cases more experimental than what he was doing in Journey.

02:11:45While the 40th anniversary of this album has come and gone, hopefully Universal Music Group, which owns Geffen Records, will put something out before we're all dead. Not happening. I don't know. I thought I saw Sammy talking about it not long ago, but it might have just been a reference to like, hey, you remember that band? It wasn't such a risky venture to play that, to go sight unseen live because they did it in the Bay Area, which is where they're from. Well, true. So they have a lot of diehard fans.

02:12:13I remember that record very well. I bought it when it came out. I did too. Oh yeah. My hometown just rips. Yes. And you know, Neil Sean still plays that riff in his solo piece in Journey. And I'm not sure that a lot of Journey fans really know what that is. But like, I knew what it was when he played that riff. It's a great song. Setting aside all the host like 2000 drama that's been

02:12:43revolving around Neil Scho and Journey and whatever in his personal life. That dude can freaking play. And it always drove me nuts that he didn't play harder stuff. Yes. When he was. Well, if you listen to some of his solo stuff, there's some pretty cool instrumental rock and stuff on that. But I always wanted to go even a little harder because he just if you don't believe it, go watch that live clip of Stone and Stone and Love. Yeah. That they play where actually you don't even

02:13:15the keyboardist on it is Steve Perry. He plays the keys on that live because Jonathan King plays rhythm guitar on that. Oh, that's right. Yeah. Yeah. On the live version. And he only plays the keys at the end of the song, but it allows, you know, Sean to just absolutely rip. Yeah. John is a great document of Steve. Steve Perry at his height, too, by the way. Oh, yeah. That's so much fun to watch.

02:13:43And I always contended that dude was the easiest best singer. He hardly put any effort into his singing and it just mellowed out. Whether you like Journey or not, you can never deny that. Oh, yeah. His voice is just incredible. It's incredible. The mother father on there on that show you're talking about is insane. And I was going to mention about, oh, Neil Sean is a frequent poster on social media. So if you ever see him on Twitter or something, and he's always playing guitar. He's always just like, he's sitting there playing at his desk and he just,

02:14:13He just turns on the camera and he's always doing something super cool. And all those dudes went to high school right around where I went to high school too. So they're all local and you'll show up to school like a mile away from my high school and I'll be at a gazillion years before me. I mean, I'm old, but I'm not that old. Yeah. Well, what amazes me. He was just a kid in Santana. 16, I think. Yeah. He was young. He was really young. But he and Greg Raleigh were in Santana. Yeah. Yeah. No, I'm supportive of that notion, John. He's a true talent. That guy can play. Yeah. And what amazes me,

02:14:43I don't know if you guys saw the interview with him and Rick Beato. I have to watch that. I haven't watched it yet. He has almost a photographic memory for what gear he was using on what albums and how things were recorded. He's getting asked all these questions about stuff that was 50 years ago. And he's like, oh yeah, man, I had this and this is what we did and we were plugging into this.

02:15:12And it's like, how's he remembering? I was just blown away by like, and he's like, he's totally focused. Like you can tell, like he really knows what he's talking about. And, and then, you know, he's got the guitar in his hands. And so he's like ripping off like some of these solos and stuff. It's a really cool interview. If you want, if you really, if you like Neil Sean and you want to check it out, you got to check his interview with Rick Beato because it's, it's amazing.

02:15:42what that guy remembers clearly. It's because he's obsessed. He's an obsessive musician guitar player. He has one of the greatest quotes. He's got that kind of Eddie level of dedication. Eddie Van Halen level. It used to be 40 watts, but I had to get a very air conditioning. Right. Exactly. I'll say one last thing. He has one of the great quotes. He never really wanted to do the pop stuff. He was like, no, I want to do the proggy jazz hard rock stuff.

02:16:12in the audience. And it's all women. I was like, yeah, this is where it's at. This is where we're making our money. Well, I'll tell you what, he actually talks about that in the interview because he really had to change his whole style of playing to be able to do that. And he said that was a big challenge when they started playing more popular music like that, that he had to adjust his whole songwriting and playing mode.

02:16:42to be able to do that. And he did it. They actually succeeded at that. Still pisses me off, though. Well, I agree, because I love that mid to late 70s journey stuff with Rolly and when they were still kind of doing some of these jazz explorations. Well, even the Captured Live that came out in 81, before they really blew up, even with all those hit songs. You listen to that.

02:17:12He just destroys that album. He's all over the place on that. And that's with some big hits on it still. The band was called Journey. He did that on purpose. It was intended to be a progressive thing when it was formed. I'm a huge Greg Raleigh fan too. I missed that part of it. Anyway, that's a great pick. That's the second one in a row. What? Lunatic Soul and HSAS. I completely forgot about those. Oh, come on, John. That's like, especially you, man. Like, come on. Yeah. And there's this

02:17:43I don't know if Jay can confirm this but

02:17:46you know because I'm from the Bay Area

02:17:48it's just this weird thing about if a band's from the Bay Area

02:17:51even if you don't like them there's just this kind of

02:17:54affinity to defending most of them

02:17:56not everyone but

02:17:57and you just it's like

02:17:59people will crap on Y&T and I'm like we're gonna go to

02:18:02blows man

02:18:06it's just it's a weird because

02:18:08parochial

02:18:10everyone's like oh the LA scene and then it

02:18:12It's like, oh, the Seattle scene. I'm like, dude, do you know the Bay Area has a massive scene of not just rock, everything. You know, it just, I don't know, we just. I'm glad to hear that the Americans are as parochial as the Irish. You do know San Francisco, albeit not Chicago and Boston, has quite the Irish population. Yeah, maybe it's in the water. Well, and it's all along Geary Street because I've been in all those bars.

02:18:42There was a restaurant I used to go to in Marin. And it was owned by Huey Lewis's manager. And I couldn't care less about Huey Lewis. But I took a friend there one time. And he's got all this memorabilia up there. And my friend was like, Huey Lewis. And I was like, shut up, man. Yeah, that's right. Shut your mouth. I love Huey Lewis. I do too, man. I saw Huey Lewis. I got a call from some girl. She's like, hey, I got an extra ticket. You want to go with me and my mom and somebody else to see Huey

02:19:12Lewis and I had nothing else to do. I was like, it was New Year's Eve. I was like, sure, I'll go. So we, I had to go from Halfwood Bay all the way to the Oakland Coliseum on New Year's Eve. We won't ask what happened after with the, uh, it was fine. They were freaking awesome. They were so good live. The Tower of Power was their backup horn section at night. Also a San Francisco native. Yeah. It's just this weird thing. You know, you'd go from Huey Lewis News to Grateful Dead, Doobie Brothers,

02:19:42CCR and then the whole thrash scene. And then you've got all the punk bands that were from there. Yeah. It was crazy, man. Anyway, those are great picks. So my next pick is not a rock band. It's not a metal band and it's not a prog band. Perfect. Albeit, the guy who this band comes from, which is actually a solo act, is played in rock and in prog and in metal.

02:20:12a drummer. It started out as a solo. This is actually solo material for him. But he's kind of got a follow-on project that's developed within his solo work. And what I'm referring to is, it's not a band, but it's kind of a themed name for some of these albums. And it's called Protocol. And it's from the drummer Simon Phillips. Yes. Who started out as just his own thing, but his first album as a solo artist.

02:20:42was called Protocol. Many years later, there's Protocol 2, Protocol 3, and it's almost like Protocol has become a band within his solo work. And if you're not familiar who Simon Phillips is, outside of Virgil Donati, I'm going to make a brush reference, Neil Peart. Simon Phillips is probably my next favorite drummer of all the guys and all the drummers I followed growing up. He's incredible. And if you don't know him, if you like metal, you know, he might have played on a Judas Priest

02:21:13I think he was 19 on that album oh my god yeah he's one of the early guys maybe not the first but one of the early guys to the blast beating you know from distant aggressor that that got even perfected even more on the following albums from priests and other bands but protocol is a jazz fusion work it's all instrumental and I'm just a super fan of Simon Phillips work here because I'm a fan of all his work with Derek Sherinian which might come up at some point

02:21:42later on in this. But Simon Phillips, great drummer. I don't even have an album to pick. I like all his stuff. Probably it would be the fourth version of it. He's had some great guitars like Andy Timmons has played with him. And I can never remember the hair band Andy Timmons played with. He's a guitar player. Maybe I'm wrong about that. But he's had like Greg Howe's played for him. And Greg Howe, you know, went from being shrapnel shredding to now jazz fusion.

02:22:12He's got great musicians that play with him across the whole jazz scene. And I'm not a big jazz guy, but I do like fusion. And this is more fusion than it is straight jazz. So that's my number whatever. We've done protocol, which is really just Simon Phillips. Yeah. All right. I'm going to try to keep this brief. There was a band once. This one time in band camp? Remember that band?

02:22:43There's a band called Bauhaus. Oh, yeah. Oh, here we go. And surprisingly, this led to a lot of other good music as well, because after the end of Bauhaus, we got Love and Rockets. Daniel Ash and some of the other Bauhaus guys. Big fan of Love and Rockets. And while that was going on, Peter Murphy was doing his solo thing, which, of course, is amazing. And then recently, Daniel Ash did another band.

02:23:11that I mentioned on our year-end episode. Ashes and Diamonds put out their first album last year. And that is also pretty cool. So a lot of good stuff came out of Bauhaus, other than what Bauhaus did. Yeah, that's great. I love Peter Murphy. Even if he does sound like David Bowie during a portion of David Bowie's career, that's all right. That's cool. I still like him. That's all right. All right, Derek.

02:23:41Okay, I'm going to speed things up a little myself because I'm taking too long with mine. So my next pick is one of my favorite metal guitars of all time. I've loved this guy since the Carillion Isthmus album with Amorphous and this is Isa Halapainen and the album is Silver Lake, which he put out in 2021. Yeah, I really love this. Now it's not a proper album.

02:24:10e tem um álbum, ele tem que ter de todas as críticas, ele tem que ter de cada um.

02:24:40But some great guests on this. The second track, or the third track, is Hocken

02:24:48Hemlin, who's otherwise known as Nordman. It's kind of like a Dire Straits type riff

02:24:53on this. It's less acoustic and folky like the Renska one.

02:24:57Then it moves on to one of my favourites, Ray of Light. This is Einar

02:25:04Solberg, the leprous

02:25:05guy, who sounds, and I mean this in a compliment, he's like

02:25:09Morden Hark, its spiritual successor, his voice is amazing on this track. He just fucking blows it out of the water, you know. And I get the impression that Hala Pina wrote, you know, the track specifically with these people in mind, because otherwise it could never have worked, you know. But it moves through. There's also an actor, Vesa Mati-Lurie, who's kind of like a Finnish Brenna Gleeson, who narrates over one of the tracks. But this track, what's brilliant about this track, number five, is that it veers off into some madcap, like,

02:25:39the sax synth solo in the middle of the song that like have Keith Emerson blushing you know it just comes it comes out of nowhere because you have this guy and he's got a real you know he is as I say I looked him up he looks like a Finnish Brendan Gleeson you know he's really I think he passed away but he looks like a kind of like favorite Finnish actor for generations but he's a real gravelly voice he narrates over the song and then suddenly just out of nowhere it turns into this like prog fucking psycho drama you know.

02:26:09And it's brilliant. I love it. Like, you know, if you're not grinning after that, you're dead, you know. And then it moves on through. There's a track with Tony Yotson, who's the current singer of Amorphous. I'm not mad about Yotson. I find he's okay, but I don't like these growlers who kind of growl from the throat up. I prefer, you know, diaphragm. I'm kind of snobby about growls. I don't like the kind of doing an impression of growling as opposed to growling, you know, like in a way.

02:26:38It's kind of like shouty kind of growls. So he's never really kind of worked for me with amorphous. I mean, I don't mind him, but this, because he's on it, it could just be an amorphous track. So I don't know why he's on it, to be honest. But then one of the better ones, again, is Fading Moon. This features your girlfriend, John, Annika van der. She's all of our girlfriends. I hope your partner, she's not listening, you know, because she's on it, man. She sends her love.

02:27:09My favorite singer.

02:27:09That's Silver Lake.

02:27:11Yeah.

02:27:12And honestly, she's my favorite singer.

02:27:16I'm not just saying that.

02:27:17She's awesome.

02:27:18No, no, no.

02:27:18I'm just teasing.

02:27:19She's fantastic.

02:27:20I mean, she is who she is.

02:27:22I mean, The Gathering is one of my favorite bands going all the way back to, you know,

02:27:25always.

02:27:26Oh, boy.

02:27:26We need to talk.

02:27:27We need to talk.

02:27:28We need to talk more.

02:27:30Yeah.

02:27:30Love The Gathering.

02:27:32Yeah, no, it's terrific.

02:27:33But that's a really good album.

02:27:34I'm sure you're all familiar with it.

02:27:35Like, it came out.

02:27:37It's probably a COVID album, I'm thinking, because it just seems like... Yeah. Because it's a song title from... What album was it that they took that song title from? Silver Lake. I don't know, actually. Oh, it's probably something off of... Oh, yeah, Jesus. It's not Eclipse. The one with the swan on the cover, is it? Hold on. I'm looking right now. I got just...

02:28:07There we go. Maybe it could be the one with the swan. No, that's off of Skyforger. It's off Skyforger. Well, it's Silver Bride, but I mean, I always equate the Silver Lake and Silver Bride together. Well, it's Arturian, isn't it? It's kind of like the lake and the bride or whatever. Yeah, well, she probably died in the lake. They all do. They all do. And then Dio sings a song about it later. Yeah, that's exactly right. Keep your loved ones away from water bodies.

02:28:37Yeah. I'm telling you that undertow is going to drag you out and the Pacific will kill you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like it's more feasible to die in the sea where, you know, there's tides and currents and things, but lakes are just there. Like you have to go and really involve yourself in the lake to die, you know? Right. And you, you come from those islands where there's monsters that people claim they've photographed and everything. Stop bothering lakes. All right. Jay. You can sleep well at night, Derek, knowing that everybody is sleeping.

02:29:07about growls so yeah um in the 80s there were a lot of guys who who were disassociated from other band from their original bands in the 70s and kind of floated in and out of these weird super groups here and there hsas is a good example of that um and that wasn't necessarily disassociation nil sean was still in journey but you know what i mean there was a lot of interesting people that came together in the 80s and one that was kind of a flash in the pan

02:29:37and hit when it was there and I think everybody has forgotten about and is The Firm. Oh, yes. They have two really good records and I have my favorite vocals and it's people like Ian Gellin and those. But I will admit any day that Paul Rogers is better than every one of them. Maybe the greatest hard rock singer ever. Yeah. And it doesn't matter if you love his stuff or whatever because I don't love everything he's done, but I just don't think there's a better singer.

02:30:06And to have Paul Rogers and Jamie Page land in the same place at the same time was so cool. Yes. And for them to do something that sounded pretty much nothing like anything they'd ever really done before, more or less, you know what I mean, was such a neat experiment. And a good one, I thought. He's all right now. Yeah. I gotta say though, Jay, I, real quick, I won't take too much. I was sitting in front of my TV. Remember MTV used to

02:30:36premiere videos like hey this right here it is sitting there i was like oh my god jimmy page

02:30:42oh rogers incredible and they debuted radioactive and i got done i was like yeah it wasn't what you

02:30:48expected what yeah but it's i bet you its value has grown with you though probably i saw that i saw them on tour

02:30:57i was like literally at the you saw that tour yeah jay will knows i was at the cal palace

02:31:03And I was right up front, like maybe five feet from the rail, Jimmy Page and Paul Rogers, right? And Tony Franklin on bass. Yeah. And then it was the bald dude from ACDC. Chris Slade. Chris Slade. I'm joking. Oh, my bad. No, no, no, no. It's just because of all the videos. Remember, he would be pounding on the drums and all those ACDC videos for all the lives. Yeah, I got to see them. It was, I think Jimmy Page was, is Jimmy Page alive? You know what you're getting when you see him. He's going to sound great,

02:31:32He's going to be sloppy as shit. And then he's going to play stuff like

02:31:36what? He's going to blow you away.

02:31:39And that's what makes him fun to see live.

02:31:42So, you know, Supergroup that came and went

02:31:44but worth checking out, especially if you like Paul Rogers.

02:31:47I think any chance to hear Paul Rogers saying it.

02:31:50Totally, yeah. Couldn't be more behind that.

02:31:53I mean, I love that album.

02:31:55And even the second one, Mean Business was good too.

02:31:58It's okay, yeah.

02:31:59His stuff with Queen I could have taken or leave left. Me too. It's just not his match though, don't you think? No, no. It's a strange union. Right. But it's also one of those moments where you were like, it's also, he's hitting, he hits this range where you're like, Jesus, Paul Rogers can hit that. No. I mean, he, which you kind of knew anyway, but I mean, it's, it's kind of, I agree with you. I don't really like it that much. Yeah. It was okay. It's a lesson in singing.

02:32:29I mean, I mean, I don't know. That guy just got my number. He has my number. But I agree with the Queen stuff, not so much. He's still old now, too. I wish he had snuck something really good in before he got to this age, because he had another good band in him, you know? Yeah. All right, TR. All right. Next one. Michael Schenker Group Assault Attack. I had no idea this was going to come up. Yeah.

02:33:01and UFO guitarist Michael Shanker formed the Michael Shanker Group in 1979. After a couple of albums with original singer Gary Barden, Shanker got former Rainbow singer Graham Bonnet into the group to record Assault Attack. After recording what I feel is one of the best MSG albums, they went on tour with Bonnet and he lasted just one night. He was very drunk when he took the stage and at some point his

02:33:29which exposed his privates and the whole thing was over wait is this grand bonnet or lenny kravitz

02:33:36what it's a shame because it would it would have been interesting to see what they would

02:33:41have done on the next album this album has some great playing on it assault attack is a killer tune

02:33:47and the instrumental ulcer is a cool track that i don't feel gets enough love even by the band

02:33:53it's always going to be skipped for other instrumental tracks like into the arena or captain nemo

02:33:59Bonnet's vocals are powerful, and he was the right guy at the right time. It's just a shame that the time was so short. Thankfully, Shanker brought Bonnet back into the fold for the Michael Shanker Fest album and tour, so he finally got to hear Bonnet sing the Assault Attack material. With his pants intact. With his pants intact. Nice. I do. Well, I'm a great choice, you know. Yeah. Can I just point out one thing?

02:34:28I'm sorry, were you still mid-monologue there? No, no, that's all I have to say. And to prove, first of all, that's everybody's favorite Michael Shanker record. But I love the stuff he recorded with Graham when he came back too, by the way. So we're a strong partnership. But I'm sure you know this. You listen to the live version of that, the Tokyo show where they, the fest, and they came. The crowd goes twice as crazy when Assaultless Hack starts.

02:35:00That's the loudest of the gutters. It kicks ass, dude. That album is just so good. And it's kind of a lost album because they didn't really tour on it. And they really didn't play that stuff. And it's just a shame because it was really a great album. It's a great album. Yeah. George, is there any way you can move me on the great here of our picture so Jay and TR can be next to each other?

02:35:27I'll try. You can do it yourself, John. Wait a minute. On my screen, we are right next to each other. You are on mine. Yeah, you can move it yourself, John. I feel like I'm getting, I'm in the middle of a love fest here. When George's power went out and then he came back, you guys were all out of order. You moved, yeah. George has gone right down to the ends. Yeah. And I was like, why is Derek there? And I didn't know where to look. That's funny. That's my long running joke with Shanker. All right, let's move it along.

02:35:56Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. How are we doing for time? Trust me, my picks, some of mine have been mentioned, so I won't have much to say going forward, but this one has not been mentioned. It was a short-lived band that formed out of the ashes of another band that had some heavy hitters in it, put out two albums, and then they stopped. But they came back, but they've never really done anything since that, and the band is called Ark, and they are out of the ashes of the band Conception.

02:36:26which is a Norwegian prog metal band. And Ark is also a prog metal band that features originally two people from Norway and one from the U.S. And that was Tori Oatsby was the guitarist from Conception. Jorn Londi, who is like one of the big hard rock David Coverdell, almost like type singers that's been tearing it up for years.

02:36:56and in John Macaluso on drums on the first album. They eventually added Randy Coven and Mats Oleson. Is that how you say his name? On keyboards. Everyone in this band outside of Torrey from Conception has played for Yngwie at some point. Yeah, they don't play with Yngwie. They play for Yngwie. So is Derek Shrenian. Yeah, it's crazy. But Ark was this band that kind of formed after Conception. Conception as a Norwegian progmental band was a very strange thing at this time in the 90s.

02:37:26because in 91, 92, 93, 94, 5, that area, it was all black metal. And here come these guys with their long blondish hair, for the most part, you know, are not jet black death hair, you know, of the black metal scene. So that's my next pick. Arc, if you don't know them and you like Conception, you might want to check them out. Plus, Joran Lundy is an incredible singer. I was very fortunate to see them at Prague Power back in,

02:37:562001, I saw them at the second Prog Power.

02:38:03I'm going to be super fast, but I'm also going to be super heavy.

02:38:08So we're going to Nail Bomb and their one and done album Point Blank from 1994.

02:38:15This is Max Cavalera with Alex Newport from Fudge Tunnel.

02:38:22It's just a little blip of greatness in the mid-90s. I know, apparently, without Alex, like two years ago, I think they started playing some live shows and stuff again. And it's Max and Igor and whoever else. I feel like that name has been popping up recently for some reason. Yeah. Yeah, probably because they've probably had some shows. It was some sort of controversial.

02:38:52or something, wasn't it? I remember.

02:38:53Yes.

02:38:54Was that the bomb, the Japanese Hiroshima, was it or something?

02:38:59No, it's the Vietnam picture of the woman with the machine gun to her head.

02:39:06Yeah, yeah, it was pretty grim.

02:39:07I bought that in the UK, I think, about in 1994.

02:39:12I was over there, and I remember the cover was covered.

02:39:14It was like Cannibal Corpse.

02:39:15It was just like the logo and the blank color kind of thing.

02:39:20Yeah.

02:39:21But yeah, good album. Nice. Oh yeah, yeah, that was a good, I enjoyed that, I remember. Yeah, that was, because Sepultura were kind of at their pump. Yeah, yeah. And my subtitle for this is, and anything with Max Cavalera, because he's done so many things beyond that. You know, I mean, Soulfly and Cavalera Conspiracy and just like guest appearances everywhere. Sepultura were one of my gateway drugs.

02:39:51as well. I missed the two. Remember those two very early albums? Morbid Visions. I missed those too. I came in on between the one with dead embryonic cells. Arise. Yeah, between the previous one and Arise. Beneath the Remains and Arise. Beneath the Remains. The memory is there somewhere. I just mixed them all up.

02:40:22Okay. All right. Moving on. So me. Okay. I'll be very quick. So my next one is one of my, my next favorite metal guitars. This is Arda Isval or Ice Dale, as we know them from Enslaved. And the band in question is Audrey Horn. They're a hard rocking Norwegian band formed in 2005. This is the second album, La Fall, is the one I recommend if anyone wants to get into them. This is pure, heavy,

02:40:51Melody, classic rock, Maiden, Kiss, Ozzy, Van Halen, Crew, Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, all boxes ticked, perfect album. There's even a bit of Fate No More, Red Out Chili Peppers, one of the tracks, track eight, I think, is kind of Alice in Chains. I think Black Label Society would be jealous that they didn't get to that one before, as we heard. But this is pure, you know, classic. This is basically, I think you lads discussed before on the Metalheads podcast about how all the Norwegian black metal guys,

02:41:21We think them lingering in the shadows in the woods, but they grew up with all this stuff. This is their cup of tea. So Audrey Horne was obviously a vehicle for these guys to kind of out that kind of side of their musical taste. Because he's joined, the rest of the lineup is, like this is a black metal all-stars. This is the guy from SAG, who are kind of like a stoner-y doom band. Yeah, they're very good. I love SAG. Then there's also Tom Cato-Visnes, who was in Gorgoroth.

02:41:51and I remember the one remember the one album between the two worlds I was brilliant man I don't know why they never made a follow-up I think it was 2006 it's a long time ago it's never gonna happen now I'd say but um and then like you know so this is a black metal super group but this is pure rocket this is pure like man leave your park your brain you know Stephen Wilson won't be fucking remixing this one yeah one of the videos one of the videos for uh I had a look at it today uh for the song

02:42:21Threshold, my favorite song on the, this is pure, like Ice Dale, like you can see, like, you know, ironically he leaves his shirt on in this one. I was going to ask that question, yeah. But the video, it consists of two girls, two models drinking whilst driving and they just end up making out in the car seat. I don't know how they don't crash, but, you know, this is the 50-year-old parent now worrying about, don't crash girls, you know, while you're stripping each other off and just getting it on, you know.

02:42:50No, this is pure riffage, but I do love it because it's a time and a place. As you say, you listen to some highbrow stuff, but then you just want to listen to Audrey Horn drink some beer. Absolutely. Awesome. So that's that. Very nice. I'm going to run through mine pretty quickly here too. There's a band that a lot of people like, and I don't much care for them, called Wilco, but a lot of people like Wilco. It's all right.

02:43:20I like his solo stuff. I'm not a big fan. I get it. I understand what it's all about. So ironically, this is a previous band. And the fact that this band disappeared and then it will co-exist never sat right with me. But he used to have this band called Uncle Tupelo. Oh, yeah. And they used to go out and dig out these old coal miner songs and all this kind of stuff. I mean, legit old country songs and then do them with a little bit of a Daniel Lenoir type thing. But mostly it was just straightforward.

02:43:51weird old Kentucky,

02:43:54you know,

02:43:55mountain songs and type stuff with a little weird,

02:43:59you know,

02:43:59all not rock thing in it.

02:44:01Yeah.

02:44:02But it was anyway,

02:44:03uncle Tupelo,

02:44:04just a band worth checking out.

02:44:05If you,

02:44:05if you do like Wilco,

02:44:07which I really don't,

02:44:08um,

02:44:09these guys out,

02:44:10this was the band that I wish they would have been.

02:44:13Yeah.

02:44:14Nice.

02:44:14I think I've got,

02:44:16let me see what they have.

02:44:19Yeah. But all their records were good. Okay. So my next one is getting less and less obscure. So this one is Sting, the Dream of the Blue Turtles, released June 17, 1985. The first solo release from former police frontman and bass player.

02:44:47This was a gutsy solo first album to make in terms of the musical direction and style. Sting could have easily assembled another rock band like The Police, but he chose to go in more of a jazz direction. It helped that he had colossal jazz talents like Omar Hakeem, Brantford Marsalis, Kenny Kirkland, and Daryl Jones playing on the album. I think most people are familiar with this album, so I won't belabor it too much, but I really like what Sting did on this and the tour and live.

02:45:17that followed called Bring On The Night. Bring On The Night's freaking awesome. I love that album. Even though it's disjointed in terms of the song order, I saw that tour. Did you? Oh, God. I wish I had because honestly that was so cool. When he came out with that, I almost couldn't believe what he was doing because at the time I thought, wow. It didn't occur to me that he would go in this jazz

02:45:47direction and make this album that I felt was so good and so well put together. It seemed as though there was enough space on the album for him to let these guys do their solos. Brantford Marsalis has these cool horn solos that he does and he plays.

02:46:17And he gave them the space to do that. And I really felt like, wow, that's really cool. He didn't have to do that, but he did. And it really added to the flavor of that album so well. I just really thought that was a great album. And really kind of a big left turn for him coming out of the police. Fortress around your heart, man.

02:46:48Albeit that song was the closest thing to a police song. Well, yeah. But, I mean, you know. It's a great song, though. Yeah. Yeah. Hold on. That tour, I saw them at the Greek Theater in Berkeley. I don't know, Jay, if you've ever been there. It was just really cool. That's the night. I may have told you guys this story in the past. The night we bumped, literally almost knocked Carlos Santana over walking around. Yeah, he was just walking around with a beer in the middle of the Greek Theater, you know, in the seating area.

02:47:16Yeah, which it's like a Greek theater. I mean, yeah, I sat on stone all night, so I was paying for it later on. Yeah, it was a great show. Yeah, I've been to Greek many times. Plus, Omar Hakeem on drums. You kidding me? Yeah, it's incredible. Get him to the Greek. Yeah, that's the Los Angeles Greek, but yeah. Yeah, this is the Berkeley one. I think it's similar. Yeah. All right, so for my next pick is a change on my list. I bounced the dude who was here and put a different dude in there.

02:47:46And both of them are big names, although the person I balance is a much bigger name. But that's okay, because this guy's a pretty big name. And he comes from a pretty big band. But I feel like his solo career kind of... People either love it, or they're kind of like, eh, whatever. And I think it's great, personally, especially the album I'm going to mention. But my next pick is Jerry Cantrell. Oh, yeah. His solo career. Obviously, we don't know who Jerry Cantrell is. I don't know.

02:48:15The Dude from Alice in Chains that plays guitar and sings on almost all their songs, even though everyone says, no Lane Stanley, no Alice in Chains.

02:48:24Oh, no. Could be more untrue.

02:48:26No, because he's the bleeding heart of that band.

02:48:29Yeah.

02:48:30But I love Jerry Cantrell's solo work.

02:48:34More so the first three releases, and that's because Degradation Trip, which is the album I'm going to mention, is two.

02:48:40You can either get the single or the double.

02:48:41I got the double.

02:48:42And it's just loaded with great songs.

02:48:44And you get to hear him sing more. And then you realize how great that combination was in Allison Chains with him and Lane singing together. Because they both complemented each other. Because they don't sound anything like each other. And it just shows how talented he is. He's, I think, an underrated guitarist. He is not a grunge guitarist. He is a metal, hard rock guitarist at heart, I think. And I fight people on Allison Chains is more alt metal than they are grunge.

02:49:14Because half of those riffs, like Soundgarden 2, if no Soundgarden won't admit it, half of those riffs are Black Sabbath riffs, you know, or come from that. I think, sorry, I think they happily admit it. He does. He does. But I think Kim Tile has said before, like, he's a Sabbath, worships at the altar. He does, but he, just, they like to, not Alice in Chains, they've never done it, but all those other bands from Seattle are like, oh, we don't want nothing to do with metal.

02:49:44because they always compare it to the hair metal scene at the time and that was that big fight in the late 80s early 90s and i'm like well compare yourself to the 90s underground metal scene and then we have a different story we're talking about anyway yeah but yes i know it sound garden is just all those riffs are just oozing black sabbath on the first on the first two albums yeah alice and chains like their direct lineage is from glam like i mean they started off that's what's so funny like yeah so like jerry cantrell

02:50:14I grew up like he's good mates with Skid Row like he grew up like grunge killed all that scene but Jerry Cantrell's mates were all his victims I know that's the thing people don't realize you know I feel he's a very underrated guitarist I think he's an underrated singer too on top of that I don't think people casual fans Alice in Chains don't realize he is Alice in Chains and yes it's not the same without Lane Staley I agree and I still like William I think he's great live I've seen him a number of times with William he's great and he's a

02:50:45He's not a kid anymore, but

02:50:47so anyway, Jerry Cantrell. Nice.

02:50:50Nice. Yeah. All right. So

02:50:53I'm surprised this one hasn't come up yet, but it will now. And this is Temple of the Dog, a.k.a.

02:51:01Oh, yes. Pearl Garden.

02:51:04Yeah. Just a matter of time. Yeah. So

02:51:10done as, I guess, like a tribute to Andrew Wood.

02:51:14It was Jeff and Stone and Mike and Eddie. So it was Pearl Jam. Plus Matt Cameron, who at the time was not in Pearl Jam, but was still in Soundgarden. And of course, Chris Cornell. And yeah, great. Amazing. And they did it. They had a side stage where they played acoustically Chris Cornell and Eddie Vedder.

02:51:42And it was the year they were all breaking

02:51:45And they set the side stage up thinking

02:51:47Oh, a couple people show

02:51:48And it was ridiculous

02:51:49You know, like, I mean

02:51:51They ruled Lollapalooza that year

02:51:53It was a cool year to see it

02:51:55And an addendum to this

02:51:56More Chris Cornell audio slave

02:51:59We used to sell a ton

02:52:01I was working at a record store at that time

02:52:02We used to sell a ton of t-shirts

02:52:04That said Stone Temple of the Dog Pilot on them

02:52:11Nice

02:52:12Nice. All right. We got like what? Two more. Three. Three. Well, I'm going to write their mind fast. We can plow it. Yeah. I'm going to piss through my last three as well, guys. My last three are probably not my weakest entries, but they're kind of the more controversial. They'll probably get kicked off the podcast entries. But this one, I stand firmly behind. This one, I absolutely stand firmly behind. This is Tremonti, right? This is the guy. Before you press the fucking

02:52:46I don't care what anyone says you can have your rival sons you can have your van van fleet or whatever they're called but Alder Bridge have been one of the best rock bands of the 2000s and Mark Tremonti is the reason I know Miles Kennedy has got the pipes from heaven right he's a great singer but Mark Tremonti can actually sing a tune as well he's a great voice he's got riffs to beat this guy has got it's a really good guitarist yeah he's unbelievable I even like I even

02:53:12I googled Mark Tremonti underrated and the amount of like forums that came up you know you

02:53:16think Mark Tremonti's underrated I mean people talk about Creed okay you know they're hated or

02:53:21whatever they're much maligned but like any of Creed's best stuff and they did have a couple of good tunes it's because of him you know what I mean but the guy can sing as well so his solo work kind of gives him allows him the opportunity to kind of literally have a voice you know outside of two alpha kind of sing you know Scott Stapp and Miles Kennedy you know so and the

02:53:42The Album Question Here is Marching in Time. And honestly, I've been playing it loads of times. I can't stop playing some of the songs. It's kind of like, it is like Alter Bridge. It'd probably be similar to that, but it's more metallic. There's definitely more Metallica. The riffs are way angular, way, way angular. He's kind of rocking out. But then it's melodic too. There's a couple of ballads on it. Some of these tracks wouldn't be out of place on an Alter Bridge album, but that doesn't diminish them in any way.

02:54:12So if you could think of a heavier altar bridge with Mark Tremonti actually singing, this is great. But he's a savage guitarist. He's just got a bad rap. It's just like, you know, the bass player from Nickelback is never going to be able to live that down. You know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. But it's the same with him. It's not his fault. It's just he's got a bad reputation because it's got Stapp really in that band. Yeah, exactly. And I think he's a super talented guy. And he's on record being a hard rock kind of metal-ish guy anyway, I think, isn't he? Yeah.

02:54:41Yeah, he is. Yeah, he is. He's got cred. Yeah, he does. He's got a little schmaltz to that band. So it's just unfortunate. He made a career out of it. So what are you going to do? I'm not going to know. And Miles is, I'm not a huge Alter Bridge fan, but he's an incredible singer. He really is. So I don't mind when they come on. I don't mind hearing it. It's because I know that that band, to me, I have no issues with at all. I just never really got into them. Maybe I should. Maybe I should listen to them. And the album you're talking about,

02:55:41I don't know you turn up in a Porsche and everyone else is driving Ferraris I don't know like but you know I mean well yeah it's like everybody that ended up yeah yeah you know so but he's definitely worth checking out I mean anyone listening to this you know obviously you know might think Creed you know I'm not gonna I'm not gonna listen to that guy's solo stuff but honestly give it a shot like you'd be you'd be pleasant yeah yeah all right my next one kind of fits in pretty well with that

02:56:11in a strange sort of way just because it's a guitar player who's insane and you'll probably laugh now when I say it because you could be like dude those are worlds apart but it's somebody who has a very large reputation of his own has done lots of different supergroups and things over the time but once upon a time was in one of the great supergroups a fusion group I bet you John can already guess what I'm going to say and it's let's just remember that fusion has two things

02:56:41Jazz and Rock. So we're still talking about rock. And what I'm talking about is Mahavishnu Orchestra. Yeah. You know, I think guitarists know about this record and I'm not sure how many other people do. But it's also just a good record to listen to. They have two records. The other one was called, I forget now, this is the first one. It doesn't matter. Well, no, I'm going to tell you just to tell you. First one was called The Mounting Flame.

02:57:11Yeah. I'm talking. This is John McLaughlin is the guitarist in question. And I could listen to him all day. Mahavishnu John McLaughlin. I once asked a guitar teacher, how does he play like that? He said, because he's Mahavishnu John McLaughlin. Okay. Yeah. Not helpful. Exactly. Probably the proggiest thing on my list, but a cool super group that was not the prime focus of anybody in that band, but ended up.

02:57:42That band on the first two albums, though, Billy Cobham, Jan Hammer, Jerry Goodman. Holy smokes. Yeah. And then go to the Wikipedia page and just look up how many people walked through that band over the course of the years. It's insane. Everybody. So, yeah, totally worth checking out. Don't let the word fusion scare you off. It's a good time. Is that Jan Hammer or Miami Vice? Yeah. He's a fusion guy first. I mean, before Miami Vice, he was...

02:58:11There's nothing wrong with the team. Oh, no, no. Before we came back. He also did stuff with Jeff Beck. Yeah. And famously had the Yon Hammer group. Right. With the old Sean and Hammer. Yeah, Sean and Hammer. That's right. Nice. That's it. I'll move on. I like it. Good one, Jay. Just a brevity. All right. So my next one is getting even less obscure. It's David Lee Roth with Eat Him and Smile. Released in July.

02:58:41What my next one is. 1986. The first full-length album from former Van Halen frontman David Lee Roth. In the Van Halen divorce, Roth kept all the swagger, and it is front and center on this album. He recruited top-notch musicians Steve Vai on guitar, Billy Sheehan on bass, and Greg Bissonette on drums to back them up, and they brought the rock. While I liked what was going on in the Van Halen camp with Sammy and the band, Roth kind of kept the Van Halen

02:59:11that was lacking in Van Hagar land. The songs were hard, rocking, and full of the slap and tickle that one expects from Roth. The subsequent tour also did not disappoint. Plenty of Van Halen tunes interspersed with songs from this debut. For those of us who didn't get to see Dave with Van Halen, it was the next best thing. The next album and tour was good too, but nothing after this rocked or hit as hard.

02:59:40I also love the Spanish version of this album called Sonrisa Salvaje. Same exact music, but with Dave singing Spanish lyrics. While it may sound like gringo Spanish to some, the screams and other vocalizations that Dave adds are awesome. Oh, and to connect this with my other earlier choice of Assault Attack, Graham Bonnet left MSG and joined Alcatraz, which recruited a young Steve Vai after Yngwie Malmsteen was fired.

03:00:11and Roth poached Vi from Alcatraz for his solo band.

03:00:16This was my first show ever.

03:00:18Oh, cool.

03:00:19Yeah, David Lee Roth, Edom and Small Tour.

03:00:21Oh, really?

03:00:22Yep.

03:00:23Wow.

03:00:24This is so funny, dude, because when we get to my next one, you're not going to believe it, and it's not that.

03:00:30But I had this whole rant about why it's not that.

03:00:33But I'll keep it brief.

03:00:37Okay, John.

03:00:38That's awesome.

03:00:39All right, so mine's already been mentioned.

03:00:40This might be the first repeat. So I won't take much time. My number three is Archmotheos, which is basically just another Fate's Warning album because everyone on it has played in Fate's Warning. We've already talked about it. Same album as TR. Sympathetic Resonance is an incredible album. We got to see them play live. It was great. And they did some old Fate's Warning from the second and third album at that show. Not much more to say.

03:01:10I wish we would get one more from them because the second, although I still say it's the third release, but it's the second official release was good. I like it. But the first one just was different. It just had an ominous sound to it. It was big and it was heavy as hell. So yeah, Archbethios is my number three. And the album, again, Sympathetic Resonance for 2011 is where I would point you to go.

03:01:39I'm curious how there's still two more for everybody because I've done one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight already. Yeah, this is our last, this is our penultimate one. Oh, you've done eight? No, no. No, I've done nine. I've done nine, I think. Yeah, or eight. I've done eight. I'm about to do my nine. Oh. I've got two left. I've got two left.

03:02:07I did the Husker Du did the Love and Rockets oh wait uh no no I okay I Foo Fighters and Probot I did together but um my list reset when the computer did because I had changed it and I had them as separate and then I put them together okay so that's how it happened okay I am I am honored to be on the podcast for a list fuck up a list fuck up

03:02:37I am absolutely, honestly, George,

03:02:39like I thought these things only happened at mid-year.

03:02:43Just to be here, I'm getting emotional, man.

03:02:47That's how good of an editor George is.

03:02:49Trust me, you don't hear everything.

03:02:52Yeah, there's always a good half hour on the floor.

03:02:57All right, so this one has not been mentioned as a pick,

03:03:02but it was mentioned in passing.

03:03:04And this is adjacent to my last pick. And this is Mad Season. Yeah, I figured this was going to come up. Yeah. So I'm trying to come up with a name for this band, the Alice Screaming Jam. So it's a couple of guys from Screaming Trees, Mark Lanigan, Barrett Martin, Mike McCready from Pearl Jam.

03:03:34And then some other guy that nobody's ever heard about. John Baker Saunders from a band called The Walkabouts. Don't know him. But the other guys I do. So great album, you know, for what it was. I think there's a live album or two as well. Didn't they do a big like release of all that stuff? One thing I thought. Live at the Moor? There's a vinyl I think that's come out with it live.

03:04:03Yeah, I've got it. I guess. Is there a video to that too? Probably. I'd say they've mined it for. Actually, there was a track on the Brad album that sounds very like down. Well, the name of the song is down on the Brad album, but it sounds very much like the song down, you know, on Mad Season. So it's very interesting. Maybe Stone Gossard nicked Mike. No, hang on. Who wrote? No, maybe Mike McCready nicked Stone Gossard's idea.

03:04:31Yeah. Alrighty. Let's nail these last couple. Yeah. Okay. So my last two are ones. They're, they're not my strongest entries, but they're just, I'm a big fan of both these artists, alternative rock artists, America from the nineties. First one is Billy Corgan. And Billy Corgan had turned into some weird pseudo got overlord with the last two pumpkins albums. Everyone ran scared. He was like a fucking tripod out of war.

03:05:01But he eventually split from the pumpkins and got back to writing some kind of jangly pop numbers in a band called Zwan. Now, it's a one-off album with one of the members of a perfect circle. It's called Mary's Star of the Sea. I mean, it's not, you know, it's not kind of reinventing the wheel. It's pretty much Corgan going back to what he did best, you know, a bit of strumming, acoustic, jangly kind of pop, kind of Siamese Dream Gish stuff. So it's well worth a listen if you kind of missed it because it was very easy to miss it at the time.

03:05:31But if you're expecting, you know, some sort of Billy Corgan, what would you say, about face in terms of his character, forget about it. When the Vader mask came off, he just ripped into everyone. He ripped into everyone calling them. I think there was a quote here. He called them like dirty, filthy people who have no self-respect or class. So there you go. That's Billy for you. Yeah, I've got that CD somewhere. Great musician, fantastic singer, but doesn't seem to be the nicest of the guys. Certainly when it comes to him.

03:06:01He turned down everyone. I listened to it a number of times on decent stereo CD and everything. And it's just like, when you kind of when you roll in with this guy, he's just going to turn you down, you know, and completely lost in the mix, you know. So yeah, there we go. Jimmy Chamberlain's on it, though. So if you're a drummer, and you know, you don't like Jimmy Chamberlain. If you're a fan of Billy Corgan, definitely watch his podcast on YouTube, because he's the only one who talks. I he he his questions are

03:06:3112 minutes long and then the answer is 30 seconds from the poor guy sitting there. It just sounds like we were due to meet him. Actually, I know we're short on time, but just quickly 2008 and after the pumpkins reformed myself, my brother and another mate, we went up to Dublin to watch them. And a friend of ours over in the States had knew the band slightly and we were supposed to meet him. We didn't realize we were supposed to meet him, but maybe it was a good thing that we didn't know. I think he's probably okay. He's just. Yeah, I'm joking. Yeah.

03:07:01If you're listening, Billy, we love you. Yeah, he's a big listener on this podcast. He's quite a big guy. I wouldn't like to mess around with him, actually. He's like some over-art. He's like 6'5 or something, right? Yeah, really. And with the bald head, he's really imposing. I still remember the GISH videos on MTV when he had the hair. Yeah, yeah. It literally fell out in the video because he only had hair for about five minutes. That was it. That was it.

03:07:32So mine is, I was just shocked to death by TRs. I didn't choose that. And even though it's hard, I think Yankee Rose is such a great song. And the record is a lot of fun too and everything. And I don't, I understand people who don't like David Lee Roth, but I think he's a weird force of nature. I love to listen to him talk. I think he's hilarious. So funny. And then he made his second solo record, which I thought was sort of strangely in, it's a mix of the first one.

03:08:01and it's kind of introspective as well. And it didn't sell a single copy except for the one that I bought. And it's called Sky's Graper. I love Sky's Graper. I like it too, but it didn't have enough balls for me. Hence the introspective. But I love the title track and there's just so much good stuff on it. There is. And I mean, you know, like that song Hina, which was kind of like chilled out. There was good stuff on that album, but

03:08:31But when you compare it to the swagger from the first album, it just doesn't have the balls, right? I mean, it's a good album, and pretty much it's like the same dudes, right? It is. I think 100%. I mean, they kind of had more keyboards and stuff on there, but I don't know. I dig it, and I think it's kind of when they became more of a band, and I don't know why it appealed to me the way it did, but I just, I think

03:09:01He gets a bad rap. I would suggest anybody who hates him, go listen to the interview that Mark Maron did with him. And Mark Maron writes about the interview and just says, I was told, he said, I asked a friend, how do I interview this guy? And he said, just turn him on and let him go. And that's what he does, which is what you do with David Lee Roth. And he's just got such an interesting past and all these interesting things. So anyway, Skyscraper, I think is a really, really good record that gets overlooked. Nice. And it's post, you know, this huge

03:09:31Bandy was in and post his huge

03:09:34debut and but it's a good record yeah yep well

03:09:37and and the tour was cool I mean don't

03:09:39get me wrong I I enjoyed the skyscraper

03:09:41tour yeah nearly as much as I enjoyed

03:09:44the eat them and smile tour but yeah

03:09:48all right so my my next to last

03:09:52penultimate choice here actually

03:09:55Derek mentioned it earlier and he I

03:09:57always thought he was taking my thunder

03:09:59here.

03:10:00Audio Slave, their debut, Audio Slave, released November 2002. Rage Against the Machine minus vocalist Zach DeLaRosia plus Chris Cornell from Soundgarden equals an unexpected killer debut.

03:10:18I didn't know what to expect when this lineup was announced, but the album surpassed my expectations.

03:10:24The riffs are huge, and Cornell's vocals end up being a perfect fit.

03:10:28I wasn't sure how funky it was going to be, but it ended up being more hard rock oriented, which I was very happy with. Morello tones down the weird and wacky guitar sounds found on the Rage Against the Machine albums for more traditional hard rock guitar sounds. While the album is mostly hard rockers, there are some mellower songs that add a dimension that I didn't think would be possible with the Rage guys. Songs like Like a Stone, I Am the Highway, and the Nearly

03:10:58Soulful Getaway Car, give the listener a pleasant break from the more skull-crushing tunes. Subsequent albums, to me, were not as consistently good all the way through as this release. I saw them on this tour at the Electric Factory in Philadelphia, and later when they played with Jane's Addiction on Lollapalooza. So, Audioslave's original debut, Audioslave. Nice. People will think this is strange, but Like a Stone is my very,

03:11:30I just love that song. It's so beautiful. Yeah. Yeah. He just is so good on that. It just opens up and gets so weird and so good. He's such a good singer. And that song was kind of what converted me to being a Chris Cornell believer. Yeah. It's kind of sad as well. When you see the video, I think his daughter, I think, is only a baby at the time and she's on his shoulders and she's grown up now and her dad's no longer around.

03:11:58It's kind of sad, you know. I remember I got married, actually. It was a Chris Cornell tune we had, you know, as we kind of walked out. And like, he's always been a big influence in my life, musically. And, you know, he's just, when he died, he died just before he got married, actually. And I was quite, I was quite upset. I think my wife probably thought I was crying about it. I was getting married or something. But, you know. I was just genuinely, like, I'm not one who gets, it's not like I'm kind of cold about it, but I don't kind of,

03:12:28You know, when actors and famous people pass, they kind of go, that's sad and everything. But Chris Cornell was one of those, you know, like, oh, fuck, we really lost someone there, you know? Yeah, it hurt. Yeah, it did. YouTube, him singing Nothing Compares to You, the Sinead O'Connor. Oh, yeah, yeah. Prince, Prince Tune originally. Prince Tune originally, yeah. In the interest of time. John. So, not much to say. It's already been mentioned. My next one is,

03:12:58OSI, Office of Strategic Influence, the kind of merging of Fate's Warning, Dream Theater, and Chroma Key all together. At least on the first album, there were actually three band members before it became two band members. And I would agree with TR, the first release, Office of Strategic Influence itself, which is actually what it's called, not just OSI, is the best one. Although I do love all four albums to varying degrees.

03:13:27This one still stands out the most for me. Didn't feel like it was, it felt more of a band at this point than when it became just two guys. Great. If you like, like I said, Fate's Warning, Dream Theater, Chroma Key, if you like any of that stuff, it's a hodgepodge of all of it. It's not as Chroma Key on this album as it would be on the following albums, but it still has a heavy experimental ambient vibe to it, which Jim Athios was already experimenting with on his own.

03:13:57I was very fortunate to probably see the closest thing you'll ever see to these guys playing live. I was hungover to death from maybe partying at an Opeth show in San Francisco the night before. Partying with Mike. Yep. Maybe. Maybe Peter too. They were on tour with Porcupine Tree and I did a majority of that tour. I think I did nine of the 16 dates.

03:14:27I almost didn't get out of San Francisco to fly to Portland, which I'm glad I did because I had a night off and I went and saw Queensryche Dream Theater and Fate's Warning when they turned together.

03:14:39Oh, that's right. Yes.

03:14:40During Fate's Warning set, Mike Portnoy came out to play drums. Sean Malone was living in Portland at the time or was there. So I got to see three of the five guys on stage play.

03:14:52And Stephen Wilson was in the area, but he did not come to sing. But they did play Shutdown. Oh, wow. Yeah, because they were touring with Opeth at the time. Those two tours hit Portland back-to-back nights. So I'm very fortunate to see Sean Malone play live. A few times, never. Oh, I did see him once with Cinect. So anyway, that's my number two or second last one. Yeah. OSI. Hey, another one that I'm surprised hasn't come up.

03:15:22But here it is, Black Country Communion. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, nice. It's a super group too. Yeah, Glenn Hughes, Jason Bonham, Joe Bonham, and Derek Sherinian. I think they're working on something new, George, by the way. They might be. And they actually are a legit fan. I mean, they've got, what, four or five albums, right? Five, yeah. Five, yeah. So it's not like it's just they just don't.

03:15:52They always seem to get back together. Yeah, they all got plenty of stuff to do. Yeah, they're all busy. Joe Bonamassa, I think, is a pretty hectic solo schedule. He was in Ireland here, if not last year, I think a year or so ago. But he's really prolific. He's way bigger in Europe than he is here. He's rich because of Europe. And he does okay here, but not like he does over by you guys. That's crazy. That's a good one, George. I didn't think that would come up. Yeah, that's good. Okay.

03:16:22Last round.

03:16:25Okay, I'll speed it up because we're probably running out of time literally now.

03:16:29So my last one, I'll be quick.

03:16:31This is a vocalist.

03:16:32Again, like Corgan, he's not one of the cool kids, but I grew up with this band,

03:16:38enjoyed them quite a lot, even in the depths of metaldom.

03:16:41This is live, and this is Ed Kowalczyk, his solo career.

03:16:44Oh, yeah.

03:16:45I love those guys.

03:16:46Yeah, something's good to like.

03:16:48Absolutely.

03:16:49The Thingy, the thing about Ed Kowalczyk, he was never the rock god, he was never a vetter or Cornell, he was quite a slight kind of character, kind of unassuming, and also fairly, I think, kind of religious, so it probably mitigated against him as well, but not for me, he was one of the best, he simply one of the best singers that ever was, especially with the post-grunge thing, you know, you've got Counting Crows and all those bands, but no one could match Ed Kowalczyk for his pipes, the intensity,

03:17:18You know, it's just a superb, like that live album, Throwing Copper, what is the lightning crashes? I mean, just the lyrics, his lyrics and delivery on like, there's not that there's no song on that album. I dislike, you know, even the filler tracks like shit town or the one at the end about horses or whatever. That's such a good album. But I like that album a lot. I loved Mental Jewelry when it came out and it wasn't as big a deal. Throwing Copper really broke them.

03:17:48But Mental Jewelry, man, when that came out, I was all over it. It's so ironic you're bringing this up because just the other night, for some reason, this kind of came up. They came up. Well, they did a reunion thing a while back. And I don't know how long ago it was. I remember looking at the year, but they were all clearly a little stouter and a little older. And he hasn't lost a step. That guy's style still on is exactly the same. Oh, yeah. I just read something yesterday that, like,

03:18:18he's not allowed to use the name or anything. There's like some sort of. Yeah, there's a lawsuit. Yeah, I saw that too. Yeah. Right. Exactly. It's like it's like Bonehead stopping Oasis from reforming, you know. Anyway, that's me. That's me done. Oh, sorry. Just the name of the album for anyone who's for anyone listening who's interested. It's a live came out 2010. And it's a bit more kind of a or radio friendly.

03:18:48but his voice is superb and that's all you need to know go this nice stuff support that throat was touched by the hand of god for sure um my last one is a super group um and it's not unlike the firm and that it kind of was there for a minute and i think it was had a pretty good impact when they existed but then everybody kind of walked away and forgot about it and i don't think they ever intended to do more than one record but this is a band that has eric clapton who was god at the time in england um ginger baker isn't it no i'm not

03:19:18about cream and it has kind of a no-name guy went off and died but then it's got steve winwood in it and the band is called blind faith yeah man and this can't find my way home is such a beautiful song and in the presence of the lord and it's just this it's really an ep if i recall i don't think there's like four songs on it that's six i think really good and it yeah it was just this weird little stepping stone in all their careers where they were all in the same room for a minute made a cool record and never did anything with it again album cover might have been a little racist well yeah

03:19:52I got it released with a new cover on it. I think they cleaned it up and it just sounds great. But Jag, I agree with you. That album is, I think people forget, I mean, Can't Find My Way Home is, that's almost a gut-wrenching song though when you're listening to it a little bit. It's really gut-wrenching and, you know, Traffic was such a cool band. Yes, I like Traffic too. Got a little poppy or whatever in the 80s, but he was in some cool bands, man.

03:20:17and voice of an angel too. The other dude that started when he was like 15 or 16. Yeah, he was young. Spencer Davis, yeah. I'll admit though, too, I think Back in the High Life again is a great song. You know what I mean? Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's just, it became like Stairway to Heaven and Bohemian Rhapsody. Just that album got overplayed so much. Overplayed. By the way, Joe Walsh is on that album and that's the coolest song on the album, I think. Yeah. But Blind Faith, cool band. That's great.

03:20:47It might not. Between the firm and Blame Fee Jay, you're knocking them out of park. Is that Rick Gresh on base on that? Yes, it is. I can't remember if he's on that. Hold on. That was a massive super group at the time. It's a TR. You're up. Okay. All right. My last one is the least obscure of all. I wonder who this is. Black Sabbath, Heaven and Hell.

03:21:17Oh, well. Released April 1980. Black Sabbath minus Ozzy plus Ronnie James Dio equals possibly the best Black Sabbath album ever. I know this is probably blasphemy to all those who like Ozzy fronted Sabbath best, but to me, this album is so classic and a case where the sum is greater than all the parts. It really is magical. The band sounds like it has a completely new lease on life and a renewed vigor.

03:21:47I agree that you could say that technically this isn't Black Sabbath. And of course, later they did change the name to Heaven and Hell to differentiate the Dio fronted music from Black Sabbath. But all that aside, regardless of the name, the music is some of the best from all the artists involved. Sharon Osbourne approves of this. She's the one that introduced Iommi to Dio. Yeah, but she's also the one who said, don't use that name Black Sabbath.

03:22:19But I couldn't agree with you more, dude. A band that looked like it was going to die was completely resurrected in the coolest damn way. Yeah. Cool. This guy. Cool. This guy. I mean, just the first five notes and then. Yeah. The energy like it's just like it's undeniable and the chemistry. It's like, oh, my God, like this band that was on life support is suddenly like kicking your ass hard. And also just how nice is it that this comeback?

03:22:47The Record starts with the lyrics, oh no, here it comes again. Yeah. By the way, I'm sorry, before I do mine, we're going to have to throw Ozzy in now, at least for the first two albums. I thought about it too. Because how could you have that version of Black Sabbath and not mention Ozzy? Because they both had incredible comeback albums, even though Ozzy's first album was his first solo. It's still a comeback album. Yeah. And the funny thing is, Jay and I still think the second albums in those two groups are better than the first.

03:23:17But I thought about that too, John, when we were doing this. Hard not to mention, because they kind of go hand in hand. Yeah. Good one. That's a nice one. I like it. All right, my last one. And this is the one I could talk about for hours, because it is by far my favorite solo project from anyone. This was a dude that got brought into a band to replace another guy. He got blamed for the band sounding partially commercial, even though it was the

03:23:47He got booted and he decided I'm coming back pissed off. And boy, did he come back pissed off. Because he spurred on a whole solo career and collaborations with a bazillion bands. And to me, it actually worked out better for him. And I'm referring to Derek Sherinian. His solo work is my favorite solo artist from any band that left from a band to somebody else. Because it's progressive metal. It's progressive rock. It's just hard rock. It's jazz fusion. It's all over the map.

03:24:16and some of the greatest musicians in the world have played for him. He hasn't gotten everyone, but he's come pretty damn close. Just real quick, he's had guys like, and I'm not a super Zach Wilde fan, but he really fits in with the mold of what goes on there. He's had Alan Holdsworth, Steve Vai, Steve Lukather, Al DiMeola, Yngwie. Shanker's been on there. Then he's had John Producci's been on his song. He's had all these great bass players like Billy Sheenan, Virgil Donati, and his longtime collaborator.

03:24:46Simon Phillips, who's been with him for so long. I love all the solo work. And it's most of it. It's about 99% instrumental. Billy Idol sings on a song with him because he used to tour for Billy Idol. And I think the greatest thing that ever happened to him is he got kicked out. Because he has a solo career. He started his own another band called Planet X. He's got George just mentioned Black Country Communion. He's played with a bazillion people. He'll play on anyone's album, by the way. He's like Hans Grossman of keyboards.

03:25:16He really is. He plays for everybody. And I think he's the most maligned member of the band in Dream Theater. And it's completely unfair because it wasn't his fault the label pushed him to go a little more commercial. He's just as good, if not better, than all the other guys on keyboards. Everyone says Jordan Rue is Derek Shrenny. He's top flight. Just because he didn't go to Juilliard. Oh, he went to Berkeley. And he seems like a decent dude.

03:25:45And he's a huge Alan Holesworth and Eddie Van Halen fan. And the one guy he never got on guitar to play for him, because he has played with Eddie before. He did a backyard party, I think, for Eddie's birthday. He never got Jeff Beck, and he wanted Jeff Beck on one of his albums. And he couldn't get him. Nice. Yeah. All right. Here we are at the end of the line. Bring us home, George. This is the supergroup of all supergroups, and I just gave you an Easter egg.

03:26:15The Traveling Wilburys. George Harrison, Jeff Lynn, Tom Petty, Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan. What? I love the Wilburys so much. So much. That would have been an intimidating room to hang out in, don't you think? Yeah. I always thought Tom Petty was kind of like the kid in the room. I mean, at the time, you know.

03:26:45They match. Oh, they do. It's a perfect match. That whole group. Yeah, they were meant to be together. Although I don't like Bob Dylan singing. He's like, eep, eep, eep. Oh, man, Tweeter and the Monkey Man. I love that song so much. Did you mention George? Yeah, I started with him. Yeah. You know, they remind me of The Highwaymen, which is... Country supergroup. Country supergroup, but also an intimidating room. You know, Chris Christopher,

03:27:15Johnny Cash, Willie Nelson, who was the other guy in there? You're bound to get higher punched in the face in that group. Was it Merle? Somebody got that. Thank you, Derek. Waylon Jennings. Waylon, that's what I meant. See? It just was my point. You're either getting high or getting punched. That's a tough crowd. Some great footage of them. They were hanging out backstage and they were talking about their favorite places to go. And Chris Christopherson, who's sort of the literary one in the group, says, wow, Paris, man.

03:27:44And he goes, what? What does Paris have that I need? He goes, they got 400 kinds of cheese, they got, you know, culture, they got this, this, this. And Will and Jenny said, I can get all that in Fort Worth, man. That's actually very funny. Yeah. All right. Big fan of all those guys. That's the super group of super groups. It is, actually. That really is. Perfect one to end on.

03:28:14Yeah, let's see, who's still alive? Jeff Lynne. And Bob. That's it. Bob and Jeff Lynne. And Bob's getting up there, man. He's in his 80s. Yeah, he's going to be, he's still touring, but he just, it'll be one of those sudden kind of news ones, you know, I think. I think they will, yeah. Yeah, sadly. But he is, I mean, he never stops, but he just, he's pretty shaky. He can't really play guitar anymore because he's got arthritis, so he mostly plays piano.

03:28:44Sometimes he plays guitar, but he's looking. Yeah, Bob's getting to the end of the line. Yeah, he played here in Frederick of all places. Oh, wow. Yeah, it's the only time I saw him. Probably eight, ten times. Mm-hmm. Does he ever play Lay, Lay, Lay when you saw him? When I saw him? Yeah. No. He never played that. Never played it once. That's my favorite song from him. It's his country song that, or the song that became a country staple for other artists. Oh, no, for sure. I had a list of stuff, though,

03:29:14The One I Always Waited For was Every Grain of Sand, which I think he played second last time I saw him. Yeah, nice. George, do you have a big list you want to go through? Yeah, so I'm going to go through this quickly, but I was telling the guys I was doing some musical research, looking for new stuff that I wanted to dig into, and I came up with an old-school Metal Heads podcast, George List.

03:29:45I am going to go through it quickly. And as I mentioned earlier, I'm going to add the cowpunk stuff too. And then George, when you're done, I have one album I want to mention and it will not take long. I promise. I got a handful too. All right. So I'm just going to run through this quickly and not even tell you much. This is just like, Hey, if you want to check these bands out, I thought they were cool. The sheepdogs. Yes. I was going to mention them. Yeah.

03:30:14Nice. Yeah. I just got into them and I'm like, oh my God, these guys are amazing. Yeah. A band called Tanith. T-A-N-I-T-H. You have an extra letter in your alphabet. How much have I had to drink? Only one beer. Anyway. A band called The Answer. People might have heard of them. I know I'd heard of them before, but I'm digging into them more. Gentle Knife. Sort of a prog.

03:30:44Progy Rock Band. All Them Witches, we've talked about them before on Metalheads, I think. 1000 Mods. It's all like run together, 1000 Mods. A band called Sacrimonti. S-A-C-R-I-M-O-N-T-I. One I was talking to John about yesterday, The Vintage Caravan, because their latest album has a track with Michael Ackerfeldt.

03:31:16A band that I am actually familiar with, and I just went back to it because it was in the similar style of all this, The Dagger, which was a side project and could have been on this list. In fact, might have been what dragged me over here because The Dagger is a couple of the guys from Dismember doing rock music. That came out in like 2014 or something. And if Jay was here, he would probably,

03:31:44I'm pretty sure he liked them as well. A band called Horisont. H-O-R-I-S-O-N-T. I believe they're probably Scandinavian and sort of like Graveyard, which is another one I'm going to mention. And then a band called Radio Moscow. I don't know how to pronounce this one. I'm going to go with Wukan, like Toucan. It's W-U-U-N-T.

03:32:14C-A-N-U-C-A-N. Another band called The Commoners, which is a little more, I think, country-ish, blues-ish. Forge Hounds, Black Smoke Trigger, Cardinal Black, Robert John and the Wreck. A little more bluesy, I think. A little more Southern here. We got the Georgia Thunderbolts. Heard of them. When Rivers Meet is a male.

03:32:44When Rivers Mead, yeah. When Rivers Mead, a male-female duo that really blew me away. Imperial State Electric, which is a band, the dude from the helicopters. Nick is his name? Nicky from Entombed, yeah. And, yeah. The Good, The Bad, and The Zugly. A little more punky. Helldivers.

03:33:16Grande Royale. Anyone? Anyone? No, wow, you're digging deeper. Big Royale. Last one on this list, Dead Lord. I'd heard of these guys before I recognized the album cover and was worth going back to check out. Now, some of the cow punk stuff. I didn't write it down here, but Dead Milkman is a good cow punk band.

03:33:44Jason and the Scorchers,

03:33:47the Gun Club,

03:33:48probably everybody's heard of the Meat Puppets.

03:33:50Oh yeah.

03:33:52Love the Meat Puppets.

03:33:53Yeah.

03:33:54The Beat Farmers,

03:33:56my man Mojo Nixon, R.I.P.,

03:33:59Rank and File,

03:34:02Blood on the Saddle,

03:34:04Dash Rip Rock,

03:34:07The Long Riders,

03:34:09and it's R-Y-D-E-R-S,

03:34:12And a little more contemporary, Larry and his flask. So that's a whole bunch of stuff for you to go out and check out if you're looking for new music. You should add Dave Alvin and the Blasters to your list, George. Dave who? Dave Alvin and the Blasters. Dave Alvin and the Blasters. All right, I'm not going to write that down. You're going to care about that. Cool. I got one, and I don't know if you guys have any stuff, but I'll do it real quick if you don't mind. Yeah.

03:34:42I'm interested in this. Jay, I'm throwing this, you, a heads up on this one. You and I haven't really talked about the bands that would be fans of that might like this. But I'm going to actually do some Swedish prog rock, and that is the new Hollis album, Panorama, that just came out. It's 70s progressive rock meets 70s hard rock with some psychedelic and folk elements. So for fans of Uriah Heep, Wishbone Ash, even Old

03:35:12Genesis, for your older reference points, and for new reference points, Phantom Spell, George, the Vintage Caravan, and Witch Hazel, all of you are into those bands. It's got that vibe. So it's got that kind of Uriah Heap, hard rockin', but still proggy, you know? Not maybe as, not as much as Kansas, where Kansas became very hard rock prog. This is a little more kind of the laid back sound of those early 70s bands. And Phantom Spell's a great,

03:35:42current reference point.

03:35:44Who sit and mention the band again?

03:35:47Hollis.

03:35:48Oh.

03:35:49H-A with the umlaut.

03:35:51Oh, yeah.

03:35:51Hollis.

03:35:52Yeah, yeah.

03:35:52Or Hollis, whatever.

03:35:53Yeah.

03:35:54Sorry, no, I just I just cut down.

03:35:56Yeah, I read a review that they got.

03:35:58Yeah.

03:35:58Them and T-H-E-C-Train are meant to be.

03:36:01Yeah.

03:36:01So H-A-L-L-A-S.

03:36:04Okay.

03:36:05And don't forget the umlaut over the first day.

03:36:09Just because you just mentioned it.

03:36:11I'm not even the hugest fan but

03:36:13there's a great documentary about Kansas

03:36:15called Miracles Out of Nowhere that I cannot

03:36:17recommend enough if you like. Those first

03:36:19five albums are where I'm at.

03:36:21It's so good dude and it's just

03:36:23such a cool documentary about

03:36:25how they came about.

03:36:27They're underrated because they weren't English

03:36:29at the time when they came out

03:36:31but they really are America's great

03:36:33prog rock hard rock band

03:36:35for that era. Miracles Out of

03:36:37Nowhere totally worth your time.

03:36:39I will check that out. Cool.

03:36:40Okay. I've got a handful that I've been listening to lately. Again, I can't recommend enough to go explore your public library. This is a public service announcement. Let's get weird in this thing. Yeah. Because they've got... The more you know. Here's the thing. I will freely admit that I am not part of the group of people that

03:37:10that rents their music. I buy my music or I get my music and then I own my music so that when I quit paying for it, it doesn't go away. While I understand the idea behind renting music because when you pay a certain fee per month, you can listen to whatever you want at any time forever.

03:37:40however long you keep paying.

03:37:43So, but I just can't subscribe to that whole idea.

03:37:46So anyway, I go to the library and I take out various CDs.

03:37:53And recently I grabbed the following discs.

03:37:59Fleetwood Mac Live 1975.

03:38:02It's the first tour of Stevie Nicks and Lindsey Buckingham.

03:38:05And while Fleetwood Mac had had a few lineup changes by then,

03:38:08They were really becoming a completely different band at this point. You can hear the transformation taking place. Van Halen Live at Wembley, 1995. It's a decent set of tunes from the Balance Tour. Probably not the first Van Halen album I would reach for, but it's nice to have a live set from that time. Scorpions Coming Home Live, 60th anniversary show in Germany with a set list that the band has been playing lately. The hits you'd expect along with a couple of new tracks.

03:38:36These guys still bring the rock. Dream Theater, Quarantiem Live at Paris, 40th Anniversary set with Portnoy back behind the kit. It's a great show spanning their entire career, and they all sound good, including Labrie, who doesn't push himself to try to sing what he can't. I also picked up Loverboy Classics. I got this used for a dollar, and it's got everything on it you'd want from Loverboy.

03:39:06if you would want anything from Loverboy.

03:39:09I love Loverboy.

03:39:11And a couple of things you wouldn't want from Loverboy.

03:39:14Hey, we saw Loverboy a couple years ago.

03:39:16We did, and it was a great show, even though Mike Reno looked like three times the size of what he was when he...

03:39:22Hey, no body shame in here.

03:39:25No, there's no shame, but it's just like it was a little bit of a shock, you know, having not known that he had gotten that large.

03:39:34And then the other...

03:39:37Yeah.

03:39:38So the other album I picked up recently was the Graham Bonnet Band,

03:39:43or Lost in Hollywood Again, a live set from 2024 at the Whiskey A Go Go.

03:39:49Bonnet sings songs from across his career, including Rainbow, Alcatraz,

03:39:53and songs from the Graham Bonnet Band.

03:39:57I thought you said Graham Vomit.

03:39:59Yeah, the Graham Vomit Band.

03:40:02Bonnet is in good form, as is the rest of the band.

03:40:04It's definitely worth checking out. And then I've got a couple of ambient and electronic albums for you. One called the FD Project. Timeless is the title of that album from 2006. German electronic artist Frank Deritka. Mirror System, self-titled album from 2005. It's the UK duo of Steve Hillage and Miquette Giraudi,

03:40:34whom you may know from bands such as gong and system seven and then a a band called air sculpture with their album called impossible geometries from 1995 and this is another uk electronic music group so these are a few of the albums that i've been listening to lately that uh might be of interest nice i have a list here as well george if sorry john do you want to go do you no i i don't actually i don't have a list but i will

03:41:04say this. There's a mashup to do here really quick, which is in mentioning the Graham

03:41:11Bunnet band. He happens to be working on a record with Jeff Loomis, of all people. So that should be weird.

03:41:15Oh, wow. Huh. Oh, man. Apparently they got seven or eight songs ready to go. Can't wait to see what that's all about. Bring it, Jeff. With that, Derek, please. Thanks, Jay. Sorry, I didn't mean to butt in there. So I'll quickly raise through mine as well. A lot of this stuff is 90s rock because

03:41:34most of my focus was on that. So I just started listening to a rake of stuff. So basically, well, it doesn't start that way. Van Morrison I was actually listening to a lot lately. That's not 90s American rock. But then Silverchair, Australian kind of. Oh, yeah. Yeah, they're pretty good. That album was good. Yeah, I like that more. Frogstop, is that the one? Yeah. That's the very one. Yeah, that was the one. And then Izzy Stradlin, his solo album. Yeah, it's pretty good.

03:42:04The One Where He's On The Cover. He's Probably On All The Covers. I don't know. No one is he, but it's probably the most recent one. Them Crooked Vultures, which we're all familiar with. What else? Slash featuring Miles Kennedy and The Conspirators. That's one of the later albums. Monster Truck from Canada as well, George. I've heard of him. Haven't heard his name in a while. Yeah, I used to listen to them. They were on the radio all the time when it was over there, so I just kind of listened to them again. Danko Jones, another Canadian.

03:42:33I was just digging deep into that catalog. Really? Like a month ago. Yeah. Yeah. John Garcia on the album. I was listening to that. John Garcia was on one of the tracks. It was just brilliant. You know, I love that stuff. And Blackstone Cherry. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Good. They have a new thing coming out as well. There was an interview with them in classic rock there. They're kind of underrated band in the States. Probably done better in Europe than they have in the States. I really like the early stuff. Yeah. The non-southern States maybe.

03:43:04Who else? Graveyard, you already mentioned, George. The answer, of course, you already mentioned. Who else? The Afghan Whigs, remember that? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah. This is all. I got a few of them. Like all girlfriends. Blind Melon. Yeah. Yeah. Blind Melon. A big fan of Blind Melon. Shannon Hoon. He was a big loss. Head Swimmer, an English band. They kind of sound like Radiohead and U2. They're pretty good. I'll send you a link for those. Cool.

03:43:34I love them. Yeah. They're very divisive in America. Kings of the Young are huge in Ireland. They're fucking massive. You know. And I will say this. I don't think they ever topped their first record. And that was just the rawest, coolest. Yeah. The best title, which was Youth and Young Manhood. What a good name for a record. And even the EPJ prior to that, Novocaine for the Soul or something that was really good. Yeah. What is it? Novocaine.

03:44:03What's the first thing? Am I mixing it up with someone? No, you got it. No, but it's like something. There's a word before Novocaine. Holy Roller Novocaine. Holy Roller Novocaine. Sorry, I'm mixing it up with Novocaine, but that was another band. I think it was. Strange too. I saw them open for Bob Dylan when that first record came out. Oh, wow. They were hairy back then. They looked like the sheep dives. They were cooler back then, but I still think they're cool. Yeah, I know. I really like them, I have to say. Robert Plant and The Strange Sensation. I was just listening to

03:44:33Robert Plant's work with a strange sensation. That was a pretty good one of his many collaborations. But that was probably... What's the name of the record? Does it have a song on it called All the Kingsmen? I think so, yeah. It's kind of like a gesture or something on the cover or something. That's correct, yeah. That was probably one of his better solo outings, I thought. Yeah, it was pretty good there. Well, I still think the stuff with Alison Krauss trumps it, but definitely... Yeah, yeah. Who else? The Lemonheads, because I...

03:45:03I have two young children in the car and you've heard you've heard of girlfriend metal this is girlfriend yeah yeah I was too threatened by Evan Dando back in the day I hated them I like the Mrs. Robinson cover yeah he hated that actually like the man themselves actually hated that and having to do it but I'm sure their bank accounts will tell you I recorded a cover of their version where are we so

03:45:33Oh yeah, this is an Irish band called Wilt. They're from Kilkenny, a town near, or a county. It's a county next to us. It sounds funny to Americans because it sounds like South Park Kilkenny, but they were part of, the original band was Curb Dog. I don't know if anyone ever heard that band, Curb Dog. No, no, check them out. I'll send you on links anyway later. Cool. Who else? Let's see. Carnival, the Australian prog band. You know Carnival? Very good. I love those guys. Yeah, yeah, very good.

03:46:03Crown Lands, another kind of prog band from Canada. They had a good album out there a while ago. Alternative 4, John, you'd probably be into it. Oh yeah, love it. Who else? Arcade Fire, I was listening to Neon Bible, they're Canadian. I love Arcade Fire. Any fans there? I haven't listened to that, like the Obi-Wan thing, that's a name I haven't heard in a long time, but yeah. I'm nearly done.

03:46:33Man of Gravity, they're a one-off band from America. Pretty good album, but they weren't ever that big. From Ireland, Sin of a Higher Strain, it's a mates band. It's on Bandcamp. If I'm talking too fast, people can just pause and listen. Bell X1, they're a band from Ireland. Anyone heard of them? They're pretty good. I actually saw them with... I'm trying to remember now.

03:47:02Yeah, it was, let's see, I saw them, I saw them play in Scotland, and I think, I can't remember if it was a Keen show, they played with, maybe they played with Keen, but I saw them when they played in, I'm trying to remember now when it was, but yeah, I've seen them, and I'm familiar with one of their albums.

03:47:27Okay. Yeah. Well, they've, they've a few, they're fairly good. They're kind of like talking heads kind of, you know, a more eccentric if it's possible to have a more eccentric. How do you spell that one? Bell X one. So it's, it's named after, I think it was. Yeah. So it's B L L X and just the. So literally bell X one. Yeah. Okay. It's basically the, the, the aircraft that Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier. Okay. That's right. Yeah. Yeah. That's cool. That's the one.

03:47:57is another band from Ireland. They're defunct now. They were kind of, I think, the late 80s, early 90s. They're worth checking out. I don't know if their stuff is on Spotify. It might be, but they're pretty good. The Pale Fall. This is a band actually, they're kind of progressive. This is the lead singer, Paul Kearns. He used to sing for Solstice and Fifth Dominion metal bands. Not Solstice, the prog band now, but the metal band, the Doom band from Yorkshire. He was with them. So that's on Bandcamp.

03:48:28That's pretty good. And then that was, oh yeah, Metal. I just want to shout out a couple of Metal suggestions from friends. So we've Corvona, a band from Cork. We're kind of like a Dune, kind of Pagan Dune band. Procession of Spectres is the same as The Grief from Cork. My mate Corey's back into Badden Incarnate, Grindcore band. They have some new stuff coming out as well. Then also, who,

03:48:57Let's see, there's someone else I don't want to forget anyone now. It's going to like when I'm on some sort of radio. Yeah, that's pretty much it. Then I was listening to The Verve and Ash, and then there was another couple of progressive death metal and progressive death doom bands, Maverick Spirits, Endless River from Hungary, Cold Grey Dawn, black metal band from Ireland, and Apathy Noir, Victor Jonas, a Swedish guy. It's kind of proggy doom. So that's pretty much it. So that's it. I'll leave.

03:49:27I saw Bell X1 in Cork and actually it was with a band called Turn that opened up for them. Yeah, Turn. Yeah, I remember it. Yeah, they were pretty much in the late 90s band as well. Okay. It was 2005. That was when I saw the show. Yeah. Nice one, yeah. No, Bell X1. I'm surprised.

03:49:57because they're one of those bands who I wouldn't really have expected would have kind of broken out of the Irish UK bubble you know that kind of way yeah actually so one of my good friends Richard actually was into them and you know kind of pulled me in and said hey check these guys out and then he wanted to go see them in Ireland and that's how I ended up because he was like hey you want to go to Ireland for this show and I'm like okay and so I didn't know anything about it

03:50:27and we went to Cork. I'm envious of your budget. Well, I don't have kids or a wife, so that helps. That's a big one. I better be careful. My wife's going to listen. I don't know what you mean, TR. I'm actually richer since I've had a wife and kids. Rich in love. Yeah, exactly. All right. Well, I think we're wrapping up now.

03:50:58This was a blast. It was good to finally, at long last, have Derek on. And I think it's something that we're probably going to have to do again because it was really fun. Yeah, I really enjoyed it. I have to say, thanks for having me on, guys. It was nice to meet you in person. George, I know we've been kind of chatting back and forth over the years, but it's good to see everyone. TR as well. I'm sorry I didn't get to meet up for a pint, but next time, I know. And John, Jay. Yeah, we'll work it out. I'll be back.

03:51:27for sure no doubt yeah i think i probably will be at some point too it's we've been making a list of places to go and ireland is on that list oh yeah well you know as soon as you're here just as soon as you set foot just give me a blast you know yeah absolutely make it your first text but um i'd love to get over to the states but it depends on old trumpy and you know yeah these is going everything so we won't mention the war as the as the english say

03:51:55Thanks very much. Yeah.

03:51:57You're just so well-spoken and well-thought-out and obviously love music like we do. You're a perfect person to have. You're a perfect fit for us. Yeah, absolutely. Thanks, man. Cheers. I really enjoyed being around. And as I said, I'll do a Markazon on it. If you need me to fill in or I'm giving you a shout, no problems, man. I'd love it. Absolutely. Yeah. Pleasure, guys. All right. I'm going to go see what the snow's looking like outside.

03:52:20and then make a card.

03:52:22No, you're not.

03:52:23You're not.

03:52:23You don't love this.

03:52:25All right.

03:52:26Lots of love for the Emerald.

03:52:27See you guys.

03:52:28Peace out.

03:52:29Thanks, guys.

03:52:30Bye.

03:52:30All right.

03:52:31See you guys.

03:52:31Bye-bye.