Meatloaf - Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell (1993)

Some sixteen years ago, an unknown vocalist by the name of Meatloaf, fresh from a stint with Ted Nugent's mid-70s "Free-For-All" band, hooked up with a songwriter named Jim Steinman and recorded what was destined to become an American rock classic: the Bat Out Of Hell album. Critics hated it with a passion, but to an American audience sick of watered-down rock & roll, disgusted with Disco and unfamiliar with the punk stirrings a continent away, Bat Out Of Hell – with its bombastic, guitar-driven tales of young lust, alienation and romance – was bigger than life. The album has been a consistent best seller since its 1977 release.

After a much publicized and highly public split, Steinman went on to write a handful of hits for artists like Bonnie Tyler, while Meatloaf recorded a bunch of albums (some good, some not-so-good) in a battle against obscurity. To the benefit of an audience still starved for the real rock thing, the duo has reunited to create a sequel to one of the most enduring albums in rock music history.

Slapping Bat Out Of Hell II: Back Into Hell onto the CD player is like being nineteen again. This is the elusive pulse of rock & roll, that hard-to-capture spirit of the music and all of its promise that makes Bat Out Of Hell II and its predecessor work so well. It's like trying to tell a stranger about rock & roll – if they don't get it, chances are, they never will. This disc is loud, overblown and exaggerated, but it's also got more hooks than a Bassmasters' tournament and it rocks like a house afire. Even as history repeated itself and critics slagged Bat Out Of Hell II, it shot straight up to number one upon its release.

The world is a different place than 1977, though, and this sequel reflects the urgency and identity of the decade. The cynicism of Life Is A Lemon And I Want My Money Back, the erotic fantasies of Out Of The Frying Pan (And Into The Fire), the confusion of It Just Won't Quit all play to a different time and place. It's the two key cuts here, however – the idealistic, decade-old Rock And Roll Dreams Come Through and Wasted Youth/Everything Louder Than Everything Else – that serve as the youthful anthems around which all else revolves. It's the energy, the hope provided by these songs, and in rock & roll, that attracts the audience. It's what Meatloaf does best. It may be better to burn out than to fade away, and I'm glad that Meatloaf captured the chance to burn brightly again. (MCA Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Bat Out Of Hell II from Amazon.com)

The Yardbirds - Ultimate! (2001)

One of the truly legendary bands in rock music, it's nevertheless been very difficult for the average music fan to assemble any sort of coherent Yardbirds' collection. Back in the '60s heyday of the band, the original British versions of their albums were sliced and diced, mixed and matched and then retitled for release stateside. Cut-out during the '70s, collectors paid premium prices for rare copies of the Yardbirds' vinyl. During the CD era, albums disappeared and reappeared with unpredictable reliability and "greatest hits" collections, often slapped together by unscrupulous fly-by-night labels, proliferated. A lot of great music got misplaced, until the recent release of Ultimate! by Rhino Records.

For younger music fans that want to know what all the brouhaha over the Yardbirds is about, look no further than Ultimate! The two-CD, 52-track boxed collection includes an enormous booklet filled with rare photos, song credits and comprehensive liner notes and history provided by late musician/collector/authority Cub Koda. It's the music that does the talking on Ultimate!, however, the Yardbirds kicking out an original and groundbreaking mix of blues and riff-oriented blues-rock during their five-year lifespan. The band was blessed during its brief existence with not one but three – count 'em – three superstar six-string talents. Eric Clapton contributed guitar duties for one of the earliest incarnations of the band, leaving after a year and a half to be replaced by Jeff Beck. Jimmy Page joined the band as a bass player; later moving to guitar in a twin-guitar version of the band before taking over solo duties upon Beck's departure.

Ultimate! pieces together a chronological history of the Yardbirds, beginning with early Clapton-led singles and other material recorded under the direction of original manager/producer Giorgio Gomelsky. The Gomelsky "era" stretches across the first disc and includes some of Clapton's legendary original contributions to the band. Highlights include covers of John Lee Hooker's Boom Boom and the Ernie K-Doe hit A Certain Girl as well as live tracks taken from the band's debut album Five Live Yardbirds. The classic hit single For Your Love proved to be Clapton's swansong, the guitarist leaving the band in a huff over the song's commercial sound.

When Clapton departed to pursue a purer shade of blue with John Mayall's Bluesbreakers, Jeff Beck was recruited and joined the Yardbirds as his replacement. It proved to be a match made in heaven – Beck's improvisational six-string wizardry found a perfect chemistry with frontman Keith Relf's passionate vocals and inspired harp playing. This would be the most successful period of the band's career, as they cranked out chart-topping hits like Heart Full Of Soul,
Shapes Of Things and Over Under Sideways Down. There were plenty of other great tunes, though, such as the rollicking B-side instrumental Jeff's Boogie or a raucous cover of The Train Kept A Rollin' recorded at Sam Phillip's Recording Service in Memphis. Beck's maniacal use of feedback, distortion, echo and fuzz created a trademark sound for the band and paved the way for a thousand-and-one late-60s garage bands to delve into psychedelica, heavy metal and endless instrumental jams.

Bassist and "musical director" Paul Samwell-Smith left the Yardbirds in 1966 to pursue a successful career as a producer, working with talents like Cat Stevens and Jethro Tull. Jimmy Page was brought in to play bass, taking over six-string duties on tour during a Beck absence. The Beck/Page line-up only recorded a couple of singles, most notably Stroll On from the movie Blow-Up and the single Happenings Ten Years Time Ago, which also featured future Led Zeppelin bassist John Paul.

The Page-led Yardbirds kicked out some interesting tuneage, working with new manager Peter Grant and superstar Britpop producer Mickey Most, moving into a less bluesy and more complex psychedelic-influenced era. Page's Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Sailor was a fascinating slice of pop-rock while the acoustic-instrumental White Summer was an energetic artistic predecessor to Led Zeppelin's experimentation with British folk and Middle Eastern melodies. The Harry Nilsson composition Ten Little Indians is a chaotic delight while Drinking Muddy Water sounds like the Chicago blues as filtered through London's Marquee Club. Ultimate! also adds three solo recordings from Yardbirds' vocalist Keith Relf.

Over the course of seven albums, the Yardbirds earned a legacy as one of the true seminal bands in rock & roll history. Their musical contributions to the genre still sound alive and vibrant thirty-five years after the fact. The band also served as an important predecessor to the formation of Led Zeppelin, arguably the most important and successful rock band of the '70s.

If I had one complaint with this set, it is in the lack of material from the band's collaboration with blues giant Sonny Boy Williamson, an inspired album that predated the superstar-laden London Sessions albums by Muddy Waters and Howlin' Wolf by a decade. Ultimate! nonetheless provides a fine history of the band, an important collection that should please both hardcore collectors and new listeners alike. (Rhino Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Ultimate! from Amazon.com)

Wetton-Manzanera - Wetton-Manzanera (1998)

As the driving instrumental force behind Roxy Music's biggest hits, Phil Manzanera developed a reputation as a top-notch axeman. Bringing a fluid, melodic musical current to play beneath Bryan Ferry's often bittersweet lyrics, his contributions to that band were acclaimed critically but sadly overlooked when the pundits were crowning the next big guitar hero. As shown by this decade-old effort with fellow Roxy alumni John Wetton, Manzanera is a superb pop songwriter.

The Britpop tunes collected on Wetton Manzanera are full of the sort of wonderful six-string flourishes that the guitarist brought to Roxy Music's material. Manzanera's clean lines and flowing chords breathe life into Wetton's light-hearted romantic lyrics, providing a musical backbone for the material. A small part of the legacy of one of rock's most accomplished guitarists, the reissue of this self-titled collaboration is worth another look if only for a glimpse of the soul and talent of Phil Manzanera. (Renaissance Records)

(Click on CD cover to buy Wetton-Manzanera from Amazon.com)

Meatloaf - The Very Best Of Meatloaf (1998)

Okay, I'll admit it – I'm a Meatloaf fan. Have been, ever since Bat Out Of Hell pissed off my fellow critics so badly those two decades ago. Sure, Meatloaf's best work, i.e. the Steinman- penned songs, is overblown, bombastic and exaggerated. Then again, so is most rap music, but you don't see the big-league rock crits waxing negative over N.W.A. or 2-Pac, do you? When the 'Loaf reunited with Steinman on Bat Out Of Hell II a few years back, there had to be more than a few heart attacks at the Rolling Stone writer's retirement home. Especially considering that the carbon-copy sequel CD hit it big, scored multi-plat and provided the erstwhile Mr. Aday with another 15 minutes of fame.

"So," ask fellow Meatloaf fans, "what's the skinny on this new two-disc The Very Best Of Meatloaf set?" Well, your humble Reverend always provides his readers with the straight 4-1-1 with every review. On this subject, I can honestly say that if you're a true-blue, died-in-the-wool Meatloaf fan, then use the coin you'd spend on this turkey to dig up a copy of the 2-CD live set on Tommy Boy instead. Why? Because there's nothing really new here to attract the marks, much less satisfy the hardcore faithful.

The Very Best Of Meatloaf offers eighteen tunes, broken down as follows: there's five cuts (out of seven) from the original Bat Out Of Hell, including the title track, the hit Two Out Of Three Ain't Bad and the still-hilarious-after-all-these-years Paradise By The Dashboard Light. There are four cuts from the Bat sequel, including Life Is A Lemon And I Want My Money Back, although the producers here have ignored the Bat Out Of Hell remake from that MCA album. You've got a couple songs from the Dead Ringer LP, including the title track – a spirited duet with Cher – and you've got the obligatory Midnight At The Lost And Found, the title track from Meatloaf's best non-Steinman album.

Continuing, there are a couple of songs from the misguided Welcome To The Neighborhood (we're up to 14 now) and the rocking Modern Girl from Bad Attitude. There's nothing from the limpid Blind Before I Stop, and they've ignored hot songs like Razor's Edge from Midnight or Wasted Youth from Bat Out Of Hell II. That leaves three songs that don't come from a Meatloaf album, proper – two Andrew Lloyd Weber compositions with Steinman lyrics and Is Nothing Sacred, easily the worst song Steinman has written in eons. All three tracks are real snoozefests, certainly not representing the "very best" of Meatloaf.

The upshot here, true believers? If you've got Bat Out Of Hell and it's sequel, then you've already got half the songs available on this set (and a few more). There are no real rarities here, no creative programming – why nothing from any of Meatloaf's unavailable import discs, or perhaps his inspired Hot Patootie from the Rocky Horror soundtrack? If you just discovered Meatloaf with Bat Out Of Hell II a couple of years back, then buy the original disc. If you have that and still want to know more about the 'Loaf, then dig up copies of Midnight At The Lost And Found, Bad Attitude and Dead Ringer, if only for the Cher duet. You can score all three for about twice the price of The Very Best Of Meatloaf and end up with three times as much music, tunes that really represent the "very best" of this underrated vocalist. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

(Click on the CD cover to buy The Very Best Of Meatloaf from Amazon.com)

The Dictators - Bloodbrothers (1999)

Maybe they didn't create punk rock, but the Dictators – one of the greatest lost rock & roll bands of the '70s – certainly helped to define the genre. Hitting the streets running in 1973 with their debut, The Dictators Go Girl Crazy! the Dictators bucked the musical trends of the time with a stripped-down, hardcore rock assault that was equal parts garage band fervor and metallic overkill. Owing more to the MC5 and the Stooges than to the singer/songwriter
trend that dominated the mid-70s commercially before the onslaught of punk, the Dictators made three great albums before the members moved onto other challenges.

Sadly, only the first of the band's trio of hard rocking elpees remained in print – until now. Since the labels that originally issued these gems had no interest in putting the other two Dictators albums out on CD, the band took it upon themselves to grab the rights to Bloodbrothers, their third (and best) album and reissue it their own damn selves.

Bloodbrothers is full of great songs. Faster & Louder is hardcore punk stripped bare, more an affirmation of the band's musical philosophy than an attempt at cultural documentation. The Minnesota Strip lyrically visits that infamous section of New York City, known for its youthful population of runaways, junkies and whores of both genders. Punctuated by the razor-sharp twin guitars of Ross "The Boss" and Scott "Top Ten" Kempner, the song is as haunting as the
dark streets it evokes. Stay With Me is the sort of harmony-filled pop/rock ditty that the Del Lords would later perfect (remaking this song on their last album). The band ends the disc with as much energy as they started it, burning through a savage rendering of the Flamin' Groovies' Slow Death. All told, Bloodbrothers simply bristles with energy, an album made by a band shooting for the big time with absolutely nothing to lose.

Although Kempner would go on to found the Del Lords, and most of the rest of the Dictators would reunite as Manitoba's Wild Kingdom for an album with lead singer "Handsome" Dick Manitoba, the work that these guys did with the Dictators is priceless, straight-ahead classic rock straight from the streets. Dictators Forever, Forever Dictators! (Dictators Multimedia)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Bloodbrothers from Amazon.com)

Down By Law - Punkrockdays (2002)

When the members of Down By Law decided to assemble a career retrospective, they didn't just do it themselves; they brought their fans into the process, asking them to vote for their favorite DBL songs on the band's web site. The highest scoring tunes appear on Punkrockdays, the band's "best of" compilation. The resulting song selection may not be the best representation of the band's talents – it shortchanges much of their more political material – but it is certainly representative of the songs the band's audience is listening to.

Formed in 1990 by former Dag Nasty/All vocalist Dave Smalley and members of the Chemical People, Down By Law were one of the trailblazing bands in the field of melodic punk, that is hardcore roots paired with pop influences. True, the movement has led to atrocities like Sum-41 and most of the Drive Thru label roster, but it has also yielded some fine bands in Green Day and the Offspring. DBL were there at the beginning, though, and Punkrockdays chronicles the first decade of the band's career, drawing material from all five of the band's Epitaph label albums (no songs from their rock hard 1999 Go-Kart release are included here, tho').

The quality of the songs on Punkrockdays varies, since the band's players have changed frequently through the years, the line-up not really gelling until adding guitarist Sam Williams III for DBL's breakthrough third album, punkrockacademyfightsong. None of the songs here are bad, just that some – like Radio Ragga, Independence Day and No Equalizer – stand out as really good tunes. Smalley is an exceptional punk rock vocalist and a solid, accessible songwriter, his lyrics nailing the concerns and hopes of his audience. Williams has the best chops of the band's different guitarists, outshining even Dag Nasty's Brian Baker, who appears on Goodnight Song. Williams shows a better chemistry with frontman Smalley, covering his vocals like a comfortable wool blanket. DBL is also quite well-known for their cover performances, and readings of the Proclaimers' hit 500 Miles and Big Country's In A Big Country are played straight and are actually quite fun, DBL showing the pop side of its roots and influences.

Down By Law is still going strong – a Dag Nasty reunion album notwithstanding – the band continuing to appeal to new fans and increase its audience with electric live shows and songs like those showcased by Punkrockdays. For any punk fan unfamiliar with Down By Law, this is the place to begin listening, discovering the charm and talent that have made DBL a household name in fine punk rock homes everywhere. (Epitaph Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Punkrockdays from Amazon.com)

Richard Hell - Time (2002)

Young punk rockers that would like to find out more about the roots of their passion should seek out the wellspring from which punk first bubbled forth. In this case, I'm referring to Richard Hell, one of the most underrated and overlooked of the punk godfathers. An important member of not one, but three, seminal punk outfits, Hell's influence on rock music, punk attitude and street fashion should not be ignored. The odds-n-sods collection Time is a long overdue career retrospective for Hell, delivered, appropriately enough, in glorious lo-fi rock & roll sound.

Born Richard Meyers in Lexington, Kentucky, Hell grew up in the sleepy Bluegrass State listening to British Invasion rock and Southern soul. He found a kindred spirit in Tom Miller (ne Verlaine), and the pair would soon end up together in New York City. They would form the Neon Boys in 1971, a proto-punk outfit inspired by the Stooges and Velvet Underground, with Verlaine on guitar and Hell picking up the bass. The Neon Boys would evolve into Television and become an integral part of the mid-70s NYC music scene growing up around the CBGB club and including bands like the Ramones and Blondie.

Chafed at his role in the band, Hell left Television before they recorded their classic debut, Marquee Moon, hooking up with former New York Dolls guitarist Johnny Thunders and drummer Jerry Nolan to form the Heartbreakers. Hell would again leave the band before recording, this time striking out on his own. Fronting a band that included guitarists Robert Quine and Ivan Julian and future Ramones drummer Marc Bell, Richard Hell & the Voidoids recorded what is arguably the most important song in the punk rock canon, Blank Generation, for their 1977 debut album of the same name. With his torn clothing, nihilistic lyrics and snotty attitude, Hell became the blueprint of punk rock to follow. The Voidoids would record only one more album – 1982's Destiny Street – but the band's influence on a generation of punk rockers was set in stone. Hell would later play in other bands, write poetry and in 1996 issued his first novel, Go Now, but he would never again pursue music with any sort of ambition.

The first disc of the two-CD set Time pairs a previous, cassette-only collection, R.I.P. The ROIR Sessions, with a number of unreleased tracks, including the original version of the Richard Hell/Dee Dee Ramone ode to heroin, Chinese Rocks, performed here by the Heartbreakers. Four Heartbreakers demos kick off Time, including Love Comes In Spurts, which would be revisited by Hell on the first Voidoids disc. Two early Voidoids' demos follow, each song featuring the individual virtuosity of guitarists Quine and Julian. A different Voidoids line-up is featured on half-dozen tracks from 1979, drummer Bell having left to join the Ramones. The highlights of this middle passage include Hell's philosophical take on life revealed by an obscure alternate take of Time, the Dylan cover Going Going Gone and the live at CBGB's song Funhunt, taken from the ROIR Records release. Another live track, capturing a 1983 Atlanta performance of I Can Only Give You Everything, showcases a later-day Voidoids roster while the disc closes with what are possibly the final Voidoids demo recordings, made in 1984 in New Orleans. The sound quality throughout disc one is spotty, befitting the homemade status of most of these recordings.

The second disc of Time, collecting unreleased live performances by the Voidoids, is what has punk collectors salivating. The first half-hour plus set includes raw performances of Blank Generation era Voidoids from a 1977 performance at London's Music Machine. All the band favorites are thrown out here, including Love Comes In Spurts, Liars Beware and Blank Generation. A cover of I Wanna Be Your Dog includes Hell's barks and Quine's scorched earth six-string riffs. An angry cover of the Stones' Ventilator Blues, was chosen to piss off a confrontational audience, as explained by Hell in the extensive liner notes. The sound quality of these live tracks equal that of a mediocre bootleg, but the passion and fire of the performance is priceless. The last four tracks on disc two of Time, taken from a 1978 benefit for St. Mark's church held at CBGB, include an original take on The Kid With The Replaceable Head (later recorded for Destiny Street) and You Gotta Lose, featuring Elvis Costello on vocals and guitar. Time closes with another Stones' cover, Shattered, performed by the Voidoids just this one time. The sound of these four tracks, taken from an FM radio broadcast soundboard, is markedly improved over the earlier live performances.

The significance of Richard Hell's influence on punk rock cannot be overstated. An innovator and pioneer who matched literature and poetry with angry, aggressive music in much the same way as his contemporary Patti Smith, Hell is often overshadowed by the bands that he helped create (Television) or influenced (the Sex Pistols, the Clash). While other punks have been incarcerated in the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Time shows that Hell's place is on the street, his music and defiant spirit ready to inspire a generation of rockers to come. (Matador Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Time from Amazon.com)

Steve Earle - Sidetracks (2002)

As explained by Steve Earle's excellent liner notes, the songs on Sidetracks aren't outtakes, but rather "stray tracks" that were previously unreleased or saw the light of day only on soundtrack or tribute albums. Much like Bill Lloyd's excellent All In One Place compilation album, Earle's Sidetracks confines these stray songs to a single package, providing extensive musician credits and song-by-song commentary. The resulting album is every bit as remarkable as any title in Earle's impressive catalog, a vital collection of original songs and inspired covers that illustrates Earle's talents as a songwriter, performer and bandleader.

Steve Earle's career has always been plagued by misconceptions, his early Nashville albums dismissed by ignorant Music Row hacks for being "too rock & roll," while mainstream rock audiences failed to embrace Earle as "too country." The truth lies somewhere in between, perhaps, but I believe that Earle is too enormous a talent to be confined by one style or genre, a fact illustrated by Sidetracks. A roots-music traditionalist who has had a tremendous influence on the alt-country scene, Earle has nonetheless flirted with hard rock, reggae and Celtic music as well as country, folk and bluegrass throughout the span of his nearly twenty-five year career.

Johnny Too Bad, recorded with Knoxville, Tennessee roots rockers the V-Roys, redefines the Jamaican classic with a harder edge while the Irish-flavored instrumental Dominick St, recorded with the Woodchoppers in Dublin, extends Earle's love affair with Celtic music. A powerful cover of Nirvana's Breed showcases Earle's rowdy rock side, tho' maybe not as well as Creepy Jackelope Eye, a lively collaboration with Eddie Spaghetti and the Supersuckers. An alternative version of Ellis Unit One performed with the Fairfield Four achieves an eerie spiritual edge lacking in the solo version used in the film Dead Man Walking. The folkish Me And The Eagle stands in stark contrast to much of the material on Sidetracks, while a twangy, bluegrass-tinged reading of Lowell George's Willin' captures the spirit of the oft-covered original.

Not everything on Sidetracks clicks, most notably a cover of the Chambers Brothers' classic Time Has Come Today. A technologically crafted duet with Sheryl Crow that was recorded in Nashville with Crow in LA, the performance may have seemed a good idea at its conception, but it suffers in execution. Crow's vocal contribution is lackluster and the band fails to achieve the manic (drug-fueled?) energy of the original, although the Abbie Hoffman vocal samples are pretty neat. This minor cavil aside, Sidetracks is an extremely worthwhile addition to your CD collection, a significant compilation and a revealing look "backstage" at the multi-faceted talents of Steve Earle. It's telling that by collecting his various cast-offs and rarities, Earle has cobbled together an album that still stands head and shoulders above most of the country and rock music that will be released this year. Though other artists should probably hang their heads in shame, Earle fans can rejoice in Sidetracks. (Artemis Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Sidetracks from Amazon.com)

Living Colour - Vivid (2002)

When they came along in the late-90s, Living Colour was an anomaly among hard rock bands. First of all, the members were all young African-American men with musical backgrounds in jazz, R&B and improvisational avant-garde music. Rock & roll at the time was sheer whitebread, dominated by longhaired white boys, the cultural diversity of the late-60s/early-70s overthrown by corporate homogenization. Living Colour didn't fit into MTV's nerf metal demographic, but damned if they didn't rock harder than half a dozen Motley Crue clones. The band seemingly appeared out of nowhere in the summer of 1988 with the release of its debut album, Vivid, but New York City fans knew differently. Living Colour had been banging around town for a couple of years, refining their sound and stage presence with residencies at clubs like CBGBs.

The release of Vivid would break through the barriers of race in rock, opening the door for multi-cultural '90s hard rock bands like Rage Against The Machine and System Of A Down. This breakthrough was accomplished mostly on the strength of a single song, the blistering Cult Of Personality, the accompanying video dominating the MTV playlist well into 1989 and breaking the band with a white audience. It was apparent from the video for Cult Of Personality that Living Colour wasn't kicking out the same old shit. Vernon Reid wasn't just another heavy metal guitar god, but a world-class six-string wizard who had earned his bones as a member of the experimental Ronald Shannon Jackson's Decoder Society. The rhythm section of bassist Muzz Skillings and drummer Will Calhoun provided as big a beat as a band could ever want while frontman Corey Glover – largely untrained and with little experience as a singer – perfectly complimented the band's funky, unpredictable groove with his rough-hewn, soulful vocal style.

Listening to the remastered reissue CD of Vivid shows that the album held much more great music than the celebrated hit single. Living Colour incorporated many styles and influences into the band's sound, placing disparate elements of freeform jazz, funk, soul, heavy metal and guitar pyrotechnics into a hard rock framework. While songs such as Open Letter (To A Landlord) and Funny Vibe showcased the band's social consciousness, visiting themes of poverty, homelessness and race, songs like the hedonistic Glamour Boys or I Want To Know were pop-influenced rockers with an almost new wave sound. (This was the '80s after all!) When the band hit a metallic groove, however, as with Cult Of Personality, Middle Man or What's Your Favorite Color? there were few other bands around who could match Living Colour's powerful and innovative sound.

The CD reissue of Vivid includes five bonus cuts culled from 12" singles; most of which have never appeared on compact disc before. A hip-hop remix of Funny Vibe by Prince Paul includes cameos from rappers like Daddy-O and Chuck D and Flavor Flav of Public Enemy. A red-hot cover of the Clash's Should I Stay Or Should I Go and a live version of Middle Man appeared previously on the Biscuits collection. A Keith LeBlanc remix of What's Your Favorite Color? adds to the funk quotient while a live performance of Cult Of Personality closes Vivid and blows the roof off the mutha! One of the most important albums in rock history, Vivid sold over a million copies and earned the band a Grammy™ Award. More important, though, is the influence the album and Living Colour would have on those that would follow. With Vivid, Living Colour literally changed the face of rock & roll. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Vivid from Amazon.com)

Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band - Tracks (1999)

I remember all too well the first time that I heard Bruce Springsteen. It was in the spring of 1975 and the song was "Born To Run." I was lying in bed, ready to go to sleep when I heard the opening chords of the song drifting up through the heating duct from my sister's radio. It was unlike anything that I had ever heard, and I quickly tuned in my radio to the song. The power of the music, the lyrics spoke to me in a way that I had never felt. This was rock & roll with teeth and I couldn't get enough of it.

I ran out the next day and bought all of the Springsteen albums that I could find, but neither of them had that magic song. Sure, they were great, and they grew on me as time passed by, but I'd have to wait until the fall of that year to buy Born The Run the album. It proved to be well worth the wait. Born To Run was a grand artistic stroke, Springsteen's "make-it-or-break-it" album and it soon became the one constant on my turntable. Although it was to be almost another year before I'd see Springsteen perform live, like many others in the autumn of 1975, I'd become a die-hard Bruce fan.

Almost twenty-five years have passed since then, and all of us – Bruce included – have gotten a little older. Bruce's fans have literally grown up with him, passing through marriage and parenthood into middle age along with our artistic touchstone. I've personally seen Springsteen perform live over a dozen times during the years, own every legitimate album (and more than a few bootlegs), videos, fanzines and a lot of the other flotsam and jetsam that go along with a lengthy and successful career. It's for folks such as myself – the life-long, die-hard Bruce fan – that the four CD compilation Tracks was released.

It's become almost chic the past few years to dis Bruce, dismissing him as a relic of the eighties, a commercial artist that never achieved the hipster status of the rising tide of "alternative" artists. Fan interest in Bruce has remained high through the years, however, and if his work in the nineties hasn't sold on par with his 1984 blockbuster Born In The U.S.A., well, what other artist's work has held up as well as Bruce's? Prompted, perhaps, by the unquenchable thirst of Bruce fans for new music (or, at least, unheard music), and certainly pushed by the recent twelve disc bootleg The Lost Masters series, Tracks collects 66 demos, outtakes, B-sides and assorted rarities and places them in a nice neat box for the Bruce fan.

It's a nice collection, a fine reflection of where Springsteen has been and where, perhaps, he's headed with his music. Always a prolific songwriter who is said to throw away four or five songs for every one that makes it onto an album, Springsteen's rejects are famous for becoming hits for other artists. Although the collection is a little light on the early period of Bruce's career, Tracks nonetheless covers in some detail the important, ground-breaking 1977 to 1983 period that led up to Born In The U.S.A. and subsequent superstardom.

Disc one begins with several tracks from Springsteen's initial 1972 demo session with Columbia Records and John Hammond, the great label A & R man that signed him. The first four tracks on the disc eventually made it onto Springsteen's debut album in vastly superior versions than those offered here. From here the disc jumps around, mixing early (i.e. 1973-74) songs with Darkness On The Edge Of Town outtakes (1977-78). The Born To Run period seems to be pretty much glossed over entirely, with only a couple of (deservedly) rejected songs placed here. There's still some good stuff on the disc, though, such as the live studio cut of "Rendezvous" (a minor hit for Greg Kihn, done better by Bruce), "Iceman" and Bruce's equally-wonderful version of the Southside Johnny chestnut "Hearts Of Stone."

Although many scribes have tagged disc three as their favorite, I personally like the material provided on the second disc. Representing the post-Darkness, pre-River era Bruce, the second disc in Tracks is almost a classic album in its own right. Take the first thirteen songs, throw away the somber "A Good Man Is Hard To Find (Pittsburgh)" and "Wages Of Sin" and you've got the core of The Ties That Bind, a legendary unreleased and often-bootlegged
Springsteen disc that has taken on almost mythical proportions. Many of these songs are from the 1979 Power Station sessions and there's some great material here.

"Roulette," an almost forgotten B-side is one of Bruce's most powerful songs, a cautionary tale of what – nuclear holocaust? environmental disaster? Whatever, it's a hard-rocking song with aggressive lyrics. Dismissed as an example of Springsteen's penchant for "frat rock" (and what's the problem with that? Many of rock's great one-hit-wonders achieved their popularity on the frat circuit), "Where The Bands Are" is a great rock & roll tune, a love song wrapped up in an ode to the power of rock music. "Loose Ends" and "Be True" are also fine songs, rollicking numbers with solid performances. "Ricky Wants A Man Of Her Own" is a humorous tale of teen rebellion and "Living On The Edge Of The World" rings with the chime of Danny Federici's farfisa.

Not to downplay the material provided on the third disc of Tracks. "My Love Will Not Let You Down" is a fine example of Springsteen's heartfelt romanticism, a gentle song with a tasty guitar break. "This Hard Land," Springsteen's populist parable is familiar from its placement on his greatest hits albums. "Frankie," a rare live favorite from the Born To Run era finally sees the light of day here along with another throwaway hit, "Pink Cadillac" (popularized by the Pointer Sisters).

The story-song "Brothers Under The Bridges ('83)" serves as a bookend to the same-named closing track on the fourth disc, the earlier song showing the characters as kids, the later song offering its protagonist as a no-longer innocent adult. Much of the fourth disc is low-key ruminations on love and life, similar to Tunnel Of Love. Not that the songs are completely without charm here: "Part Man, Part Monkey" is kind of funky, a hilarious send-up of humanity
while "Back In Your Arms" is a lovely love song similar to many on Human Touch.

Many have pointed out that Tracks features many songs that Springsteen didn't think were good enough for inclusion on an album, using that excuse as a reason to lessen impact of the collection. Nonetheless, more than a handful of the songs here have been hits for other people or have proven themselves as live favorites. Some are among the best songs that Springsteen has ever written, and just because they didn't find a place on a certain album doesn't mean that they're no good. True, Tracks isn't the kind of collection that's going to win over new fans – Springsteen is too well known, his music too acutely documented to offer many surprises. For the long-time fan, however, wanting to compliment their knowledge of Bruce's evolution, I'd easily recommend Tracks as a fine starting point.

(Ironically, although many thought that the release of Tracks would dampen the parade of bootleg Bruce CDs, less than a month passed before enterprising 'leggers had raided the vaults with several releases of studio material not found on Tracks. If Bruce really wants to stay a step ahead of these gray area CDs, he'd be better off taking his cue from Frank Zappa, King Crimson or the Grateful Dead and release his own official "bootlegs." Dig into the vault, Bruce, and start putting out collections of individual live performances. Not only would die-hard fans buy them up, but new converts would also flock to your door.) (Columbia Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Tracks from Amazon.com)

Bruce Springsteen & the E Street Band - Live In New York City (2001)

Bruce Springsteen has sold a lot of records during his career, but it has always been his live performances that have drawn the lion's share of the acclaim. I've personally seen Springsteen perform eight or nine times during the past 25 years and can honestly say that out of the 300+ shows that I've seen during my critical career, his shows dominate my top ten. Whether with the full E Street Band or solo with just a guitar and a harmonica, Springsteen is a dynamic and charismatic performer, a fact that has made him second only to Led Zeppelin as one of the most bootlegged rock artists of all time.

All of which makes the 2-CD Live In New York City a mixed blessing. Culled from the last two nights of a remarkable year-long "reunion" tour with the E Street Band, the set offers some wonderful performances from what, by all accounts, was a powerful pair of shows. Springsteen and crew revisit some old classics, reinvent some obscurities and even introduce a couple of new songs. Much as with the previous Springsteen live box set, however, all of the rough edges have been removed from Live In New York City.

The production team of Springsteen and Chuck Plotkin (with input, no doubt, from manager Jon Landau) has sonically sanitized the performances, leaving the listener with only part of the strength of the original performances. Bootlegs of these NYC shows – and, truth be told, of most of the tour – present the band warts and all, as one of the tightest and toughest rock & roll outfits to ever grace a stage. Although the sound quality of many of the bootlegs may not be as pristine as this legitimate release, the honest depiction of the performances is more compelling.

That minor cavil aside, Live In New York City is still a fine collection of performances. The album opening "My Love Will Not Let You Down" is a soaring, transcendent rendering of an otherwise overlooked entry from the Springsteen songbook. "Atlantic City" is offered with full band backing that, while removing the stark quality of the original studio version nevertheless shows a hidden power to the lyrics and the story told. The arrangement of "The River" is completely changed; transforming an already potent and dark-hued tale of lost dreams and desperation into a masterful modern blues song. Clarence Clemons' mournful sax opens "The River," leading into an acoustic passage and, eventually, Springsteen's sadness-tinged vocals. The song's sparse arrangement and incredibly delicate performance is superior to the studio version and breathes new life into one of Springsteen's more memorable pieces.

Afforded a full band performance, "Youngstown" rises above its acoustic roots to become a stormy maelstrom of rock & rage. One of the most powerful protest songs ever written, "Youngstown" is a fine example of blue collar blues, a chilling documentation of the decline of America's industrial heartland that ends with a wicked six-string battle courtesy of Springsteen, "Little" Steven Van Zandt and Nils Lofgren. Springsteen's lively introduction of the band members during "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" echoes the "Boss" of old, crowning the E Streeters with various titles and honors to the delight of the audience. "Land Of Hope And Dreams," one of two new songs showcased on Live In New York City, is a throwback to The River era, a beautiful affirmation of faith in the face of adversity.

The other new song is the controversial "American Skin (41 Shots)." Inspired by the murder of an immigrant by overzealous NYPD officers, it is another powerful musical statement. Featuring a quiet instrumental undercurrent, the focus is on Springsteen's vocals, his questioning lyrics and the phrase "41 shots," repeated over and over by the band. A lengthy and appropriate silence follows the song, leading into the six bonus tracks tacked on at the last minute to make this a 2-CD set. The seldom-played "Lost In The Flood" sounds good in a live setting, guitars clashing and wailing behind the vocals. "Born In The U.S.A." is reinvented as a bluesy dirge while the album-closing "If I Should Fall Behind," another overlooked Springsteen gem, is offered as a quiet prayer. With vocals from Bruce, Patti Scialfa, Nils Lofgren, Little Steven and Clarence Clemons, the song is transformed from a folksy tale of love and loyalty into a spiritual wonder.

In our society's rush to unquestioningly embrace youth culture, it's become trendy, even required, to dismiss anything older than last week to the dustbin of history. In an era where even the Clash aren't considered "punk" enough by today's cultural standards, Springsteen – whose greatest commercial successes were a decade and a half ago – is considered a rock & roll dinosaur. As a year long, sold-out tour and this 2-CD live set prove, however, there's still plenty of life left in Springsteen and crew. The E Street Band plays with a joy and fury that musicians half their age will never equal, Springsteen's new songs show a skill, concern and relevancy lost to modern rock bands. Spoon-fed corporate pabulum by the music biz, today's youth don't realize that true musical giants still walk this planet. To paraphrase an old blues song, what the kids don't know we old geezers understand. (Columbia Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Live In New York City from Amazon.com)

Entombed - Unreal Estate (2005)

They have been the forefathers of stoner-tinged grindcore, offering their dark, Sabbathesque vibe to the overtones of Napalm Death relevant glory, but nobody ever thought that Entombed (or any hard-edged group for that matter) could have influenced and helped create what is hard to believe – a ballet. Yes, I said it, literally a performance of about 30 dancers doing a routine to "Entombed" music.

What we get with Unreal Estate is a live recording of a performance at Sweden's Royal Opera Hall, with the music speaking for itself. There is a dark vibe found within the record with complete grinding thrusts of tracks such as "Say It In Slugs," "Mental Twin" and "In the Flesh" offering the classic sound of Entombed. This is a typically tight musical performance from these guys, but that is only the audio portion...it's hard to imagine what the dancing was like, being that there is no DVD included. Normally you would think of slam-dancing or moshing among the thick cloud of pot smoke at an Entombed show, but not in this case. Even for a live record, the crowd is fairly subdued; the only applause you hear is at the end.

A very strange feat for Entombed, which began as an idea by choreographers who were fans of the band that decided to try something unique, and unique this is. When looking at this recording, it's not like you have to think that the band has the balls to do something like this. It's more like the band has to have discrete and precise musicianship, similar to an orchestra (by the way there is no orchestra, just the band themselves). So it remains an honor that Entombed was chosen to create the musical mastery behind such a different approach to the world of the dancing arts. (Candlight Records)

Review by Tommy "Hashman" Hash, copyright 2005

(Click on the CD cover to buy Unreal Estate from Amazon.com)

Southside Johnny - Live At The Paradise Theater (2001)

I don't know what dark closet or dusty vault shelf that somebody dug up this vintage Southside Johnny performance from but I'm sure glad that it's been brought into the light of day. Taken from a December 1978 show at the Paradise Theater in Boston, this collection shows the band in their prime. Electric and exciting live performers, only Springsteen's E Street Band or the Iron City Houserockers could come close to touching the Asbury Jukes in 1978. Since live Southside Johnny albums (legitimate or bootleg) are scarcer than good songs on a Backstreets Boys' album, Live At The Paradise Theater is a welcome addition to the Jukes canon.

Drawing from the band's classic first three albums, Live At The Paradise Theater features Southside Johnny Lyon's soulful vocals on a handful of songs donated by former Juke "Miami" Steve Van Zandt and Asbury Park legend Bruce Springsteen. There are also inspired covers, including a rave-up rendition of Sam Cooke's "Having A Party" and the Leiber/Stoller gem "Santa Claus Is Back In Town." After all this time, Jukes classics like "This Time It's For Real," "Love On The Wrong Side Of Town," "Trapped Again" and "I Don't Want To Go Home" still sound as fresh and heartache-inspiring as they did twenty-something years ago. With a horn section hand-picked by Van Zandt and some finely-crafted guitar playing from Billy Rush, the Jukes run through a fourteen song set that evokes the passion and fire of the Rhythm & Blues revues of the fifties and sixties.

Although Southside Johnny & the Asbury Jukes continue to tour and blow the roof off every venue they're asked to demolish, the band was always too reverent in their roots to break through to a mainstream audience. That leaves Live At The Paradise Theater for us long-time fanboys, the hardcore legion who feel that the unique blend of roots rock, soul, R&B and blues kicked out by Southside Johnny transcends time and trends. In this light, Live At The Paradise delivers the cheap rock & roll thrills we crave. (Phoenix Rising Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Live At The Paradise Theater from Amazon.com)

Rare Earth - The Best Of Rare Earth (2001)

They might have well been the funkiest bunch o' white boys to come out of the Motor City, kicking out the jams with a hybrid of Motown soul and hard rock & roll. Much like Rodney Dangerfield, however, Rare Earth never gets any respect. Critics trashed them, the record buying public forgot them shortly after the last notes of their handful of hits had rung and, well, quite frankly, history hasn't looked down favorably on the band. The Best Of Rare Earth, a 7-track compilation released from the Motown vaults as part of the "20th Century Masters Millennium Collection" proves that these guys were ahead of their time by almost two decades.

Although they weren't the first funkmeisters to mix rock & roll with R & B roots in the sixties – hometown heroes the MC5 did it a couple of years earlier – Rare Earth had greater success with the sound. Cuts like "Get Ready," "Hey Big Brother" and "I Just Want To Celebrate" proved to be large hits for a relatively undistinguished bunch of players, and the songs hold up well even after thirty years. Rare Earth foreshadowed the jam bands of the nineties with extended instrumental passages filled to the brim with funky rhythms, rock riffs and jazzy interludes that stretched three-minute pop songs into fifteen or twenty minute compositions. Sometimes tedious, sometimes exhilerating, it was nonetheless unique.

At their best, Rare Earth exemplified the sort of musical experimentation that made the late sixties/early seventies an exciting time for music. Anything might happen, with adventuresome bands throwing elements of country, blues, jazz and R & B music on top of their basic roots rock sound. When they were good – as on the handful of hit singles featured on The Best Of Rare Earth – the band was very good. Honestly, however, those moments were few and far between. Rare Earth's more typical fare consisted of hackneyed R & B covers (like their slaughtering of Ray Charles' classic "What'd I Say"), which is what earned them their reputation with critics and historians. For those listeners wanting a taste of one of rock music's more obscure bands, I'd heartily recommend the budget-priced The Best Of Rare Earth as a low-cost sampler that features the band's four big hits, which is all anyone really wants to
hear anyway.... (Motown/Universal)

(Click on the CD cover to buy The Best Of Rare Earth from Amazon.com)

Modern English - Life In The Gladhouse (2001)

It's hard for a pop band to be all things to all people, and most satisfy their creative egos by merely finding a singular groove and flogging it to death. Modern English were one of the few outfits who managed to blend together many disparate influences – punk roots, new wave sensibilities, Goth ambiance and industrial attitude – into creating an entirely unique and highly experimental body of music. Best known for their infectious 1982 hit "I Melt With You," which has become a staple on classic rock radio, Modern English had an identity beyond MTV and movie soundtracks.

Life In The Gladhouse 1980-1984 presents the Modern English in the band's halcyon days, warts, pretensions and all, and the collection of album tracks and 'A'-side singles shows a band at least a decade ahead of their time. Masterfully blending the aforementioned musical styles and influences, Modern English created songs that were atmospheric, emotional and intelligent. The band has much more in common with obvious creative predecessors like Roxy Music than with the legion of new wave bands that glutted MTV in the early eighties. Modern English sculpted sound and abstract lyrics in the creation of musical art that sounds as fresh and exciting today as it did twenty years ago. If you're looking for a new musical thrill, want to hear something that is both familiar and yet intellectually challenging, look no further than Life In The Gladhouse 1980-1984. If you know nothing more of Modern English than "I Melt With You," prepare to have your conceptions gladly shattered. (4AD Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Life In The Gladhouse from Amazon.com)

Alice Cooper - Billion Dollar Babies (2001)

By 1973, Alice Cooper was one of the hottest bands in rock & roll. Featuring the flamboyant on-stage antics of lead vocalist and band namesake Cooper and a sound that was a cross between metal-edged blues, hard rock and camped-up show tunes, the band struck gold with their fifth album, 1972's School's Out. By the time that they would enter the studio to record what would become their masterpiece – Billion Dollar Babies – the band was on the verge of breaking up. Suffering from tensions created by constant touring, the ever-growing complexity of their stage shows and problems created by the extreme overuse of alcohol, the band nonetheless put together ten songs that would become the keystone of the Alice Cooper legacy.

Remixed by producer Bob Ezrin and reissued by Warner Archives and archival experts Rhino Records, Billion Dollar Babies was originally released in 1973 to overall critical acclaim and great commercial success. It became the band's best selling album, it led to one of the largest-grossing and spectacular tours in rock history and it inspired a legion of hard rock, punk and heavy metal bands to follow. Today, nearly thirty years after its release, it stands out as a landmark of rock music. Cuts like "No More Mr. Nice Guy," "Hello Hooray" and the vastly underrated and oft-overlooked "Generation Landslide" stand as rock icons. "Elected" is every bit as funny and relevant in the new millennium as it was in the Nixon era while lesser-known tracks such as "Raped And Freezin'" and the macabre "I Love The Dead" did their best to launch the Goth and death metal genres.

Released by Warner/Rhino in two versions, those who merely want a taste of one of rock's most unique and influential bands can go for the single-disc reissue of Billion Dollar Babies. For long-time fans or the curious, the "deluxe edition" of Billion Dollar Babies includes a second disc of live tracks and outtakes that is well worth the few extra dollars to buy. Featuring eleven songs taken from two Texas shows in April 1973, it offers killer performances of "Elected," "Hello Hooray," "No More Mr. Nice Guy" and "Billion Dollar Babies." It also includes live versions of older Alice Cooper faves like "I'm Eighteen," "My Stars," and "I Love The Dead" as well as a handful of outtakes from the Billion Dollar Babies sessions.

Two years after the release of Billion Dollar Babies, Alice Cooper the band would break-up and Cooper the individual would start a lengthy and productive solo career that continues to plod along today. Along with his contemporary Ozzie Osbourne, Alice Cooper has been granted "rock godfather" status by today's heavy metal kids. Through the years that followed, however, Cooper and his bandmates would never again make rock & roll as primal, vital and energetic as they would with these ten tracks. (Rhino Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Billion Dollar Babies from Amazon.com)

Against Me! - As The Eternal Cowboy (2003)

As mainstream audiences embrace bands of dubious punk rock merit like Blink-182 and Sum-41 and other alpha-numeric ciphers, the real punk rock kiddies are getting their cheap thrills from old school masters like Rancid, Bad Religion and Pennywise. For music lovers seeking new musical challenges and hardcore jollies, however, the Reverend recommends Against Me! This Gainesville, Florida foursome has been kicking around on the fringes for a while, recording some solid material for their hometown label No Idea and earning a following the old-fashioned way – by playing their collective asses off with no major label financing and little press coverage.

All of that's about to change, methinks, with the release of the band's As The Eternal Cowboy on the larger and well-respected Fat Wreck Chords label. The album is certain to raise the brand's profile and, considering the quality of music on As The Eternal Cowboy, might just spark a bidding war among major label A&R drones with dollar signs in their eyes. Your humble scribe doesn't think that the temptation of filthy lucre will be enough to lure Against Me! away from the band's indie rock roots, tho'. Affirmed leftists with a thinly veiled lyrical agenda, Against Me! are old-fashioned rocking radicals with a new-fangled sound. As The Eternal Cowboy moves the band past notions of three-chord punk, bringing elements of roots rock, blues and even alt-country to play in support of a solid collection of songs guaranteed to blow the dust from your speakers.

Against Me! walk a lyrical barbed-wire tightrope between rock and rhetoric, Tom Gabel's intelligent lyrics adding a personal feel to tried-and-true socio-political polemics. "Turn Those Clapping Hands Into Angry Balled Fists" is a clever take on consumerism and conformity, the average person embracing mediocrity in order to avoid confrontation. The anthemic "Cliche Guevara" is a spirited call for a new revolution, the band crying "there's a lot of things that should be said, so we're hammering six strings, machine gun in audible voices, this is the party we came for" with a violent fervor. "Mutiny On The Electronic Bay" takes its cue from Noam Chomsky, spotlighting fashionable wartime chic for the hypocrisy that it is, concluding that "when an invasion can bring a country to its freedom, then unconsciousness it true happiness..."

"Slurring The Rhythms" mixes metaphors, a traditional rock & road song with stinging guitars and an upbeat tempo standing as a thinly-disguised commentary on the fleeting nature of progress and the brevity of life, the song trailing out with the haunting words "we are never going home." Against Me! handle personal relationships with several songs here, most notably the rapid-fire "You Look Like I Need A Drink" and the country-flavored "Cavalier Eternel," Gabel bringing a fresh perspective to the "beautiful loser" persona that is legend in rock & romance. Throughout As The Eternal Cowboy, Against Me! play like their very lives depend on it, the band tilting at windmills with reckless abandon, guitars screaming and rhythms crashing like hurricane-fueled waves on the shore. Recorded at the legendary Ardent Studios in Memphis, Tennessee, the birthplace of rock & roll, As The Eternal Cowboy is a significant musical statement from one of the most exciting young bands in the punk rock world. You'd have to be a real twit to pass this one by on your way to the Good Charlotte section of your local record store. (Fat Wreck Chords)

(Click on the CD cover to buy As The Eternal Cowboy from Amazon.com)

Anti-Flag - The Terror State (2004)

Anti-Flag has never been hesitant about wearing its left-leaning political tendencies on their collective sleeves. Frontman Justin Sane brings a folkie's sensibilities and lyrical sense to the band's musical onslaught, Anti-Flag eschewing empty political rhetoric in favor of a good, old-fashioned, meat-and-taters anarcho-leftist perspective. The Terror State, the latest broadside by the working class heroes from Pittsburgh, hits with all the impact of a high-octane Molotov cocktail looking for a match.

It would be no stretch of the imagination to suggest that Sane and crew won't be voting for Bush next election day, a notion reinforced by The Terror State's opening track, "Turncoat." A sort of "Emporer's New Clothes" recounting of the President's many crimes against humanity, Anti-Flag brand 'W' as a "turncoat, killer, liar, thief." With dynamic vocals and incendiary lyrics backed by three, maybe four explosive chords and a monster beat, the song sets the stage for that which follows. "Rank-And-File" is a call-to-arms for the working man and woman while "Post-War Breakout" is an eerie reading of Woody Guthrie's prophetic tale of a returning soldier. The powerful "Wake Up," its lyrics supported by a fast-n-furious wall-of-sound, is an attempt at shock treatment for the ignorant and uninformed that might just be too damn late to help. "Death Of A Nation" is an anthemic obituary set to scorched earth instrumentation, Sane's passionate vocals bringing an Orwellian clarity to this hardcore dirge.

Free-trade treaties, the war in Iraq, the loss of civil liberties, immigration, corporate welfare and social policies that further the interest of a wealthy minority, all subjects that provide fuel for Anti-Flag's poetic fire. Unlike many political punks, however, Anti-Flag provides justification for their rage, offering suggested reading and contacts to get more information on the issues they sing about.

Musically, Anti-Flag are unabashedly punk, punctuating Sane's intelligent lyrics with a no-frills blend of the Clash and Minor Threat. The Terror State was produced by Rage Against The Machine's guitar wizard Tom Morello, an artist who knows something about mixing politics, protest and powerful music without getting burned. Morello's skilled work on the board adds more punch to Anti-Flag's songs, bringing an undeniable jackhammer dynamic to the band's sound.

It's a dangerous combination, to be sure, mixing erudite, anti-authoritarian lyrics with flammable hardcore punk rock, a tightwire walk that Anti-Flag does well. You can bet that if George W. has an "enemies list" (and do you doubt for a moment that an administration as paranoid as this doesn't have a list?), Justin Sane and crew are marked in red right near the top. With The Terror State, Anti-Flag has drawn a line in the sand and marked its territory with characteristic fire and fervor. There's more to punk rock than Good Charlotte, Hot Topic and cool T-shirts. Raise your I.Q. several notches with Anti-Flag.... (Fat Wreck Chords)

(Click on the CD cover to buy The Terror State from Amazon.com)

Balzac - Out Of The Grave And Into The Dark (2005)

The Japanese punk-rock outfit Balzac, formed in Osaka in 1992, owes a considerable debt to those early Misfits records released by Caroline back during the golden age of punk. The band pursues a familiar horror-rock aesthetic, the members wear their hair in the ubiquitous "devil's lock" style and even have an eerie band logo similar to the Misfits' grinning skull. Balzac has formed a long-standing friendship with the Misfits and has even toured with the band. That being said, however, Balzac is no mere Misfits tribute band, nor are they overly derivative in their musical style. These Osaka crazy men have forged out a distinctive style that is entirely Balzac in nature, and have actually eclipsed their original influence in both number of albums and singles released and in the scope of the music created.

Precious little Balzac music has hit these shores to date, a situation happily rectified by Out Of The Grave And Into The Dark, released in the US by the Misfits' record label and distributed by the good folks at Ryko. A deluxe package featuring a 22-song CD and accompanying DVD, the set combines Balzac's 2004 Japanese album Comes Out Of The Grave with the band's 2005 EP Dark-Ism. Although various zombies, demons, vampires and such inhabit Balzac's lyrics (or at least those that you can translate – their English web site helps), the band's preoccupation with horror movie themes is overshadowed by its heady blend of three-chord punk and choppy power-pop with metallic overtones. Balzac has talent, no doubt, and some of guitarist Atsushi's impressive fretwork belies the band's minimalist punk rock roots.

As an introduction to Balzac's considerable charms, Out Of The Grave And Into The Dark is a perfect primer to the band's milieu, showcasing their trademark 120mph sound, explosive rhythms and blistering six-string work. At times, as on "The World Without End," the band sounds remarkably similar to rockers such as the London Quireboys or Dogs D'Amour; at other times you'll hear strains of Cheap Trick, the Ramones, the Cramps and, yes, the Misfits. Balzac frontman/songwriter Hirosuke has the perfect punk rock voice, with a range between a poppy whisper and a HC scream. The rhythm section of bassist Akio and drummer Takayuki create a glorious noise, embroidered upon by guitarist Atsushi, a talent that would be a giant star if the band were American independents rather than Japanese shock-rockers.

The bonus DVD included with Out Of The Grave And Into The Dark features several of the band's imaginative music videos, a short horror film and some raucous live performance footage, as well as some other rare "audio only" tracks. Overall, this two-disc set is quite impressive, from the music and video to the abundance of color pics of this creatively photogenic band, lacking only informative liner notes about the band to be a perfect package. If you want some rock & roll cheap thrills with plenty of bite, look no further than Balzac, the best punk rock band that you've never heard! (Misfits Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Out Of The Grave from Amazon.com)

Willie Nile - Beautiful Wreck Of The World (2000)

Released in 1999, I recently found this criminally overlooked album in the discount bin at the local used music store. If my memory hasn't failed me quite yet, Willie Nile was hanging around Nashville in late '99 – so it's possible that this copy might have come into my greedy little hands via some unappreciative person who originally received it from Willie himself. Regardless, as a long-time fan I was glad to stumble across it and if you, gentle reader, care a whit about finely-crafted songs and intelligent lyricism, you should be digging up your own copy.

Saddled with the "new Springsteen" albatross early in his career (the eighties version of the "new Dylan" comparison leveled by unimaginative critics in the seventies), Nile never quite recovered from the critical overkill and commercial indifference. He only released three albums for Columbia before being shuttled off to relative obscurity. 'Tis a shame, too, since Beautiful Wreck Of The World proves that not only have Nile's artistic chops not diminished any since his 1980 debut, his skills have sharpened and matured during the past two decades.

Nile's greatest asset as a songwriter is his observational ability and the skill with which he shares what he sees. Beautiful Wreck Of The World kicks off with the ultra-clever and rocking "You Gotta Be A Buddha (In A Place Like This)." A wickedly tongue-in-cheek rundown of the modern world and tribute to the virtue of patience, the song includes one of my favorite refrains: "You laugh, you cry, you live, you die/you wake up in the morning and don't know why." The title track is a whimsical and humorous look at a world turned upside down while "Brain Damage" is a slightly offbeat love song that is as witty as it is accurate. "On The Road To Calvary," dedicated to Jeff Buckley, is filled with beautiful imagery and wordplay, as haunting a tribute to the late songwriter as will be written.

Although Nile's work evokes Dylan and Springsteen – his obvious artistic forebears – he is nevertheless an original voice with a singular lyrical vision. A vastly underrated talent, Nile has been frozen out of the mainstream music biz by trend-following cretins unable to recognize the man's skills or the aging 35-50 year old demographic that would appreciate a fresh and original singer/songwriter. Much like his contemporary Carolyn Mas or the recent efforts of wordsmiths such as Dan Bern or Nashville's Threk Michaels, Willie Nile is a man without a country. Talented as hell, Nile is nonetheless out of step with the industry in which he's trying to make a living.

Then again, as long as he makes records like Beautiful Wreck Of The World, we'll gladly march to the sound of Nile's different drummer. (River House Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Beautiful Wreck Of The World from Amazon.com)

Black Rob - Life Story (2000)

The bulk of these tracks have been sitting in the box for a couple of years, rapper Black Rob patiently waiting for beleaguered Bad Boy boss Sean "Puffy" Combs (a/k/a "P Diddy") to release his debut disc. Now it's Rob's turn at the plate, batting in the place of the legendary Notorious B.I.G. in the Bad Boy line-up and these ears tell me that he's hit a home run with Life Story.

It's a tribute to Rob's skills as a songwriter and performer that the rhymes he recorded even a couple of years ago play as fresh and contemporary as those captured on tape a month or so ago. Life Story is a cathartic collection of material, with Black Rob drawing on his own experience, writing songs in prison in anticipation of his shot at the brass ring. The resulting collection of songs is brutally real, and sincerely heartfelt, the first shot from a major new hip-hop talent.

Guest stars abound on Life Story, from the scandalous, always sexy Lil' Kim and the underappreciated Mase to the chairman of the board himself, Puff Daddy. It's Rob's commanding presence, however, along with his finely delivered rhymes that dominate the proceedings on Life Story. Much like other young talents like Beanie Siegel and Sisquo, Black Rob is stepping out of the background with a set that earns the artist a well-deserved spotlight of his own. (Bad Boy Entertainment)

(Click on the CD cover to buy a copy of Life Story from Amazon.com)

Al Kooper - Rare & Well Done (2002)

In a review of his amazing auto-biography, Backstage Passes & Backstabbing Bastards, I referred to Al Kooper as the "Forrest Gump of rock & roll." Unbelievably, I have reason to believe that Kooper might have been insulted by the comparison. Like that fictional film character, Kooper has always seemed to manage being in the right place at the right time to affect rock & roll history. Whether playing keyboards behind Dylan's landmark Like A Rolling Stone, forming pioneering jazz-rock fusion band Blood, Sweat & Tears or discovering Lynyrd Skynyrd, Kooper has been a valuable, behind-the-scenes player in rock music. Unlike his slow-witted cinematic counterpart, however, Kooper's immense talents have enabled him to string together a largely unheralded career that has now entered its fifth decade.

Most people think of Al Kooper primarily as a session musician, a professional mercenary who has appeared on albums by everybody from Bob Dylan, the Rolling Stones and Jimi Hendrix to Trisha Yearwood and B.B. King. Some might know Kooper as the producer and label exec that discovered Lynyrd Skynyrd and produced their early (and best) albums. The two-disc Rare & Well Done is a long overdue retrospective that places Kooper in the spotlight as a songwriter and recording artist, twin roles for which he is often overlooked. The first disc of the set, "Rare," includes eighteen unreleased tunes, both originals and covers, and Kooper's first ever single, New York's My Home (Razz-A-Ma-Tazz) a/k/a The Street Song from 1965.

Among the first disc highlights are an inspired remake of one of Kooper's signature B, S & T song, I Can't Quit Her, covers of Ray Charles and Ann Peebles and a phenomenal version of XTC's Making Plans For Nigel from a tribute album. Solid originals like the quirky The Earthquake of Your Love, the blues raver Nuthin' I Wouldn't Do (For A Woman Like You) and the rootsy Rachmaninoff's Birthday showcase Kooper's not inconsiderable skills as a songwriter. Kooper possesses an impressive knowledge of pop music, rock & roll, soul and blues, which he brings to bear in his material. The real find on the first disc is a discarded Dylan track from 1970's New Morning LP, Went To See The Gypsy. An epic, rollicking, guitar-driven track with great vocals and tasty guitar from Kooper, Went To See The Gypsy is a timeless slice of rock music history.

"Well Done," the second half of the set, offers up some of Kooper's better-known solo and band material and recorded collaborations. Kooper's other signature B, S &T song and my personal favorite, I Love You More Than You'll Ever Know, is here as are a pair of fine Blues Project tunes, Flute Thing (1965) and I Can't Keep From Cryin' Sometimes from a 1994 reunion captured on the Soul Of A Man album. Most of the second disc is culled from a handful of Kooper's long out-of-print solo albums and his Super Session recording with guitar great Mike Bloomfield, which provides Albert's Shuffle and Season Of The Witch. There's a drastically different version of the Gary Lewis hit This Diamond Ring – co-written by Kooper and originally envisioned as a soulful Ben E. King-styled tune – as well as a live 1994 version of I Can't Quit Her.

Probably the most curious of Kooper's many film and TV compositions is Love Theme from the cult movie The Landlord. Presented here in its original form from the 1969 album Easy Does It, Love Theme was later sampled by rapper Jay-Z on the multi-platinum album Dynasty, an unlikely inclusion that is hopefully contributing to Kooper's retirement fund.

Rare & Well Done comes with a CD-sized booklet crammed with song information, Kooper's memories of the material, rare photos and testimonials from over two dozen musicians, critics and admirers. Extensive liner notes are provided by writer Jaan Uhelszki, but it's the music that really does the talking here. Kooper's reputation as a session keyboardist overshadows that fact that he is a fine guitarist with a bluesy touch. Throughout his lengthy career, Kooper has developed a rich, mature and soulful voice that graces his later material and as a songwriter, Kooper has grown beyond his early Brill Building-inspired '60s pop inflections into a top-notch craftsman.

Any success enjoyed by Rare & Well Done will hopefully lead to an increased availability of Kooper's long out-of-print solo albums (available now only as imports). Until then, the set serves as an invaluable documentation and introduction to the talents of one of rock's most overlooked MVPs. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

(Click on CD cover to buy Rare & Well Done from Amazon.com)

Gary Moore - Live At The Marquee (2002)

One of British rock's greatest secret weapons, Gary Moore has never received the attention or props that he deserves as one of the Emerald Isle's wildest and most talented guitarslingers. It is certainly not his immense skills that have prevented him from gaining more than a token stateside audience, although his penchant for skipping from project to project might provide some reasons for his obscurity. After fronting the early-70s British blooze-rock outfit Skid Row, Moore banged out hard rock with Thin Lizzy, flirted with jazz/fusion as a member of Colosseum II and played on solo albums by folks like Cozy Powell and Greg Lake. Moore's own solo efforts have run the gamut from heavy metal to improvisational jazz to hardcore blues. For all of his genre hopping, Moore might be pegged as a dilettante but for the fact that no matter the style of music, he plays it so damn well....

Live At The Marquee is taken from a 1980 show captured at London's Marquee Club and is probably as good a representation of Moore's six-string skills as one might find. Although this critic personally prefers the blues bashing Moore practiced during the '90s, the metal-tinged rock and jazzy fretwork found on Live At The Marquee is nevertheless impressive. Fronting a band that includes journeyman MVP drummer Tommy Aldridge, the Irish guitar wizard runs through a set that includes the hard-driving title cut from his 1979 solo album, Back On The Streets and the wonderfully sublime Parisienne Walkway, Moore's first UK hit. Run To Your Mama rocks with a rabid ferocity, Moore's lightning-quick runs highlighting an otherwise generic "kiss-off" song while You plays like melodic new wave pop. The soaring, operatic Nuclear Attack and the thrash-and-bash instrumentation of Dallas Warhead (with Aldridge's manic drum solo) close out Live At The Marquee with a proper showing of Moore's heavy metal skills.

Although Live At The Marquee probably won't win Gary Moore any new fans, standing miles away stylistically from his latest release, the bluesy, bone-rattling Scars, the album does serve as a solid documentation of Moore's early work. Hopefully this reissue will herald a complete revamping of Moore's '80s-era hard rock catalog by Sanctuary, which very well might attract listeners searching for a new guitar hero in this age of limp, lifeless "modern rock." Gary Moore is a guitarist of unusual skill and dexterity, a six-string virtuoso capable of great subtlety, power and speed. He deserves a much wider hearing in the United States. (Sanctuary Records)

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Radio Birdman - The Essential Radio Birdman (2001)

The Saints may be Australia's best-known punk export, but for this scribe's hard-earned cashola, I'd choose Radio Birdman as the more raucous of the two. Formed by American expatriate Deniz Tek – born in Michigan and weaned on the Stooges and the MC5 – Radio Birdman lasted for just four years and a handful of albums. They were skewered by the notoriously effete British music press and their single U.S. album release was widely ignored. Throughout it all, the band has lived on through rare recordings and bootlegs, building a devoted cult during the past two decades that rivals that of similar high-energy outfits like the Dictators or New York Dolls.

The Essential Radio Birdman (1974-1978) should appeal to even the most dedicated of collectors. The compilation offers all the songs from both the Australian and U.S. versions of the band's excellent 1978 debut album Radios Appear as well as their 1981 follow-up, Living Eyes (recorded in 1978). Two songs are provided from the original self-produced 1977 EP Burn My Eye, the album closing with three live tracks from a 1977 performance. Fully 12 of the 22 tracks collected on The Essential Radio Birdman (1974-1978) have never been released officially in the United States.

So what is it about Radio Birdman that attracts such fanatical acolytes? It's a curious mix of American roots rock, the madness of late-60s Detroit bands like the Stooges, Up, SRC and the MC5 and the peculiar Australian perspective created by residing at the end of the earth. When Deniz Tek moved to Australia in 1972 to study medicine, he brought with him the spirit of the slash-and-burn six-string style of Wayne Kramer and Fred "Sonic" Smith. Matched with fellow guitarist Chris Masuak's metalstorm fretboard technique and surfer Rob Younger's tortured howl, Radio Birdman cranked up the volume and kicked out electric jams that energized a generation of Aussie musicians behind them.

Tek's lyrics were street-smart and darkly poetic, seeped in Velvet Underground imagery and Motor City sensibility. Tuneage like the desolate "Murder City Nights" or the nostalgic "I-94" rock with a primal passion and fury that was shared by just a handful of mid-70s bands. "Aloha Steve & Danno" makes good use of the Hawaii Five-O theme, pairing it with the band's destructive twin guitars and pop-influenced rhythms while "Alone In The Endzone" echoes the Doors, featuring razor sharp riffs and Younger's Morrison-like. Radio Birdman threw elements of three-chord rock, electric blues and metallic drone into the creative blender and came up with a powerful, no-frills sound that resonates as loudly in 2001 as it did in 1977.

If you listen to the Dictators, New York Dolls, Johnny Thunders & the Heartbreakers, the Flamin' Groovies, Sonic Rendezvous Band, the Streetwalkin' Cheetahs or any other devotees of the Detroit rock sound, then you owe it to yourself to discover Radio Birdman. The Essential Radio Birdman (1974-1978) is a hard-rocking introduction to this sadly overlooked band, a comprehensive collection of classic punk rock tuneage from "Down Under" that should appeal to new and old Radio Birdman fans alike. (Sub Pop Records)

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Grin - The Very Best Of Grin (1999)

Nils Lofgren has gained a fair degree of respect for his role as guitarist in Springsteen's E Street Band, receiving far fewer props for his solo efforts and studio work with Neil Young and Ringo Starr. Lofgren's is a career that dates back to the late-60s, however, thirty years as a journeyman rocker and visionary. Grin, Lofgren's first band, is one of those great cult favorites whose place in rock & roll obscurity outshines even Lofgren's wonderful, if mostly ignored solo career. Grin released four fine major label albums during their six years, 1968 - 1974, and toured constantly, supporting folks like Jimi Hendrix, the Faces, the Byrds and the J. Geils Band. The Very Best Of Grin offers a deeper retrospective look at the band than previous "best of" albums, a nineteen song history that pretty well sums up what Grin was all about musically.

Originally a trio, teenage guitarist Lofgren was joined by Washington D.C. music scene vets Bob Gordon on bass and drummer Bob Berberich, forming Grin. Signed by Columbia Records' Spindizzy imprint with a little help from Neil Young and producer David Briggs, the band relocated on the West Coast to record their debut album. The Very Best Of Grin includes four tracks from the band's first effort, including the surprisingly honky-tonkish "Everybody's Missin' The Sun." The previously unreleased "Nobody" is an outtake from the sessions for the first album and sounds a lot like a Lofgren solo song, offering a foreshadowing of music to come while the also unreleased "Sing For Happiness" from those sessions is a soulful ballad complete with lush backing vocals.

The band's second album, the conceptual 1+1, proved to be their signature disc, yielding what would be the closest Grin ever came to a hit single, the buoyant "White Lies." An energetic pop/rock tune with an undeniable hook, "White Lies" again sounds like solo Nils, the young guitarist developing his vocal chops and showing the charisma that would later attract a loyal following. 1+1 was broken into two sides, the "dreamy" side and the "rocking side," and The Very Best Of Grin includes a selection of material from both, six songs in all. "Hi, Hello Home" offers a countryish beat with fine harmony vocals by Nils and guest Graham Nash. The turbo-charged "Moon Tears" would become a staple of Grin's, and later Nils' live performances, an enduring fan favorite that refuses to disappear quietly.

Grin expanded to a foursome in 1972, adding Nils' brother Tom on guitar and keyboards, a pairing that continues even today, the two brothers touring in support of Nils solo material. This Grin line-up would record two albums, the criminally-overlooked All Out, which would be their Spindizzy/Columbia swan song and the ill-promoted Gone Crazy for A & M Records. The Very Best Of Grin includes a half-dozen cuts from All Out including the rocking "Love Or Else" with Nils and Berberich's shared vocals playing off each others differences and strengths. "Sad Letter" is a bittersweet love song with a tearful guitar riff courtesy of brother Tom while the title cut is a soulful ballad featuring solid vocals by Berberich and guest Kathi McDonald. "You're The Weight," the lone cut here from Gone Crazy, is a flat-out rocker, featuring forceful vocals from Lofgren, a full band chorus and some tasteful six-string work from Nils.

Grin would be dropped by A & M Records after the lukewarm success of Gone Crazy, the band playing their farewell show in front of a hometown D.C. crowd in late 1974. Nils was almost immediately picked up as a solo act by the label, and would go on to enjoy a critically acclaimed if commercially questionable career until joining the E Street Band in 1984. Lofgren's solo releases have been less frequent since hitting the road with Bruce, but albums like Silver Lining or Damaged Goods show a mature artist mining different musical veins than those enjoyed in his youth. For those Nils Lofgren fans who know him only through his solo work or E Street Band performances, I'd recommend The Very Best Of Grin as a portrait of Lofgren's roots. With only the classic 1+1 still in print, this is the best documentation of the range and depth of one of rock's most talented, if unknown bands. (Sony Legacy Recordings)

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The Strawbs - Concert Classics, Volume 6 (1999)

Progressive rock, or "prog-rock' to its many fans, never really went away at the close of the '70s – it merely went underground, where it continues to ensnare adolescent males with its fusion of folk, psychedelic rock and classical influences. In any discussion of prog rock as an art form, the same names are always thrown about – Pink Floyd, Yes, King Crimson, ELP...even obscures ones like Atomic Rooster – but seldom will the Strawbs' name be brought up.

With relatively little chart success in the United States, Strawbs did somewhat better in their British homeland, marking up a succession of hit singles during the early-70s. With a sound that derived more from the folk side of the prog rock equation, Strawbs had a rich history, counting among its early members a pre-Fairport Convention Sandy Denny and a pre-Yes Rick Wakeman. The band released better than a dozen original albums from the late-60s into the mid-80s, a recording legacy that is in sad disarray. The band has mostly disappeared from the musical landscape, a sad situation only partially addressed by the domestic release of Concert Classics Volume 6 by Renaissance Records.

The lively performance captured by Concert Classics Volume 6 is not credited as to date and venue, but I'm guessing that it's from a late-70s show, judging from the tracklist, and possibly taken from a radio broadcast. It serves as a solid introduction to the magic of Strawbs, the band delivering a strong acoustic-based set. Originally formed as a bluegrass trio called the Strawberry Hill Boys by guitarist David Cousins, the band went through several changes in members and artistic direction before solidifying as Strawbs in 1969. Cousins could be considered a minor visionary, an adventuresome artist who pioneered the blending of folk roots and hard rock. Concert Classics Volume 6 showcases this musical style, with Cousins leading the band through eight songs drawn from at least five different albums that I can find. A few of the cuts here were bonafide hits, including the grand, eclectic "Hero And Heroine;" the powerful, hard-rocking "Heartbreaker," with its rapid-fire keyboard washes; and the eerie "Ghosts." The more pop-influenced "Simple Visions" is a stand-out track, sounding as fresh today as it did almost twenty-five years ago, Cousins' jangly guitar sound and sing-along verses a precursor to a lot of the college radio rock that would follow in the '80s.

As mentioned above, the entire Strawbs catalog is in significant disarray, with only this live disc and a couple of various greatest hits retrospectives available domestically. Strawbs were an important part of the prog-rock movement, an original and unique band that sounded like nobody before them and nobody since. If you're into progressive rock, you owe it to yourself to check out a different facet of the genre. Strawbs' Concert Classics Volume 6 is as good a place as any to begin familiarizing yourself with the band. Also, a handful of the band's original albums are available as import CDs from England, Germany and Sweden, among them their 1973 breakthrough album Grave New World, 1975's Ghosts and a twofer that combines Deep Cuts and Burning For You from 1976 and 1977. A fair amount of their recorded output can be found on vinyl, however – if you're interested, check your local used record store. (Renaissance Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Concert Classics, Volume 6 from Amazon.com)

Box Of Frogs - Box Of Frogs / Strange Land (1998)

Originally a reunion, of sorts, between former Yardbirds mainstays Jim McCarty and Chris Dreja and mate Paul Samwell-Smith, this pair of early-80s releases by the threesome's new band stand quite well on their own, thank you. Kicking out an inspired blend of blues-infused rock and British-styled pop, the former Y-Birds trio, along with vocalist/guitarist John Fiddler, crafted a couple of timeless rock releases that have withstood the cultural ravages of almost a decade and a half.

Although considered mere curiosities at the time of their release, notable for guest appearances by Yardbirds' alumni Jeff Beck and Jimmy Page, the self-titled debut and the Strange Land follow-up were pretty much lost amid the hype and furor of MTV and the one-hit wonders that media forum created. 'Tis a shame, too, since both albums are full of solid musical moments. The first album's haunting, bittersweet "Into The Dark," with British jazz great Guy Barker, or the unrelenting boogie riffs of the album-opening "Back Where I Started" stand out, as does the second album's bluesy, syncopated "House On Fire" or the powerful revisiting of the Yardbirds' classic "Heart Full Of Soul."

More notable, to my mind, than either Beck's or Page's minuscule musical contributions to these discs are those of guest guitarist Rory Gallagher. Gallagher's six-string work and sitar flourishes shine brightly, fitting seamlessly with the band's approach. Truly one of the music world's great lost blues guitarists, Gallagher's underrated talents are right at home with those of McCarty, Dreja and Samwell-Smith. (Renaissance Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Box Of Frogs/Strange Land from Amazon.com)

Dan Bern - New American Language (2001)

When asked what he thinks of Bob Dylan, whom he has been repeatedly been compared to, Dan Bern has been known to reply "I think he's the Dan Bern of the '60s." Brash? Well, remember that Dylan once challenged a journalist by asking "name someone who writes better songs than me." It would be hard for Dan Bern not to realize that he is this generation's greatest poet because, as New American Language demonstrates, he is so far ahead of the pack that anyone would be hard pressed to name one better.

Bern's last three releases were on Sony/Columbia, which yielded no chart success. Nada hits. Which ought to be an indicator of how stale the major label system has become. Of course, Bern's offbeat approach to songwriting doesn't lend itself to streamlined radio playlists or MTV video rotation. Dan Bern is more about frontiers.

My introduction to Bern came when a friend mailed me a CD-R packed with MP3 files of Bern performances lifted off the Internet. Among the tracks was a song called "Shakespeare's Got An Uzi." Indeed. These recordings weren't smuggled out of a record company vault. They weren't sold into circulation by some unscrupulous soundman at one of his concerts. A disgruntled former manager didn't give them out. Bern himself handed them over to his fans. They are easily available on the Internet and Bern is not screaming that he is being robbed as some less visionary old-school artists do. On New American Language's "Albuquerque Lullaby" Bern addresses industry execs who fret over "stolen royalties" with the line "no one cares about your glory days." Bern has built an almost fanatical following without the help of the status quo entertainment system.

New American Language is Bern's first post-Sony release and it is his best to date (not to downplay the Sony releases – they are all excellent). The Dylan comparisons are inescapable, not as a Dylan song-writing clone, but rather as a poet with a firm grasp on the social issues of the day. Bern paints a bleak picture where violence is just fodder for TV ("Tape"), you can get beat up just by looking different ("New American Language"), elections are bought "fair and square" ("Alaska Highway"), and even God is a cynic ("God Said No").

But throughout New American Language Bern finds refuge on the frontier where with a "guitar and a backpack, my soul is intact" ("Black Tornado"). In "Albuquerque Lullaby" he states "at the bottom of the ocean you might find a pearl. Don't let your heart get broken by this world."

Bern smartly avoids overwhelming (or boring) the listener with a healthy dose of comedic relief in his writing. "Alaska Highway" is a joyous gonzo cruise into the Alaskan frontier with Cowboy Joe filling in as Raoul Duke's 300-pound attorney. In what is becoming a Bern trademark, some familiar faces are encountered along the way. I wouldn't think anyone could namecheck Leonardo DiCaprio, Eminem, Britney Spears, Keith Richards, and God in the same song and make it work. But on "Alaska Highway" Bern does and even makes it one of the album's highlights.

Bern closes the album with the epic "Thanksgiving Day Parade" which is delivered with perfect Dylan cadence, a nasal delivery, and even incorporating a harp that sounds as if it were being played by Dylan himself. Mythical and non-mythical figures weave in and out of the story in Dylan fashion. Like many Dylan epics, it's a sometimes humorous, often mysterious tale open to any number of interpretations. A musical joke? Probably. But when Bern sings "we'll have to bring our own tunes," you know he's not just whistlin' "Dixie." (Messenger Records)

Review by Bill Glahn, copyright 2001

(Click on the CD cover to buy New American Language from Amazon.com)

Robert Bradley's Blackwater Surprise - What About That: New Year's Eve Live In Bloomington (2006)

Robert Bradley is a vastly underrated, incredibly natural soul singer...by that I mean that he's not a slick, overproduced, studio-augmented and label marketed talent. No, Bradley draws from a musical wellspring that includes gospel, blues and classic '60s soul with no little rock & roll influence. He's a natural in the way that Ted Hawkins was a natural – his imperfect voice cracks, drifts and drops out of sync with the band. Bradley's voice also is capable of great swoons of passion and arcs of fiery emotion, imbuing every song with an enormous amount of heart.

Bradley's myth, in brief, begins in Detroit slightly more than a decade ago. The blind singer was kicking around the Motor City, singing in clubs and coffee houses and in the street, mostly because his muse just needed the outlet, not because it was going to get him discovered and make him famous. He was discovered, however, by the Nehra brothers, Michael and Andrew, local musicians who asked Bradley to be the vocalist for their new band. This original incarnation of Robert Bradley's Blackwater Surprise recorded two solid albums in the blues-rock jam band vein, but that direction never really comfortably fit Bradley. His band began to evolve with 2002's excellent New Ground and by the time of 2003's Still Lovin' You, Bradley had put together an entirely new group to pursue a new sound.

What About That: New Year's Eve Live In Bloomington captures Bradley onstage on December 31, 2005 showcasing a more soulful sound with a dynamic live performance. The two-CD set features songs from across Bradley's ten year, four-album catalog, his raucous early material re-imagined as rock-influenced R&B rather than bluesy rave-ups -- a small but important distinction -- his backing band supporting rather than overwhelming Bradley's potent vocals. The new(ish) band, led by guitarist Matt Ruffino, plays with much greater subtlety than the original Blackwater Surprise, the sparse arrangements afforded the songs propped up by superior musicianship and sporadic use of background singers. Ruffino is a mighty fine guitarist, not flashy, but rather elegant and graceful with his fluid leads and a style that is equal parts Magic Sam and Stanley Jordan. The rest of the band gets hotter as the night goes on, and by the time they come back from intermission to greet the new year, the joint is figuratively on fire.

As if a two-disc set featuring Bradley's entire new year's eve performance wasn't enough, KUFALA Recordings throws a little bonus on the end of disc two with a handful of soundcheck recordings. Bradley's a cappella reading of the gospel classic "Will The Circle Be Unbroken" showcases the man's vocal abilities at their best, giving a more proper reading of his talents than, perhaps, anything that he had previously recorded. Stop watching American Idol, turn off the television and check out What About That if you want to hear what a real singer sounds like...one day you'll thank me. (Kufala Recordings)

(Click on the CD cover to buy What About That from Amazon.com)

Immortal Lee County Killers - These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again (2005)

Just a mere two years after the White Stripes won massive critical acclaim for their attempts to reinvent the blues-rock idiom with a bastard hybrid of shambling electric blues and garage rock fervor, the Immortal Lee County Killers came roaring out of Alabama with The Essential Fucked Up Blues. Taking the blueprint so carefully constructed by Jack White, the ILCK's Chetley Weise scribbled some notes on a brown paper bag and then proceeded to toss the White Stripes' formula into a meat grinder of distorted guitar riffs and primal, explosive percussion. Punker, bluesier and far more powerful than the Stripes' media-approved soundtrack, the Immortal Lee County Killers kicked out the jams with Son House spirit and Black Flag attitude.

A few years have passed by now, Jack and Meg became a tabloid sideshow and the bloom has fallen off the rose of punk-blues or garage-blues or whatever the hell you want to call it. R.L. Burnside is dead and many of those bands that once pursued rock & roll stardom with a washed-out, carbon-copy blues-rock sound have now become '80s new wave revival bands. Shudder. The Immortal Lee County Killers, however, are seemingly, well...immortal...the band carrying on with a new line-up and a more mature sound on album number three. Don't fear, erstwhile ILCK fans, because even though Cheetah and his crew have expanded their sound beyond the delightful musical trainwrecks of The Essential Fucked Up Blues and Love Is A Charm Of Powerful Trouble doesn't mean that the band has lost its way. They still hit your ears like the less-desirable business end of a shotgun blast.

If anything, These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again is even meaner and scarier than the ILCK's previous two albums, the band incorporating more elements of Southern soul and '60s psychedelica into the creative palette of their lo-fi aesthetic. "Turn On The Panther," for instance, includes tough-as-nails sonic distortion courtesy of Weise's over-amped guitar, Toko the Drifter's percussive drumming filling in with lightning-and-thunder intensity. Jon Spencer's "Revolution Summer" is the same sort of blues-influenced, three-chord hard rock that won the MC5 everlasting notoriety, the ILCK covering the song with a chaotic clashing of vocals and instrumentation. "Boom Boom" is the sound of the music industry imploding, a cacophonic death rattle writ larger-than-life with unrelenting percussion, manic vocals and some of the squonkiest guitar that you'll hear outside of East Village jazz clubs.

"The Damned Don't Cry" evokes the late, great R.L. Burnside, the song's martial rhythms and almost-chanted lyrics creating an air of menace, its roots in the Mississippi Hill Country and its sound straight out of Junior Kimbrough's juke joint. Even slower, more deliberate numbers like "Lights Down Low" evince a certain swampwater consistency, the song a cross between a funeral dirge and a tent revival while "No More My Lord" is a spiritual plea for relief in a Blind Willie Johnson vein. The addition of keyboardist Jeff Goodwin was definitely a good move, providing the band with another talented songwriter and complimenting the material with an instrumental style that sounds like Deep Purple's Ian Gilliam, Jerry Lee Lewis and Booker T jamming together at the Stax studios in Memphis.

For all of his bluster, drummer Toko the Drifter is capable of both tornado-force blasts and subtle, jazzy flourishes while Chet Weise is a six-string madman throwing razor-sharp riffs like ninja death stars and pounding out earth-scorching leads like bolts from the meaty paw of Zeus. Weise's understated lyrical style is short on nonsense and long on imagery, the underrated wordsmith throwing together minimalist blues-haiku that says what it needs to and then gets the hell outta the way of the general instrumental din. These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again is both a fine garage blues workout and an encouraging third album, displaying the Immortal Lee County Killers' evolution from a loud, badass duo with lots of heart into a loud, baddass trio with lots of heart and soul. These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again will kick you in the ass and leave you asking for another boot...and folks, it just doesn't get any better than that! (Tee Pee Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy These Bones Will Rise To Love You Again from Amazon.com)

John Mellencamp - Scarecrow (2005)

It's surprising to remember, but up until the mid-80s, John Mellencamp was looked down upon as some sort of illegitimate little brother of American rock. "He sings like Springteen," sniped some critics. "He writes like Tom Petty" whined others. After the commercial successes of 1982's American Fool and Uh-Huh the following year, however, even the most hardcore critics had to admit that Mellencamp had developed a loyal following entirely of his own making. Half-dozen albums into his career, the onetime "Johnny Cougar" had experienced a sort of adolescent "growth spurt," finding his creative voice with a mix of electric roots rock and small-town populist imagery. With the release in 1985 of Scarecrow, Mellencamp's eighth album, all arguments became moot...any critic that would deny the rocker his hard won artistic credibility just wasn't listening.

With Scarecrow's song cycle, Mellencamp championed the common man in a manner separate though equal to Springsteen's best work, concentrating on the trials and tears of Middle America, the land he grew up in. True, some of the material on Scarecrow, most notably the rambling "Rumble Seat" or the hit "Small Town," is somewhat cliched in its handling and presentation. The best songs here stand up tall alongside the works of any populist songwriter, from Woody Guthrie through Bob Dylan to Springsteen, Seger and Petty. Mellencamp's salute to his musical forebears, "R.O.C.K. In The U.S.A." or the allegorical "Justice And Independence '85" each score a musical and lyrical bull's eye.

It is with two cuts, both from the first side of the original vinyl release of Scarecrow, with which Mellencamp lays low any criticisms ever leveled in his direction. The countryish "Minutes To Memories" is the engaging story of an old man handing down his mantle of wisdom, unheard, to a young man during a chance encounter on a cross-country bus. The young man later relates his regrets over ignoring the old man's advice (to his misfortune). The masterpiece here, though, is "Rain On The Scarecrow," a dark, disturbing song, tragic in its story of America's betrayal of the farmers who pioneered the Midwestern badlands.

Opening with a driving beat swelling towards a powerful crescendo and joined by a massive guitar riff, Mellencamp relates his sad tale of the diminishing American family farm. Delivered matter-of-factly, Mellencamp bitterly sings "rain on the scarecrow, blood on the plow/this land fed a nation, this land made me proud/and son I'm just sorry, there's no legacy for you now." This moment, as powerful as any in rock & roll, is the equivalent of Joe Grushecky's steeltown blues or Springsteen's lament for the lost Jersey shore. Art can make you think; great art will make you cry in terror at the truth it conveys. In the three minutes and some odd seconds of "Rain On The Scarecrow," Mellencamp achieved that which most rockers strive their entire lives to create: a fleeting, immortal moment of perfection.

The incredible success of Scarecrow and Mellencamp's increased role as the voice of a largely-forgotten Mid-America would help to make him one of the biggest stars of the decade, a heartland rocker whose popularity and artistic credibility remains strong today. It would also enable him to gain near-total control of his music from the label and producers, resulting in a pure representation of Mellencamp's vision on subsequent albums like The Lonesome Jubilee and Big Daddy. Twenty years after its initial release, Scarecrow stands tall as a timeless classic of rock & roll, the album an integral part of John Mellencamp's canon and a long ways from the Chestnut Street of the artist's misguided early days. (Mercury Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Scarecrow from Amazon.com)

John Mellencamp - The Lonesome Jubilee (2005)

John Cougar Mellencamp's breakthrough album, 1983's Uh-Huh, provided the artist with the commercial success he craved while 1985's Scarecrow brought him the critical respect that he had earned. Two years later, The Lonesome Jubilee brought Mellencamp something else entirely – freedom. With this 1987 album release, Mellencamp not only claimed his place alongside Bruce Springsteen, Tom Petty and Bob Seger as a respected working class wordsmith, he also won the creative freedom to explore his muse unlike anything he had previously recorded.

Extending the lyrical themes he began outlining in detail on the American Fool album a half-decade earlier, songs like "Paper In Fire," "Cherry Bomb" and "The Real Life" continue Mellencamp's fascination with life in the heartland and the everyday trials and tribulations of the average man, woman and child. These hit singles only tell part of the story, however, with Mellencamp pursuing a darker vision of the American Dream™ on the album's less well-known songs. Lyrical broadsides like "Down And Out In Paradise," with its bleak American landscape, the anthemic "We Are The People" and "Hard Times For An Honest Man" suggest that nearly two terms of Conservative Reagan administration policy had seriously eroded the country's working class prospects by '87.

The songs still rock hard on The Lonesome Jubilee in spite of Mellencamp's ongoing evolution in sound. Incorporating instrumentation like fiddle, accordion and acoustic guitars, Mellencamp adds an Appalachian flourish to his material, extending his artistic milieu to include elements of folk and country alongside his native roots rock. It would prove to be an excellent move, creating a distinctive and timeless flavor to his material that would serve as Mellencamp's trademark well into the next decade. A bonus cut added to the CD reissue of The Lonesome Jubilee – the previously unreleased "Blues From The Front Porch" – is a real gem. A Delta-dirty duet with singer Crystal Taliefero, it is a fitting addition to the album.

The Lonesome Jubilee has withstood the test of time, the songs sounding as fresh, original and, sadly, lyrically relevant as they were nearly two decades ago. Not amazingly, John Mellencamp's musical legacy seems to grow with each passing year, the artist that once struggled for critical acclaim now overshadowing his colleagues in defining the voice of a decade. The Lonesome Jubilee stands tall as both one of Mellencamp's best works and as a truly classic masterpiece of rock & roll. (Mercury Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy The Lonesome Jubilee from Amazon.com)

Backyard Tire Fire - Bar Room Semantics (2006)

Chicago's Backyard Tire Fire pursues roots rock with a vengeance on Bar Room Semantics, the band's sophomore effort. The spunky trio throws together a mean musical porridge, slicing and dicing portions of Midwestern rock (think Head East, or maybe early REO Speedwagon), tossing it into the pot with a slab of Uncle Tupelo, a dash of Wilco and Springsteen-esque lyricisms, blending it all with a soupcon of psychedelia and a spoonful of authentic Southern twang. Frontman Ed Anderson sounds like R. Stevie Moore and writes like Joe Grushecky, penning down-and-out story-songs about hard times and harder people, the hopeful and the hopeless.

Much like the Boss and Joey G, however, Anderson provides his characters with a glimmer of hope, and the band choogles along behind his soulful vocals like a spare, leaner version of Levon Helm's former crew. Call it Americana, call it alt-country, call it country-rock -- it won't fit easily, no matter what convenient label you want to stick on Bar Room Semantics. This is music created with a purpose and delivered with a heart and fire far too often lost on young bands eying MTV, The OC and major label deals without a future. Backyard Tire Fire is the real deal, creating songs that are cerebral, with weeping pedal steel and plenty of atmosphere that, at times, also delivers bone-jarring rock & roll thrills. (O.I.E. Records)

(Click on CD cover to buy Bar Room Semantics from Amazon.com)

Adrian Belew - Side One (2005)

Latter-day King Crimson guitarist and former Zappa sideman Adrian Belew hasn't released a solo album in nearly eight years, preferring to work with Robert Fripp as part of legendary prog-rockers Crimson, and with his own band, the Bears. When he hits the studio to do a little solo work, Belew does so with a vengeance, recording three -- count 'em -- three solo albums for release this year. Side One is the first of these efforts, a magnificent showcase for Belew's original and highly unique six-string skills. To put it bluntly, Belew's jagged guitarwork has more sharp edges than a broken bottle.

Belew recruited Les Claypool from Primus and Tool's Danny Carey to accompany him on several cuts, including the Hendrix-flavored "Ampersand," composed of syncopated rhythms and angular riffs, and the funky, distraught "Writing On The Wall." Belew's breathless vocals on the dreamy, drifting "Matchless Man" are supported by a fluid lead with a Moroccan flavor while "Madness" offers exactly that, a descent into darkness with cacophonic, swirling guitars and recurring riffs. The experimental "Elephants" uses found vocals and plodding, heavy leads approximating an elephant's cries to describe the plight of this endangered animal.

There are few vocals on the album, Belew preferring to let his guitar do the talking for him. At a mere thirty-three minutes, Side One may seem a bit brief, but the songs here are complex and quite intense. Side One is the work of an innovative instrumentalist not the least bit above experimenting with sound and composition. (Sanctuary Records)

(Click on CD cover to buy Side One from Amazon.com)

Corporate Avenger - Freedom Is A State Of Mind (2001)

With the departure of Zach de la Rocha from Rage Against The Machine, the other members of the band are left merely whimpering at the machine while other outfits steal the thundering sound they made their bones with. Although the musical landscape is littered with the corpses of a thousand and one metal-tinged hip-hop Rage wannabes (Fred Durst, your 15 minutes are up buddy), the band's social consciousness and politikal rage lives on in Corporate Avenger. With the explosive Freedom Is A State Of Mind, Corporate Avenger lyrically tackle the gamut of social issues, matching their incendiary lyrics with muscular riffs, ringing chords and blistering rhythms.

Fueled by the powerful twin lead vocals of the Corporate Avenger (Spike Xavier) and Adawee the Wind, Corporate Avenger is a conceptual band, mixing radikal politics with extreme performance art and musical chops that include elements of heavy metal, hard rock, rap and punk. I hear strains of Black Flag, Govt. Issue and Public Enemy in these grooves, the music created by Mike Kumagai and producer Daddy X, from the Kottonmouth Kings. Like no band since Public Enemy, Corporate Avenger blazes new trails, creating a sound that is both familiar and totally unlike any band that you've heard before. Raucous and obnoxious, Corporate Avenger throws caution to the wind with wailing guitars, lightning-quick turntable scratching courtesy of DJ Hall Of Records, anarchistic samples, big beats and monster rhythms. It's the band's lyrics that capture the imagination, though; perhaps the most controversial anti-capitalist screeds ever committed to a musical treatment.

Although a major label deal allowed Rage Against The Machine to bring the band's radikal worldview to a mainstream audience, there was always an uneasy vibe around their act, a feeling that they might have watered down the message to slip it past their corporate masters. There's no such feeling with Corporate Avenger –- this is the real shit, as hardcore as a Molotov cocktail and as dangerous as a rabid Doberman. Freedom Is A State of Mind leaves no sacred cow unslaughtered, bludgeoning the listener with sound and imagery that preaches an undeniable message of tribal brotherhood even while it damns the system that keeps people poor, confused and uneducated.

The songs on Freedom Is A State Of Mind are intelligent, well researched and articulate. The band doesn't merely mouth leftist platitudes, but explain the reason for their perspective with their lyrics. Whether singing about the oppression of the Native American (“Christians Murdered Indians” and “$20 Bill”), the corrupt nature of organized religion (“The Bible Is Bullshit”) or the social injustice and racial implications of the “war on drugs” (“FBI File”), their lyrics are consistently challenging and thought-provoking. Sometimes they seem to purposely piss people off, like with “Jesus Christ Homosexual” which asks if the so-called savior might have been a homosexual. By mixing two mythological Christian icons (Jesus and the degenerate homo) in one song, Corporate Avenger manages to bait the fundamentalist Christian right while providing food for thought for the rest of us.

Every track here is like an alternative history lesson as given by Noam Chomsky or Howard Zinn, Corporate Avenger cramming more academic information into a four-minute rock song than many young listeners walk away with after four years of college. As the band states in the liner notes to Freedom Is A State Of Mind, “the songs are written in the language that we speak every day, it is not intended to be offensive. While this message is for everyone, this record may not be.” The controversy surrounding the band has led hypocritical Christian groups like the Promise Keepers and the American Family Organization to work towards pressuring retailers to keep the CD out of their stores. The band currently receives 10 to 20 death threats each week, no doubt from the same “good Christians” who kill abortion doctors in the name of Jesus. Several cable television networks, including MTV and Comedy Central, have refused to air advertising for the album.

Although Corporate Avenger is making the right enemies, their message deserves to be heard. Critics usually dismiss politikal rock bands out-of-hand, stating that music and politics don't mix and lyrics don't influence anybody, anyway. I strongly disagree with this perspective. Freedom Is A State Of Mind is a turning point for rock music, a revival of social consciousness after too many years of mindless pop bullshit and corporate-crafted "modern rock." With Freedom Is A State Of Mind, Corporate Avenger is providing a soundtrack for the new millennium, one that is aggressively pro-human, anti-government and anti-corporation. This is music to riot by and this is one critic who is ready to throw the first stone. (Koch Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Freedom Is A State Of Mind from Amazon.com)

Stace England - Greetings From Cairo, Illinois (2005)

Every now and then a CD will find its way onto your stereo and proceed to stomp both your ass and ears into the ground. Stace England's Greetings From Cairo, Illinois is one of those discs, an ambitious work of staggering brilliance and stunning confidence. England's inspired mix of rock, folk, blues and country defies pigeonholing. This is simply American music, damn it, the end game of a century of stylistic cross-pollination that started with Delta field hollers and stopped in Cairo on its way to Chicago, Detroit and destinations both east and west. England's mastery of the style is impressive, forged by years of recording and live performances.

Sitting astride both the Mississippi and Ohio rivers in southern Illinois, Cairo is a mystery to most Americans. A busy shipping port on two great rivers and a jumping off point for a fair number of former slaves and sharecroppers headed north from Mississippi, Cairo has struggled with its identity for decades. Greetings From Cairo, Illinois is ostensibly a concept album, England recounting the history of his fair city from 1858 through the Civil War, the Delta migration of the 1940s and '50s, the struggle for civil rights and so on into the new millennium. At its heart, however, these songs about Cairo are also about America at large – the racial tensions, the poverty, the economic injustice and the religious oppression suffered by the average person as they search for dignity amidst the ever-changing currents of history.

Greetings From Cairo, Illinois is an engaging song cycle, kicking off with the traditional "Going Down To Cairo," a mid-1850s folksong song a cappella. A fine cover of Henry Spaulding's classic "Cairo Blues" opens the door for England's original observations on the city that follow. The county-rocker "Grant Slept Here" offers some solid snaking six-string work beneath its Civil War history lesson and "Equal Opportunity Lynch Mob" is a folk-styled accounting of Cairo's violent history that recalls Billie Holiday's "Strange Fruit" in its dark imagery. "The North Starts In Cairo" is a rollicking tale of segregation and freedom during the Delta migration.

Three powerful songs tackle the issue of race in Cairo. "Far From The Tree," with a slashing recurring riff and loping bassline, is a dark-hued tale of fear and paranoia in the city while "White Hats" remembers a violent 1967 incident that led to rioting in the city, the disturbing lyrics supported by red-hot slide guitar work. The funky, R&B flavored "Jesse's Comin' To Town" recounts Jesse Jackson's 1969 visit to the city in the wake of the assassination of Martin Luther King, his appearance providing a beacon of hope for the beleaguered African-American residents of Cairo. The song's Stax styling and tasteful horn charts place the soul of the song right in the heart of the era.

Jason Ringenberg and guitarist George Bradfute pitch in on "Prosperity Train," sounding more like a Jason & the Scorchers rave-up than anything else on the album does. The tune simply rocks, England's lyrics mourning the loss of Cairo's Main Street while Jason hits the mouth harp like a frenzied dervish. "Buy My Votes" is a Sonny Landreth-styled swamp rocker, England's bluesy vocals matched by dirty, intense slidework. Greetings From Cairo, Illinois closes with "Can't We All Get Along," a countryish tune that concludes that the trials and tribulations for Cairo will never end as long as greed and corruption continue to grip the city's leaders. It's a strong political statement with engaging instrumentation and more than a little reckless spirit.

Stace England's warm vocals come across as a mix of John Hiatt's gravel-throated, blue-eyed soul and Dan Baird's rootsy southern twang and his songwriting skills show endless possibilities. After five years of research into the city that England calls home, he's accomplished what many artists have tried and failed to do – capture the essence of their hometown in song. After listening to Greetings From Cairo, Illinois you'll feel the heat of the city's streets and smell the rush of the rivers as they run past Cairo. (Gnashville Sounds)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Greetings From Cairo, Illinois from Amazon.com)

Roky Erickson - I Have Always Been Here Before (2005)

Any rock snob or music historian worth his or her credentials knows the story of Roky Erickson by heart. Naïve young musician flirts with the big time, gets hassled by intolerant local law enforcement, chooses a mental hospital over serious jailtime after getting jammed up on a marijuana possession charge (due to the draconian anti-drug laws in Texas) and pays for this choice for the rest of his life. Unlike other madmen and visionaries of rock & roll, however, Erickson's mental instability is less organic than manufactured, any neurotic tendencies he may have possessed before he entered the asylum blown up by the dubious treatments of electro-shock and psychoactive drugs. After his release from the institution in 1973, shady operators, fly-by-night labels, rip-off artists and bad luck plagued Erickson's subsequent musical career -- which, incidentally, has nevertheless lasted longer than most of his contemporaries from the '60s.

Lost among the whispers, rumors and half-truths of Erickson's legend is the fact that the artist has made some pretty damn good music over the past forty years. Sure, for a long time any charlatan with a microphone and an eight-track tape deck would closet Roky in a studio, on a stage, or even in a hotel room to record his songs (recordings for which the artist never earned a dime). Prolific to a fault, Erickson would crank out the songs, enigmatic rockers and sad-eyed folk tunes that spoke of two-headed dogs, demons and outer space, the chatter in his mind taking form as interesting and often mesmerizing lyrical poetry.

Unfortunately, for the uninitiated wanting to delve into the Erickson catalog, the choices have been confusing and often times disappointing, albums marred by poor sound quality, duplicate performances and dubious stewardship. Music lovers who want a taste of Erickson's talent can rejoice in the Shout Factory's excellent two-disc set I Have Always Been Here Before. Featuring forty-three songs culled from four decades of the artist's lengthy career, this is the only Roky Erickson anthology the average music lover will ever need. Assembled with loving care by long-time Erickson supporter Bill Bentley (who also produced the wonderful 1990 Roky tribute album Where The Pyramid Meets The Eye), I Have Always Been Here Before displays the many faces of this amazing artist in roughly chronological order.

The first disc kicks off with the rare Spades B-side "We Sell Soul" featuring Roky's piercing tenor vocals, jumping quickly into the psych-garage classic "You're Gonna Miss Me." The disc features a total of ten 13th Floor Elevators songs, culled from the band's first two albums, 1966's The Psychedelic Sounds Of and 1967's Easter Everywhere. After his release from the mental hospital in 1973, Erickson's friends helped him form his first backing band, Bleib Alien. This band recorded a handful of tracks in an Austin, Texas studio with Doug Sahm, including "Red Temple Prayer (Two-Headed Dog)" and "Starry Eyes," both of which would be revisited by Erickson frequently through the years to follow. Part of the Erickson mythology is that he sold the rights to a handful of songs, including the hauntingly beautiful "Starry Eyes" to Sahm for a slushie.

From 1975 until the late-90s, trying to nail down Erickson's extensive catalog is like tiptoeing through a minefield while on crutches. One of the most productive eras of Erickson's career was with his late-70s band the Aliens, which recorded fifteen strong tracks in Austin with Creedence Clearwater Revival bassist Stu Cook (who was playing with Sahm at the time). These tracks -- psych-rockers and proto-metal romps with vivid lyrical imagery like "Creature With The Atom Brain" and "It's A Cold Night For Alligators" -- would travel the globe. The fifteen songs would be packaged and repackaged a maddening number of times by various labels, although they were originally released by CBS on two albums in 1980/81. Around two-thirds of the Stu Cook recordings are presented on I Have Always Been Here Before.

The second disc concludes the Cook session material, includes an assortment of Erickson's imaginative work with Evil Hook Wildlife E.T., songs from the All That May Do My Rhyme album recorded with Paul Leary of the Butthole Surfers in the mid-90s and various solo acoustic recordings. Erickson's impressive songwriting skills are reflected in touching ballads like "You Don't Love Me Yet," "For You I'd Do Anything" and "Clear Night For Love" that display Erickson's tortured vocals and lonely, lovelorn lyricism. The second disc also includes a fair number of rockers, often-covered tunes like the rockabilly-tinged "Don't Slander Me" and "The Beast," a bluesy work-out with fractured vocals and taut lead guitar work.

With a documentary film on the horizon, this exhaustive two-disc anthology and the recent reissuing of Restless/Pink Dust label collections like Don't Slander Me and Gremlins Have Pictures, a full-fledged Roky Erickson revival seems right around the corner. It's about time, too, to take a look behind the veil of mystery to discover the too-often overlooked talents of one of rock & roll's truly misunderstood artists. I Have Always Been Here Before is an essential collection for anybody interested in discovering the heart and soul of rock & roll as embodied by Roky Erickson. (Shout! Factory)

(Royalties from I Have Always Been Here Before benefit the Roky Erickson Trust Fund, formed by Roky's brother and others to help provide the artist with food, shelter and medical care.)

(Click on the CD cover to buy I Have Always Been Here Before from Amazon.com)

The Dead Kennedys - Mutiny On The Bay (2001)

The Dead Kennedys never released a live album during their brief yet notorious career as America's favorite hardcore bad boys. The legendary punk outfit's incendiary live performances have nevertheless been well represented by a handful of bootleg albums and videos, the best of which is probably Jello's Revenge (Armed Response Records), culled from San Francisco club shows in 1979 and 1985. Mutiny On The Bay is the first “authorized” Dead Kennedys live disc, part of Manifesto's reissuing of the band's catalog under the aegis of members East Bay Ray, D.H. Peligro and Klaus Flouride and against the wishes of vocalist/songwriter Jello Biafra, who has disavowed the entire series of reissues.

Mutiny On The Bay presents not a single entire performance but rather pieces of four different shows that date from 1982 and 1986. The original soundboard tapes have been digitally remastered but manage to retain a fair degree of their original energy and grunge. I hate to disagree with my old buddy Jello, who has publicly dissed Mutiny On The Bay, but this is a hell of a collection. A veritable “who's who” of the DK's greatest hits, this fourteen song set offers those of us who never got to witness the band live (i.e. most punk fans who didn't live within a day's drive of the west coast) a taste of what bootleg videos only hinted at.

Almost all the great DK songs are here, from “Police Truck” and “Kill The Poor” to “Hell Nation” and “MTV - Get Off The Air.” The energy in these tracks is undeniable; Biafra's warbling, operatic vocals jumping out of the speakers above East Bay Ray's slashing six-string work. One of the band's signature songs, “Holiday In Cambodia,” offers some fiery fretwork courtesy of East Bay Ray while the Flouride/Peligro rhythmic assault that opens “California Uber Alles” provides powerful punctuation to Biafra's angry vocals. The production seamlessly stitches together the performances; tying songs together with Biafra's onstage comments and smoothing out the rough edges so that the entire collection sounds like one lengthy performance. Perhaps some of the spontaneity is lost in this digital translation, but the quality of these performances shine through nonetheless and there is plenty of feedback and stage noise present for the purist.

There are some good Dead Kennedys' bootlegs still circulating around in trading circles, but Mutiny On The Bay puts most, if not all of them to shame. If all you know of the Dead Kennedys is their reputation, then Mutiny On The Bay, coupled with the band's incredible debut, Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables, are perfect introductions to the band's legacy. Let's hope that Manifesto has some other live material of this quality stashed away in the vault for future release. The Dead Kennedys were one of the most influential hardcore punk bands of the eighties; their importance based on live performances like those captured by Mutiny On The Bay. Let's hear some more! (Manifesto Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Mutiny On The Bay from Amazon.com)

Cluster & Eno - Cluster & Eno (2005)

More musically adventurous than his Roxy Music bandmates, Brian Eno left that successful British band and struck out on his own in 1973 to follow his own unique musical vision. Although he would later build a significant body of solo work, become the superstar producer of bands like U2 and the Talking Heads, and record groundbreaking collaborations with artists like Robert Fripp, David Bowie and David Byrne, one of Eno's first stops along the road to fame and fortune was in Germany. Fascinated by the conceptual possibilities of ambient music – one of many logical endpoints for the fledgling artform of electronic music during the mid-70s – Eno would team up with the duo of Dieter Moebius and Hans-Joachim Roedelius for a series of albums that, while not earthshaking in their scope and ambition at the time, have nevertheless crept into the shared consciousness of popular music over time to become influential pieces of the puzzle that is Eno's wonderfully enchanting canon of work.

Eno's first collaboration with the two members of Cluster would be released in 1977 as Cluster & Eno. By the time of the album's release, Eno had already made his first forays into creating ambient music with the release of 1975's Discreet Music and the recording of Before And After Science, which included Cluster in the studio. His first album with Moebius and Roedelius, however, an entirely instrumental affair, would serve to define the boundaries of ambient music and then shatter them. Utilizing a series of set pieces – loosely-structured songs, really – the three visionary artists experimented with various found sounds and instrumentation, studio wizardry and the electronic synthesis of sound. The resulting mix of musical styles, instrumentation and sonic manipulation flows from your speakers like watercolors on a canvas. Cluster & Eno is a challenging and invigorating listen, with fragments of the album's compositions blending, chameleonlike, into the background (Eno's vision of ambience) while others jump up from the grooves to grab you by the ears and demand your attention.

Although the trailblazing electronic experimentation by Eno, Moebius and Roedelius, as well as other fellow travelers like Klaus Schulze would later become the foundation of prog-rock and, much to our dismay, the keystones of both techno and new age music, at the time of this recording, this was revolutionary work, weird in both its ambition and its execution. Recently reissued on CD for the first time, Cluster & Eno deserves a listen by any music lover interested in this essential touchstone in the evolution of electronic music. (Water Music)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Cluster & Eno from Amazon.com)

The dB's - Like This (2006)

Formed in 1978 in North Carolina by guitarist/songwriter Chris Stamey, bassist Gene Holder and drummer Will Rigby, the dB's stood at the forefront of the late-70s/early-80s Piedmont "jangle-pop" movement that included Mitch Easter's fondly-remembered band Let's Active and performer/producer Don Dixon's various projects. Peter Holsapple, a former bandmate of Stamey's, hooked up with the trio later the same year and the band moved to NYC in search of fame and fortune. Sadly, they couldn't get a stateside record deal, instead signing with British imprint Albion for the release of two excellent pop/rock efforts, 1981's Stands For Decibels and 1982's Repercussion. Although both albums were critically acclaimed, they were ignored by the masses – much like Big Star's first two albums, an obvious touchstone for the dB's sound – and Stamey left the dB's in '83 to pursue a solo career.

With Holsapple fronting the band, the three remaining members recorded Like This in 1984. Influenced, perhaps, as much by the Byrds and Buffalo Springfield as by the British Invasion, the album added more of Holsapple and Rigby's roots rock sound to the pop formula, moving beyond Stamey's art-rock maneuvers to deliver an ingratiating collection of songs. It's no stretch of the imagination to say that Like This paved the way for folks like Matthew Sweet and Velvet Crush to follow, influencing contemporaries like R.E.M. and the Fleshtones as well. Like This opens with the charming "Love Is For Lovers," a spry song with great vocal harmonies and hook large enough to reel in any listener, a song prime for covering by the right artist. "Love Is For Lovers" sets the table for the feast to follow, songs like the beautifully bittersweet "Lonely Is (As Lonely Does)," which matches lofty vocals with lush, intricate instrumentation and mournful lyrics.

"Amplifier," a tragic, dark-hued tale of love, loss and suicide sports clever lyrical gymnastics supported by a solid rhythm and snakelike guitar licks to pierce the wall of sound. "A Spy In The House Of Love" displays the boy's Southern funk side, with a loping rhythm and Holsapple's soulful vocals while the fierce, rocking "Rendezvous" features Holsapple's nifty fretwork and some of Rigby's best drumming, the rhythms hitting your ears like a tidal wave. "White Train" documents a meeting with the devil, a story of sin and salvation and a heaven-bound soul with a twangy rockabilly soundtrack and fine harmonies from the trio. The CD reissue of Like This offers bonus tracks in the form of "Darby Hall," a Gothic tale with ethereal vocals and delicate instrumentation and a largely disposable and unnecessary remix of "A Spy In The House Of Love" that robs the song of its original energy.

As written by history, the dB's chose to release Like This and jump into a tour opening for R.E.M. rather than wait for their label, Bearsville, to sign a distribution deal with Warner Music. The label folded shortly after the album's release, leaving the band high and dry and dooming the album to commercial obscurity. Although they would later sign a deal with R.E.M.'s label, IRS Records, for their 1987 release The Sound Of Music, the dB's would never get over their "cult band" status and broke up after their fourth album. With Like This finally restored on compact disc, pop/rock fans can rediscover this long-lost musical bridge between Big Star's groundbreaking early-70s albums and '90s-era popsters like Matthew Sweet, Jellyfish and the Posies. Enjoy! (Collector's Choice Music)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Like This from Amazon.com)

Greg Dulli - Greg Dulli's Amber Headlights (2005)

As frontman for '90s-era critical darlings the Afghan Whigs, Greg Dulli was responsible for bringing a measure of soul to a rather barren alt-rock landscape. While most bands of the decade – particularly those from the over-hyped Seattle scene – acted like they had never heard of R&B music, Dulli's songwriting for the Whigs injected a sense of history and energy into the band's rocking sound. Despite a shot at the big time with two major labels, the Afghan Whigs never rose above cult status and eventually drifted into the oblivion of talented bands that never received the hearing they deserved.

Dulli started the Twilight Singers as a side project while the Whigs were between record deals, recording songs in New Orleans with a varied cast of friends, experimenting with sounds and ideas like trip-hop and folk that laid beyond his regular band's milieu. Nothing if not prolific, after the break-up of the Whigs and the release of the first Twilight Singers' album, Dulli began yet another project: a collection of rock-oriented material that he hoped would provide a signpost to his musical future. However, the songs were shelved after the death of his friend, filmmaker Ted Demme, and although several of the tunes would later be reworked into Twilight Singers songs, the originals remained lost to time.

Until now, that is. Greg Dulli's Amber Headlights collects nine songs from those 2000 sessions, presenting them in their raw, unvarnished form. The songs rock hard, possibly more than anything else that Dulli has recorded, and display an undeniable heart of gold beneath the varnish of clashing guitars and amped-up, funky rhythms. The material sounds eerily timeless, not like the Afghan Whigs or like the Twilight Singers, but rather like vintage '70s-era rock & roll where the boundaries between black & white, rock & soul were constantly blurred and artists were able to play what they damn well pleased. There are some good songs here, one or two even verging on greatness, and all would sound wonderfully exciting on the radio.

The vocal harmonies of "Black Swan" sound like the Eagles while its riff-happy interludes sound like Rush to these ears, verging on a power metal vibe. The folk-pop of "Pussywillow" sounds amazingly contemporary, predating artists like Bright Eyes or Iron & Wine, the song chiming brightly like a bell and sporting Dulli's tender duet with Petra Haden. The dark-hued "Wicked" slowly unfolds from its quiet opening into a droning, hypnotic, psychedelia-tinged dirge while "Get The Wheel" is a blues-tinged tale in a John Hiatt vein. Dulli's lyrics are smart, introspective and universally accessible, displaying no little skill in creating a sense of both time and place. Although Dulli may never create music sounding exactly like this again, Greg Dulli's Amber Headlights is an excellent road trip into the artist's past, a rock solid collection of songs that can stand proudly with Dulli's best work (old and new) as well as with anything any other musician is creating these days. (Infernal Recordings)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Greg Dulli's Amber Headlights from Amazon.com)

Current 93 - Black Ships Ate The Sky (2006)

From Devendra Banhart to Sufjan Stevens, lots of folkies are gettin' their freak on these days, and none of these humble troubadours is freakier than Mr. David Tibet. The stunning genius behind the ever-evolving collective that is Current 93, Tibet made his bones during the heady industrial-music daze of the mid-80s. Slicing and dicing and experimenting in sound effects with Burroughsian zeal, Tibet's collaborative efforts with fellow travelers like John Balance (Psychic TV/Coil) and Steven Stapleton (Nurse With Wound) throughout the decade were complex, dark-hued and hauntingly beautiful tone poems that often verged on madness.

Somewhere along the way, Tibet got in touch with his inner-folkie and throughout the '90s he pursued his unique vision of "apocalyptic folk," combining the adventurous musical experimentation of his early work with traditional and often exotic acoustic instrumentation. The resulting recordings were brilliant and challenging, the meager instrumentation pushing Tibet's quivering vocals to the forefront, his voice wrapped around mystical tales and somber dirges. It is unlikely that Tibet ever thought that his work would impact an entire genre of music, albeit one as marginal as the current "avant folk" movement, but two-dozen years after his initial recording, Tibet's importance and influence continue to grow.

Black Ships Ate The Sky is Current 93's first album in five years, a stunning collection that is both eerily alluring and magnificent in the breadth of its emotion and instrumentation. Working with his old friend and frequent collaborator Stapleton, guitarists Michael Cashmore and Ben Chasny, and cellist John Contreras, as well as guests like Marc Almond, Bonnie 'Prince' Billy and the legendary British folklorist Shirley Collins, Tibet has created a work for the ages. Black Ships Ate The Sky is, says Tibet, "the closest I have come to picturing what I hope, and feel, and love, and fear."

"Yeah," you say, "all this hyperbole is well and good. But what does the damn album sound like?" Well, gentle reader, Current 93 defies categorization or comparison, refuses to be pigeonholed, and laughs in the face of mundane, focus group-driven trends. Current 93 simply is. As for Black Ships Ate The Sky, imagine the sweatiest, most flesh-tingling wet dream that you've ever enjoyed, and combine it with the most frightening, horrible, spine-tingling nightmare that you've ever suffered through. That's the sound of Current 93. Black Ships Ate The Sky is bracketed by eight varying versions of the ancient hymn "Idumea," each sung by a different vocalist, providing thematic continuity through the album and a foundation for Tibet's ruminations on our final judgement, which take on a Biblical intensity.

David Tibet's voice cuts through the mix like the Reaper's scythe, a siren's call to salvation or damnation -- depending on your perspective -- and the choice is entirely up to you. The instrumentation is at once both perverse and gossamer, a soundtrack to purgatory; Norwegian death metal bands dream of writing music this extreme. The guitars rumble, at times, like the four horsemen on a three-day drunk while delicate notes dance across the lyrics like fireflies in a mating frenzy. Punctuated by found voices grabbed from the ether, Tibet's lyrics are obsessed with intangibles such as love and fear, and by the cold realities of death and loss. This is "folk" music only by the furthest stretch of the imagination, Tibet and crew bending and stretching the form for their own use, musicologists collecting random sounds and influences from across the globe in a quest to create a new folk idiom for the post-industrial age.

Confused? Now you know how I always feel after listening to a Current 93 album. The experience is exhilarating and infuriating, the music, vocals and lyrics working on both a conscious and subliminal level. This is the musical nirvana that fringe-folkies from Mike Heron and Vashti Bunyan to the current crop of talents have attempted to achieve for nearly half a century now. Current 93 combines the best of industrial music's myriad of influences with classic British folk, a mystical tradition and a global vision to create both the most challenging and the most seductive music that you'll ever hear...and you'll never hear anything else like it in this world. (Durtro Jnana Records)

(Click on the CD cover to buy Black Ships At The Sky from Amazon.com)