The Third of the Three

Finally, after a bit of a cold, some Christmas shopping, and some good old procrastination, I am finally putting down my thoughts on the last of the three shows. The first two took place twenty five years ago - thin Lizzy and Gillan. For awhile I just was not putting many thoughts together. In the last two posts I went on and on about those two shows that I saw twenty five years ago. And my intention was to continue on with that enthusiasm about a third show that I went and checked out back on the 14th of December down at Don Hills, in NYC, the Christmas edition of Steve Blush’s Rock Candy.

How does any show compete with the two shows you have been holding up for the past 25 years as the gold standard of shows. “Here are the two greatest shows. . . oh and here is a third. . .just as good. Either there is no room for the third or you have been lying to yourself for these past twenty five years. I explored both sides of this fork, and felt the absurdity of such ventures. I guess it comes down to wanting to hold onto something, but don’t cling on to these things too tightly. At some point you will look at you what you clung to, what you put up on those pedestals and ask yourself what exactly was it. It is just hard to compare what is going on today with something you have romanticized for twenty five years. Either those shows from long ago are going to have to come down off their pedestals or I am going to have to erect something awfully quick regarding the show from last week, and it just does not happen like that. I suppose in the end it is a little bit of both, or another option, all to common is to ignore and deny such issues.

We could go on. . . the fan of Camus could explore the questions of authenticity and identity here, but not here. I have been stuck for the past two weeks though asking what to say. One would think another couple of bands, same instruments, all doing rock’n’roll, what is there to be stuck on. Just proceed ahead. So that is what we are doing.

So lets start with the night. They had an incredible number of bands on the bill and all had some talent. Some I had no idea who they were. Some did not grab me but they did have something going on. Others I missed. Two I had wanted to see and they were just too early or too late-it was a school night and my butt was already dragging when I got there.
Here is the roster of bands for that December 14th, 2005 at Don Hills:

Honor Among Thieves
The X's
Jesus Knevil
Red Robot
Queen V
Grounded
Metal John
Swear On Your Life (w/ Militia)
Oblivious

That is a list! And it was all in one night too! It was like Scrooge and the spirits - all in one night. I was hoping to check out Life with Militia. they seem interesting but I missed them - I was too late. Metal John is just one long absurd guitar solo. It reminds me of rehearsal studio noodling that guitar players love to do during down time. Things friends would do a long time ago when they did their imitations of Yngwie or Eddie. Even his introduction at the start fits into that whole tradition-the seriousness of it. It works, and is certainly something different in a club. It is neat to see something usually saved for the rehearsal studio brought out into the light of the stage.

Grounded I have seen twice now. And the material is already getting familiar to me. Considering that one fact, I have to say they got something going on. The singer has a good voice, The band is fairly tight. I wish the guitar solos were a little more present, but again the songs are there. They are definitely metal, no denying that, complete with several hails to satan. In a post 911 world, though, devoting oneself to satan perhaps has lost some of its evil luster. Hell, I am not sure if satan worshipers actually think he is evil. I was always confused by worshipping something or someone that is viewed as not good. Maybe Satan is in fact good, or maybe he is worshipped exactly because he is not good, but then you got something that is not good but is good. Anyway, I will look forward to the next time I see Grounded.

Queen V was up next and I always enjoy her shows. She knows how to work a room. She is really a classic rock act with a dash of punk attitude. Some have compared her to Joan Jett, and I guess there is something to that. I f you grant that you might as well draw some analogies to Steven Tyler too. Plus her material for me is more reminiscent maybe of Aerosmith back when they were making albums like Rocks and Toys in the Attic. I do wonder if that one song she has is a response to Mama Kins.

The interesting thing on the Queen V stage that night were the changes. She got a new lead guitar player, which is probably a good thing. The new guy is an able guitar player who comes from Joker Five Speed. Joker Five Speed was another veteran act from the NYC, though he, Anthony(?), was I believe a relative newcomer to that band, which sadly disbanded a little while ago. Newcomer or not the man is able to play! So hopefully he can make a home for himself with Queen V. The last guy just did not seem up to the task - he played all right, but at least once every performance something would happen. Either a cord would go on him or an effect box. . . something, or so it seemed. And going back to the classic rock theme, instead of the usual - Zeppelin’s Rock’n’Roll, they ended with an AC/DC number. Now what was it? Damn!!!! Oh, it was the Girl’s Got Rhythm, a nice choice!


The last act that I caught was the X’s. Again I have seen them twice now, and again veterans of the NYC scene. I guess the key members are John coming Banana Fish Zero doing vocals and some guitar. Chris who handles the lead guitar chores, who was or is still with GSX. The bass player is Jeff Scallions who has another band, Fuel, which has been putting out albums and having some success since the mid-nineties. Lastly, there is Michael Maenza who also has an array of projects, past and present including a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup commercial. It don't get better than that!

So that is a listing of who was who, and the X’s did put on a great show! No doubt John Law is front and center and he knows how to entertain. He has this unique self-conscious presence up there. It is as if he is performing and reflecting on the performance simultaneously. Regardless of how you want to describe it he is just good up there-a neat visual to check out. Their material covers a wide range from punk to pop to metal and in the end I would just describe them as a fun band that I hope sticks around for awhile.

My one question for them is what Chris thinks of Tracii Guns of LA Guns, a couple of times I was just having flashbacks of Tracii Guns/ LA Guns during their set. Two different bands, no doubt, but as far as guitars, one has to wonder. Check out “Hot Enough”. It is always cool to see someone with some talent who does make use of things. Just as I would love to ask Tracii Guns if he owes anything to Paul Chapman!

So this is a sampling of the night’s festivities! And no doubt there were a few others that I missed, but between being wiped out and just catching up with a few people, well it just did not happen. The big disappointment was that I did not stick around to see Honor Among Thieves. Every time I see that band they are better, and when I first saw them last year in October (04), again at Don Hills they impressed me! So I was torn about heading out, but it was a school night. Next time. They are out on the road soon if not already!

So I started originally with the intent of writing this in one piece, but it ended up three. No doubt, however, they are of one piece, just three components needing numerous multiple edits. All three point to fact that rock is alive and well. Perhaps more educated in some respects, perhaps equipped with better technology. The guitars don’t detune as quickly. The sound systems might be a little smaller and a little better sounding. The basic component of a live performance with an audience there in front of you, though, is still there, and still the key. The guitars, amplifiers, though maybe not with enough feedback and whammy bars, but they are still there. The basic four/ four rhythm driving the venture is still there.

Add to that the fact that performers and audience have all these memories, collective and personal just pulls the three shows together more so. Maybe there are too many memories. There is a value in forgetting. For myself, though, those Thin Lizzy and Gillan shows certainly do factor into pulling me out of my comfortable house in Valhalla, and having me drive down to the Village, to Don Hills, on a pretty damn cold night in December.

And if you think at some point it will all become boring, how many shows, how many bands can there be - it probably will and no doubt it has. That is why there are things like punk and grunge, getting us back on track or derailing us entirely. And memories of what originally drove this venture will be driving those ventures too.

Bob Schaffer

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Gillan in Concert - December 12, 1980 - the 2nd of the three. . .

A continuation of the post from December 11th, exploring three shows, two from December of 1980 and the other happening on December 14 at Don Hills in New York.

This post looks at the show that took place on December 12th 1980. A show that took place at Emerald City in Cherry Hill NJ, right across from Philadelphia. The band was Gillan.

And if you don't have the patience to read all of this, just go to the music. . .Click here to check out a sample of the actual December 12th 1980 Gillan Show!

Nothing like the crowd that Thin Lizzy brought in. A week ago we were part of crowd of 500. There was no room to move and we felt the surge of the crowd when Lizzy took the stage. The 12th was a cold and icy night, with maybe 100 people there, maybe. In place of the punk band we had a reggae band warming up. No hint from anywhere of what we were going to see, just a few more Michelobs as we waited.

We knew little of the material. There was no Gillan being played on the radio, and this was before MTV, much less the Headbangers Ball or anything else. A few songs were recognized during the set - Smoke on the Water, Lucille, and maybe Trouble. The rest were new to the small crowd.

Gillan was front and center, wild long hair, which he loved to whip around in between verses, but always a gentleman in between songs complete with a bit of English wit. And then you had the band-not your typical band. You had Colin Towns on keyboard. He seemed to be the musical leader, the conductor of the night’s festivities. Mick Underwood on the drums, a solid drummer.

The other two, however, were the more interesting, maybe a dash of menace, . First off, there was John McCoy, the bass player. He was and is a big man, with a shaved smooth head and a beard. Remember it was 1980 and aside from the drummer in Spirit, I can’t name many performers sporting that look back then. Maybe he had some shades on too.

Lastly, there was Bernie Torme, the guitar player in this long gray suit jacket. At least I think he was in that outfit. Many of the photos of him from that vintage have him in such a jacket and I think I recall it on him. Bernie himself has referenced it as something out of Dickens. He did definitely did have your shoulder length peroxide blonde hair and his Stratocaster guitar. Keep in mind that everyone who came was thinking Deep Purple and all knew that Ritche Blackmore was a player of such guitars. So the Strat was required, but by the end of the night I had forgotten such requirements.

The music was heavier than Deep Purple but with these melodic preludes. You had Towns’ keyboards, primarily piano and synthesizer, that would often start out the tunes, providing these musical interludes, and then the band would tear into high gear with these pounding rhythms provided by McCoy and Underwood. So you had the tension of those two extremes, and then Bernie with his Strat, which would compete with Town’s keyboards for the solos. But the thing that intrigued me was how he made up for the shared solo time with these amazing whammy bar fills all over the place. I have yet to see anyone abuse a Strat and its whammy bar like him, nor get the sounds out of it that he did. And on top of all this chaos you had Gillan with his amazing vibrato, He is one of the few singers in rock to use vibrato. And to turn to another show for a second, you will never hear Ozzy use vibrato in those opening verses of War Pigs! So Gillan could go from this flowery vibrato in his voice at times to his infamous screams. Gillan tghe singer and Gillan the bandt was all over the place!

Now you take this music and this band and you have them performing it on one stage - it was an amazing scene. You had Gillan front and center who would go from a little quiet conversation with the audience in between songs to screaming and truly just headbanging up there, to John McCoy who was working his bass and just had a certain sinister look, and Bernie, who was just wild with the peroxide blonde hair, the jacket, and the constant abuse of his Strat.

So that is what I recall. You have to figure, I have been hyping Mr. Torme for the past three years so who knows what is actually real. I am pretty sure that the above is accurate but it has been 25 years. Luckily, I was given awhile back a recording of this Gillan show at Emerald City, so no need to rely upon my fading memory. Check out the MP3 of Smoke on the Water complete with Bernie doing a lovely little intro right here - Click here to check it out!. Regarding the recording, it turns out that one of the folks next to me had smuggled a cassette recorder in and and recorded the show. Enjoy and we still have one more show to cover-that is happening on Wednesday, December 14 2005.

A little about how this came about. . . I was at dinner talking about how I came to this obsession with all of this, so I figured, let me put it down on paper. Also it is offered as I do wish that Bernie Torme was included on Ian Gillan's New CD set celebrating the Ian's work, which Mr. Torme did contribute to.

Next-the third of the three shows. . .To be continued. . .

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Three Shows- Two Past and One Present

Twenty-five years ago this December 12th I was lucky enough to see a band called Gillan. It was a show that has haunted me ever since. Gillan was the project of Ian Gillan, who was on vocals-the man whose resume included playing Jesus in Jesus Christ Superstar, who did the vocals on songs such as Child of Time, Highway Star, and of course Smoke On The Water; those with another band - Deep Purple.

I had little idea what to expect from Gillan. Gillan the man had left Deep Purple and then went on to form the Ian Gillan Band, which was a jazzy artsy project, a far stretch from songs such as Space Truckin and Fireball. And being a 17 year old rocker, I had little use for the project. He had an amazing voice and I did want to see, however, if lightning does strike twice at Emerald City, the venue he was playing.

You see the week before, on Saturday, December 6th at the same club, Emerald City, across the river from Philadelphia in Cherry Hill, Thin Lizzy had taken the stage. Thin Lizzy was and another band that I had idolized. And that Saturday night at Emerald City I had the pleasure of seeing, five or ten feet from the stage, Phil Lynott and Scott Gorham. Snowy White, who was at that time the second guitar, was on the other side of the stage.

I recall how Lynott’s bass with a shiny metallic pickguard that just reflected the spotlights that were on Phil and would blind us in the audience as he moved around the stage. I am sitting here as I write trying to recall if they had their keyboardist back then, Darren Wharton. I think he was in fact in the back, kind of hidden. Brian Downey was on drums. It was an amazing show complete with some Christmas Carols Phil had us singing at the end. Basically it was a Live and Dangerous type set with Killers on the Loose, Looking for an Alibi, Dear Miss Lonely Hearts, and Black Rose thrown in for good measure.

Add to this my personal history. Here I was seventeen, from a quiet town in central Jersey. This was a rock’n’roll club in the city, alright, outside of Philadelphia with Thin Lizzy on their Marquee. And I was a Lizzy fanatic. Back then everybody else was hooked on AC/DC. Bon Scott was dead and Back in Black was out. It was the album of 1980, but I knew better. Chinatown was so much better! The challenge for myself in seeing Lizzy was that the venue was a club. The drinking age back then was 19 but I was 17. Out of the three of us intent on going, I was the one who could not find an ID. And the club did card everybody.

I still went down to the show with the two other guys, but I was sweating it. Lizzy was my band. I did not want to be sitting out in the car, hanging out in the Parking Lot. I suppose there is always the stage door, but I wanted to see them. I was saved when one of my buddies went in and then came back out to the parkinglot for something, gave me his ID and got back inside pointing out he had already been inside. I waited a few minutes and then with an ID and a ticket in hand was in. I was in, drinking a few Michelobs, waiting for Lizzy, and suffering a lame punk band that was warming up.

So when I saw that Gillan was playing the next weekend, the whole event, the venue, the Lizzy show, finding the damn place, getting into the place, left me with the question: How do I get there for Gillan. Actually, it was not a question, but the conclusion that I would have to come back for Gillan.

To be continued. . .

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