FIZZY’S CLOSET, VOLUME 7
Our Summer Collection!
Here we are, once again in the midst of summer. The season for swimming pools and barbecues, not to mention riots. Even though I’m no longer bound by the constraints of the school year, summertime has always been my favorite season. Sure, spring is when a young man’s thoughts turn to love and all that stuff, but summertime has always held that extra mystique, ingrained in us all since childhood, when we looked forward to three glorious months without school. And of course, the music of summer tends to have an added aura about it. And so, for this sweltering edition of Fizzy’s Closet, I’ve picked out a few albums that embody the spirit of summer, in all its facets. So park your ass in that deck chair, keep your cold beverage of choice near at hand, and enjoy, because all too soon, summer will be over.
VAN HALEN: Van Halen
1978 (Warner Bros.)
Rating: 10.0
Is there anybody that doesn’t already own this CD, or hasn’t heard most of it? Do I really need to say anymore?
Well, actually I do, because Van Halen may be the quintessential summertime hard-rock band. Be it David Lee Roth or Sammy Hagar out front, most of the band’s catalog has been blaring out of cars on the way to the beach and boom-boxes At the beach, as well as innumerable nightclubs, pool parties and barbecues, for a quarter century. Few bands rival Van Halen when it comes to sheer swaggering exuberance. Of course, we all know that Diamond Dave aided and abetted the most high-spirited of the band’s material, whatever Sammy’s talents may be. And their explosive debut is damn hard for even the band itself to match.
The main attraction is, of course, Eddie Van Halen, one of the last guitarists to truly have a unique sound. Put his tone and technique up against anybody else putting out records in 1978, even the crazed Ted Nugent, and Edward comes out the winner in almost every area. His razor-sharp distortion cuts even the most fearsome competition to shreds. Add in the sheer range of noises he can make, apparently with no studio trickery involved (crhunching power chords, shrill screams, harmonic squeals, and all manner of other odd touches), and it’s pretty amazing. But Eddie doesn’t corner the market on weird noises. DLR offers up plenty of his own, as he yips and yowls his way through these eleven tracks. At times, he truly sounds like some kind of baboon, smearing shit on the wall of his cage for the delight of gaping spectators. Bassist Michael Anthony anchors the music, and provides a steady backdrop for Eddie’s histrionics, while Eddie’s brother Alex hammers away at the drums, not to be outdone.
Over half of the album has been a fixture on rock radio since its release, and the oversaturation does tend to take away from the overall effect. “Running With the Devil” starts things off with an ominous bass pulse before launching into one of the record’s slower, more brooding riffs. While not quite the party-hearty classic that other songs are, it sets a nice, heavy tone for the remainder of the disc. As a sidenote, ever since I can remember, Scandals, which was once THE nightclub in Ocean City, Maryland, has used a slightly reworked version of the intro and main riff in their radio commercials, their own lyrics laid over it. “Scandalllls ……… every-ONE knooooows ………”
“Eruption” is hailed as one of the all-time great guitar solos, and rightly so, simply for showcasing Eddie’s pure manic technique. I’m still not sure if he actually wrote it out, note for note, or just winged it, and frankly, I have the same question about most of his early soloing, but no matter. Even after all these years, “Eruption” is guaranteed to make people sit up and take notice, and produce a startled, “What the hell is THAT?” from the uninitiated. The track serves as a worthy intro, and could be paired with many early Van Halen tunes (try it with “D.O.A.,” it’s great!), but is most often played in tandem with the album’s next track, the boisterous cover of the Kinks’ “You Really Got Me,” which I’m sure everybody in the world has heard at least a trillion times. This was one of the first true “songs” I learned to play on guitar back in seventh grade.
My favorite of the hits (and a favorite VH tune overall) is “Ain’t Talkin’ ’Bout Love,” with a nasty-ass intro and simple, two-chord riff, and a tough, shouted chorus. The quiet section after the solo is a complete surprise, before ramping back up to finish the song with an infectious, fist-pumping “Hey! Hey! Hey!” chant. This one will never be overplayed.
After the first block of monster hits, the album continues on, hiding gems in among the lesser staples. “I’m The One” is the template for a slew of up-tempo tracks to follow (i.e. “Hot for Teacher,” “The Full Bug,” “Source of Infection,” et al.) The band careens through the song, seeming always on the verge of losing control completely, pausing only for Roth to bebop like a metal Miles Davis. Later, Eddie sounds almost like he’s brushing his teeth with his guitar on the full-tilt “Atomic Punk.” He breaks out an acoustic for a bit on the riotous “Ice Cream Man,” which is a real hoot with its sly sexual humor. This is another area in which the band excelled, rarely sounding overly crude. “I got good lemonade, ha, Dixie Cups, all flavors and push-ups too!” reigns as the single best line in the band’s extensive file of witticisms.
There are more restrained, melodic moments as well. “Jamie’s Cryin’” and ‘Little Dreamer” have never been particular favorites of mine, but they’re here, as well as “Feel Your Love Tonight,” where the band really shows off their harmonizing vocal talents. The party finally ends with the gleeful “On Fire,” which consists mainly of the boys howling the title repeatedly.
It’s interesting, and very revealing, to note how many bands have borrowed or outright stolen from this album over the years. Great White took a big chomp out of the intro riff of “Feel Your Love Tonight” in their own “Big Goodbye,” while Ugly Kid Joe concluded their megahit “Everything About You” with an obvious mock-up of the ending of ”Ice Cream Man.” Countless bands of all subgenres have come up with their own little “Eruptions,” and many more have tried to cop the band’s overall ebullient attitude (“tried” being the operative word). Hell, even ’80’s rapper Tone Loc and one-time shockmongers 2 Live Crew sampled songs from this very album (“Jamie’s Cryin’” and “Ain’t Talkin’ ‘Bout Love,” respectively).
What’s left to say about this record? Even today, as the future of the band is more in doubt than ever, and as their last truly good album is almost fifteen years old, Van Halen’s debut remains one of the tallest, sturdiest pillars in all of hard rock and metal. An essential for everybody’s CD collection, whatever style of rock they like best.
Best songs: “Ain’t Talkin’ ’Bout Love,” “Ice Cream Man”
Worst song: “Little Dreamer”
BROTHER CANE: Brother Cane
1993 (Virgin)
Rating: 8.5
Summer wouldn’t be complete without a little southern-fried rockin’, now would it? If no beach is available, I’d rather spend my summers in the South, where you don’t have to worry, as they do in your northern climes, whether summer will fall on a weekend or not. There are plenty of southern-rock albums to choose from, but I chose the debut from Alabama’s Brother Cane, because it’s such a unique record.
Along with Jackyl, Brother Cane emerged at exactly the wrong time, and yet somehow managed to maintain a decent level of success throughout the musical Sahara of the ’90’s. Yet Brother Cane’s music couldn’t be more different from Jackyl’s, so shut up and keep reading. With their first album, Brother Cane managed to do what the Black Crowes only tried to do (and were only sometimes successful at): seamlessly molding stripped-down hard rock with the more down-home sounds of Lynyrd Skynyrd. Let’s not forget, that before Skynyrd became the poster-band for every suburban cowboy this side of Ouagadougou (and a sad caricature of their former selves, if not the entire subgenre, in the process), they were simply a talented band with rock-solid musicianship and often insightful lyrics. Brother Cane carried on that tradition, but infused it with a serious hard-rock kick in the ass.
The driving force behind the band was singer and guitarist Damon Johnson. Johnson was already a veteran of two failed, major-label bands. First, he played guitar in the female-fronted Witness, although for some reason, he doesn’t play on their 1988 album. The next year, he played with the Delta Rebels, an obscure southern-sleaze band who released one album on Mercury. Brother Cane is, obviously, the band for which he is best known. It was also his first turn behind the microphone, and his warm, soulful voice doesn’t disappoint. Picture a deeper, more seasoned Chris Robinson, a Chris Robinson who doesn’t try too hard.
The album kicks off with “Got No Shame,” which became an instant hit that summer, sharing radio time with future greatest-hits fodder by Rage Against the Machine, Tool, Megadeth and Stone Temple Pilots. What can I say, 1993 was a strange fucking time. In any case, “Got No Shame” grabs you from the opening fiery harmonica blasts. Is there such a thing as an electric harmonica? The song also boasts a relentless drive, a simple, repetitive melody, and plenty of cowbell in the chorus. There’s plenty more red-hot harmonica-playing slathered like barbecue sauce all over the rest of the song as well, although oddly, it doesn’t appear anywhere else on the album. All in all, this song is the prime ass-kicker on the disc, and I’m sure absolutely destroyed live. Actually, I heard them play it live in the studio on Rockline two years later, and destroy it did. Falling into the same category is the romping “That Don’t Satisfy Me,” which vied with “Got No Shame” for airplay, and later went on to become a hit in its own right. This one features a bit of barroom piano, which manages to sound perfectly at home.
The third and final hit is the mellower “Hard Act to Follow.” This one shows the band at their most Crowes-like, but still doing it better than their Georgia neighbors. Johnson really shows off his pipes here, with light piano and organ flourishes behind him, as he fondly remembers an old flame, with no hard feelings.
The fun doesn’t end with the hits, though. There are plenty more delights to be found deeper within the album. “How Long” is another standout rocker, with its soft verses giving way to a powerful bridge and even more powerful chorus. Note the high backing vocals, singing “Tell me how lonnnnng.” Lyrically, it makes me wonder if all southern-rock bands consciously set out to write that one song about racial harmony as a way to distance themselves from the bad reputation Dixie gave itself in the past. In Johnson’s capable hands, the lyrics don’t sound nearly as desperate and pandering as others might.
There may be no acrimony in “Hard Act to Follow,” but Johnson must be talking about a different girl in “The Last Time,” as he gently but firmly shows her the door. “Having me around’s gone to your head,” he sings, before dealing the killing blow, “You seem to waste my time, a finer thing you’ll never find, baby.” This is yet another stellar song, whose melody and musicality would put it head and shoulders above the others, except there are so many songs that are just as good here.
On the slower, more emotional side of things, we get the moody “Woman,” which starts out with slow acoustic picking and somber vocals, before picking up the pace for the second half with a caustic riff and the repeated pleading, “Woman, keep me warm.” “The Road,” is the requisite travelworn ballad of wanderlust, with more piano and organ. The disc closes with the reflective “Make Your Play,” combining earnest lyrics and lots of soloing, for a seven-plus-minute finale to a fine album.
I know I’ve talked mostly about Damon Johnson up to this point, and bear with me while I point out that his lyrics are also worth bringing up, as they are honest, articulate, and generally free of cliches. But the other band members are not to be overlooked. Roman Glick’s guitar work is excellent, with solos that are tasteful but creative, complex but effortless. The rhythm section of Glenn Maxey (bass) and Scott Collier (drums) keeps things rolling along nicely.
Brother Cane put out two more albums, although each was darker and more grungy than the last. “……… And Fools Shine On” was a big hit from 1995’s Seeds, which you can still hear on radio today, every once in a great while. (Actually, I heard it on KNAC.com just a few weeks ago). Glick assumed bass duties to replace the departing Maxey, and now showcases his pickless four-string talents in Jackyl. Meanwhile, David Anderson took over the guitar position. After 1998’s Wishpool fizzled out, the band went their separate ways. Glick, as I mentioned, replaced Tom Bettini in Jackyl, while Damon Johnson tried his hand at a solo career, before joining Alice Cooper’s band in 2004. An indie label released a Brother Cane tribute album last year, but not only had I not heard of any of the artists on it, but every last one of them completely butchered the song they chose to perform. (Did I buy it? Hell no! I heard the songs, or as much as I could bear to hear, on some website or other.) There’s also a cheap-Charlie best-of out there somewhere, which contains little more than the bare essentials. For the REAL Brother Cane, the 1993 debut is the only way to go. Great playing, great vocals, great melodies, great lyrics; this one is the complete package. Every song is notable in some way, and the whole thing goes down like a long glass of iced tea on a hot afternoon.
I’ve been waiting this entire review to deliver that metaphor.
Best Songs: “Got No Shame,” “The Last Time”
Worst song: “Stone’s Throw Away”
KIX: Hot Wire
1991 (Atlantic)
Rating: 8.0
Anybody who knows me well knows that Kix is one of my favorite bands. It isn’t that they’re more talented than anybody else (they aren’t) or are even better songwriters than anybody else (again, they aren’t). For me, the appeal has always been the unbridled sense of fun the band exhibits. They make party music, plain and simple. Whatever form their music took, from their quirky metal-pop-punk debut in 1981, through an ill-advised, label-enforced foray into synth-cheese (1983’s Cool Kids), to the more basic hard-rock sound of their other releases, the objective was always been to have a good time, raise hell and get laid.
It’s fairly well-known at this point that Kix toiled away in relative obscurity for their first three albums, making a name for themselves by cutting a swath through the mid-Atlantic with their formidable live shows, before finally getting the extra push from Atlantic to break big with 1988’s Tom Werman-produced blockbuster Blow My Fuse. That album was most people’s introduction to the band, with its four hit videos, including the top-ten hit, the anti-suicide ballad “Don’t Close Your Eyes.”
For the eagerly-awaited followup, the band went with Taylor Rhodes as producer, and the change is immediately apparent. The sound on Hot Wire is much more “alive” than Werman’s somewhat muffled and muted sound on Blow My Fuse. Maybe it still isn’t quite up to 1991 standards, but Rhodes is definitely an improvement. In terms of style, the band sticks with the same formula as the previous two albums, blending the hard-rock muscle of AC/DC with the pop catchiness of Cheap Trick. Kix has long been accused of being an AC/DC ripoff, and they do take a healthy dose of influence from them, but it isn’t nearly as noticeable (for the most part) as with, say, Rhino Bucket or Dirty Looks. Kix’s music is more similar to Cinderella’s early, most lighthearted material, minus the blues. Pure East Coast hard rock, if you will.
Hot Wire doesn’t have quite the power of either Blow My Fuse or 1985’s Midnite Dynamite, but there’s still plenty to enjoy here, as the boys are at their most jubilant and hell-bent on partying. After a brief intro featuring a winding guitar line and what sounds like slow stomping on bleachers, the title track peels out like a stolen street-rod. Guitarists Brian Forsythe and Ronnie Younkins spend a lot of time twanging on their A-strings while vocalist Steve Whiteman plunges right in with his high, distinctive vocals. This is one of the most energetic tracks on an album fairly bursting with energy. “Rock ’n’ Roll overdose” and the hideously-titled “Hee Bee Jee Bee Crush” follow suit in a similar fast-paced manner.
“Girl Money” was the first single and was a minor hit during that hot summer of ’91. It’s a carefree ode to the money you set aside to spend on women (of course, with the eventual hope of getting into their pants). Whiteman’s nasal voice is more endearing than annoying during the verses, and the chorus is one of the band’s most contagious ever. This one is a top highlight on the album and one of the band’s essential tracks. One minor quibble though: if you ever saw the video, that version of the song ends with the music fading out to a simple, repetitive whistling of the melody. The album version starts to do that, but is snipped off short in mid-whistle. The next track, “Luv-A-Holic,” carries on in a similar, frisky vein. The band had been messing around with this song since the early ’80’s, and it finally finds a well-deserved spot on this album. Note the end-song pickup, which always reminded me a little of the Cult’s “Love Removal Machine.”
Lurking deep within the album is the hidden treasure “Same Jane,” with its rollicking and bouncy verses (cowbell!) and strong chorus. Unfortunately, the song just fades out, repeating half the chorus, and you feel a bit let down, like they could’ve done more with it at the end.
While not a band that placed much emphasis on ballads, when Kix did do one, it was almost always excellent, and often a little quirky (see the hokey country of “For Shame,” or the surprise riff in the middle of “Walkin’ Away”). On Hot Wire, we get two, or one and a half, if you prefer. “Cold Chills” is toned down and atmospheric, but still a bit too energetic to count as a ballad, in this writer’s opinion. Nonetheless, it sports great melodies that are surprising “happy,” in contrast to the ominous (but faintly gleeful) lyrics. Given the spooky subject matter but fun spirit, it reminds me of something Alice Cooper might do. Elsewhere, the true ballad is the emotional “Tear Down the Walls,” with its gentle, chiming guitar tones and wistful vocals that are one of the best displays of Steve Whiteman’s range to be found.
As a whole, the band seems to have regressed a little bit from the ultra-commercial Blow My Fuse. Ronnie Younkins’s solos are less melodic and back to sounding like he’s just winging it a lot of the time. Steve Whiteman brings back some of the shriek he first used on Midnite Dynamite, and some grit comes along with it as well, helping to alleviate the occasionally annoying nasality. Lyrically, the band continues to travel in pretty standard circles, with most songs dealing with various loose women. There are women who won’t put out, women who won’t put out for YOU, and women who put out for everybody. It’s not very advanced stuff at all, I admit, and sometimes downright juvenile (the clich`e-riddled but infectious “Bump the La La”), but Kix isn’t a band you look to for lyrical brilliance or deep ideas. It’s music to have fun, drink, party, and get laid to, and not worry about tomorrow morning.
As a final note, five of these songs (fully half the album) appear in rambunctious live form on the Kix’s 1993 concert recording, which was taken from a show in the band’s home state of Maryland. After that, they would release one more studio album, 1995’s lackluster $how Bu$ine$$, before breaking up. Steve Whiteman is, of course, has taken up the party flag as ringleader of Funny Money, joined recently by Kix drummer Jimmy “Chocolate” Chalfant. Forsythe and Younkins have kicked around in various outfits, and the four do occasional “reunion” gigs. The only one missing is bassist/control-freak Donnie Purnell, but I’m sure nobody really misses him. In any case, Hot Wire is the last of the three essential Kix albums.
Best Songs: “Girl Money,” “Same Jane”
Worst Song: “Pants On Fire (Liar Liar)”
DOWN: NOLA
1995 (Elektra)
Rating: 7.5
Summer isn’t all about beaches and parties. It’s also about stifling heat, oppressive humidity, hazy stillness. Sometimes it all gets to be too much. And that’s why we have this first album from Down. It’s an album for those steamy August evenings when the sun sets early but the heat lingers on well into the night.
Down is a side-project headed up by Pantera’s Phil Anselmo and Corrosion of Conformity’s Pepper Keenan, with members of Crowbar filling out the rest of the ranks. The trademarks of all three bands are present, but melt together to form a unique style, often described as “southern metal.” Is it southern? Well ……… Like New Orleans itself (the city for which the album is named), it is and it isn’t. There are plenty of bluesy, southern-gothic overtones, but even more prevalent are the elements of stoner rock and doom metal.
Pepper Keenan’s guitar style is immediately recognizable, and of course, there is only one Phil Anselmo, love him or hate him. The rest of the band plods and grooves along behind, seamlessly blending the power of Pantera, the deep sludge of Crowbar and the swing of COC. The main attractions are the bone-rattling grooves worked into almost every song, but the guitarwork of Keenan and Kirk Windstein often steal the show, with thick slabs of riffs and bluesy solos. There are few power chords, as they opt for a more grinding, dissonant sound. It’s often hard to tell who’s playing which part, and I tend to think a lot of the guitars sound like Pepper. Unfortunately, Anselmo is a distraction more often than not, as his vocals are much the same as on the Pantera albums of the time: extremely gravelly, lots of throat-blowing screams, and an overall grating tone.
This is a very strange album for me to review, because I normally like to talk about specific songs that move me in one way or another, or stand out. NOLA doesn’t really have that. What Down does best on this album is to create a mood, one of lethargy and listlessness and melancholy, even when the band is at its most lively. It’s an album that makes you want to smoke a joint the size of a summer sausage, or, barring that, makes you want to lay back and not move in the heat, and let the music just roll over you as you ponder the miseries of the world, particularly your own. As one might guess, lyrically, it isn’t a happy affair. Anselmo ditches the posturing and fist-waving of his work with Pantera for bummed-out musings about drugs, death, and his other favorite topic: himself. Self-absorbed? Good Lord, yes! And frankly, it gets to be a bit much sometimes, but fits well with the weighty musical approach.
Although the record is best looked at as a whole, there are some individual songs that stand out. The best of these, the hands-down grade-A primo centerpiece of the album, is “Eyes of the South.” Starting with a tooling bassline, with some blues-drenched guitar-picking and wailing, getting steadily louder, with first one riff and then the other building out of each speaker, the intro is like a doomed-out, smoked-up melted variation of Great White’s “Rock Me.” Maybe that’s an odd comparison, but that’s what the first minute or so reminds me of. I play the intro to this song over and over again. When the song itself kicks in, it’s pretty damn good too, with a great slow-swinging rhythm that verges on a strut, before grinding into a heavy plod for the second half. Phil manages to pull his mind away from his failings for just a few minutes to pledge his own brand of warped love for Dixie.
Right after that comes the other most striking track, “Jail.” For this one, we journey through the swamps and lose ourselves in the piney woods well outside New Orleans. It’s a very quiet number, good for playing in the steamy dark, while staring at the sky. It’s almost like one of those nature-sounds CD’s. Bongos stir like swamp-water rippling; an odd, flanger-like effect swoops and buzzes like an insect; the guitars drone along repetitively, and other sounds seem like creatures moving somewhere out there. Vocals? Well, there are some, but they’re barely audible, which is probably just as well.
Elsewhere, the would-be single ‘Stone the Crow” features some very welcome smooth, melancholy vocals and intriguing, interwoven guitar lines. The other single, “Lifer” has good rhythms, but Phil does his best to kill it by screaming like an idiot, and I’ve never been as fond of this song as some are. “Underneath Everything” has another slyly snaky groove that lightens the mood just a tad, even as Phil rasps about throwing in the towel. “Temptation’s Wings” is probably the most rocking song here, and fits well as the first track. At the other end of the album, the funeral march of “Bury Me In Smoke” is equally appropriate. In between, there are plenty of grooves to go around. Oh yeah, and note the audible bong-hit in the middle of the loser-pothead anti-anthem “Hail the Leaf.”
Again, this is a hard album to review. It’s not so much about what it sounds like, as what it feels If you listened to it in the middle of a blizzard in Bismarck, North Dakota, I bet you’d still feel hot and drained of energy and just generally bummed out. Best for playing after sunset, because once the music’s over, you’ll probably want to just go to bed.
Best Songs: “Eyes of the South,” “Jail,” “Bury Me In Smoke”
Worst Song: “Pray For the Locusts”
8/21/05
