?? High Voltage (Atco, 1976) ??½ Let There Be Rock (Atco, 1977) ??½ Powerage (Atco, 1978) ??? If You Want Blood, You’ve Got It (Atco, 1978) ????½ Highway to Hell (Atco, 1979) ????? Back in Black (Atco, 1980) ??? Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap (Atco, 1981) ???½ For Those About to Rock, We Salute You (Atco, 1981) ??½ Flick of the Switch (Atco, 1983) ??½ Fly on the Wall (Atco, 1985) ???? Who Made Who (Atco, 1986) ??½ Blow Up Your Video (Atco, 1988) ??? The Razor’s Edge (Atco, 1990) ??½ AC/DC Live (Epic, 1992) ???½ Ballbreaker (EastWest, 1995) ??½ Stiff Upper Lip (EastWest, 2000) ???½ Black Ice (Columbia, 2008) ???½ Backtracks (Sony Legacy, 2009) AC/DC rose to fame during the second half of the Seventies, but this Australian band’s biggest and baddest album will always be 1980’s Back in Black, which forged the archetype for Eighties metal. Perhaps AC/DC’s most crucial innovation is the way their lyrics make plain the boys’ locker-room conception of sexuality that had previously bubbled just under the surface of most heavy-duty rock. Shamelessly sexist panderers or refreshingly frank entertainers? AC/DC fits both descriptions, but none of it would matter if guitarist Angus Young wasn’t such a gargantuan riffmonger, backed by a Godzilla-like rhythm section to boot. Learn to laugh with or at lead singer Brian Johnson’s shrieking depictions of those hormonal surges, and AC/DC’s thundering musical charge will sweep you up like a riptide.
Original lead singer Bon Scott pioneered the raunchy, high-pitched style that Johnson later perfected; he died shortly after AC/DC’s belated American breakthrough, Highway to Hell. Produced by pop-metal maven Robert “Mutt” Lange, Hell sharpens the band’s impact by refining some of its rougher edges. “You Shook Me All Night Long,” from Back in Black, the Lange-produced platinum followup, epitomizes AC/DC’s streamlined attack: a ringing, near-melodic chorus is welded to a granite-shattering beat. “Rock and Roll Ain’t Noise Pollution,” insists the climactic final cut, but overall Back in Black proves that noise pollution, when properly deployed, can qualify as great rock & roll.
Predictably, AC/DC hasn’t changed a whit since then. Angus Young still stalks the stage in a schoolboy’s uniform, tossing off riffs and abbreviated solos while his brother Malcolm strokes a propulsive rhythm guitar and Brian Johnson shakes the roof. For Those About to Rock almost measures up to the heft of Back in Black, but successive albums quickly become rote. AC/DC’s macho posturing is unspeakably dull when it’s not supported by killer hooks. (Dirty Deeds Done Dirt Cheap compiles the best of Bon Scott–era AC/DC; the title cut is a trashy, irresistible revenge fantasy.) A quickie soundtrack album, Who Made Who works as an effective introduction to the group: Previous triumphs (“You Shook Me All Night Long”) contrast with reclaimed later efforts (“Sink the Pink,” from Fly on the Wall) and a completely out-of-character Seventies blooze number called “Ride On.” Of course, AC/DC returns to business as usual with Blow Up Your Video, where even the hottest riffs (“Heatseeker”) don’t seem to detonate with the same gratifying crunch. But after girding its loins for a few years, AC/DC confidently stalked back into the metal arena with The Razor’s Edge—loud and proud.
The rest of the Nineties was a victory lap for the band, rereleasing much of its back catalogue and touring behind albums that were just a shadow of their powerful predecessors. A serviceable 1992 live album, AC/DC Live, culled from the tour following The Razor’s Edge, acted as a reminder of their onstage fury. After a three-year break the band returned to the studio for the Rick Rubin–helmed Ballbreaker. Perhaps using Rubin, whose work with bands such as the Red Hot Chili Peppers had made him the de facto hard-rock producer of the day, was a stab at relevance. Motivations aside, Ballbreaker has a spark that the band had been missing on most of its late-era work, with tracks such as “Hard as a Rock” sitting comfortably next to any other behemoth in its arsenal. The band returned in 2000 with Stiff Upper Lip, a somewhat tired collection, lacking the energy of Ballbreaker and smelling suspiciously like an excuse to rake in more arena ticket money. Guess what? None of the tens of thousands of fans who packed those concert halls cared one whit.
AC/DC were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2003, and in 2008 the band released Black Ice, on which their signature stomp was stubbornly unaltered. Though it was overlong, Ice was still the band’s most consistent album since The Razor’s Edge. In October of 2008, AC/DC scored their first ever Rolling Stone cover, and the following year they released the two-CD, one-DVD box set Backtracks, which included live cuts, rarities, and music videos and came housed in a working amplifier – a clue that this was for serious fans. Because the band has staunchly resisted best-of compilations, there is no AC/DC greatest hits collection – unless you count Back in Back, which is all the AC/DC a casual fan needs.
Portions of this album guide appeared in The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (Fireside, 2004).
?? Bon Jovi (Mercury, 1984) ?½ 7800° Fahrenheit (Mercury, 1985) ???½ Slippery When Wet (Mercury, 1986) ?? New Jersey (Mercury, 1988) ??½ Keep the Faith (Mercury, 1992) ???? Cross Road: 14 Classic Grooves (Mercury, 1994) ??½ These Days (Mercury, 1995) ?? Crush (Island, 2000) ??? One Wild Night: Live 1985?2001 (Uptown/Universal, 2001) ?? Bounce (Island, 2002) ???½ This Left Feels Right (Island, 2003) ??½ - 100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can't Be Wrong (Island, 2004) ??½ Have a Nice Day (Island, 2005) ??? - Lost Highway (Island, 2007) ????2 - The Circle (Island, 2009)
Jon Bon Jovi ?? Blaze of Glory (Mercury, 1990)
??? Destination Anywhere (Mercury, 1997)
Rocketing to stardom in the wake of the Eighties pop-metal boom, Bon Jovi?s early recordings fused the crass popcraft of Journey and Starship with the average-Joe populism of Bruce Springsteen for a sound that aspired to rock & roll grandeur. Bon Jovi and 7800° Fahrenheit understand the basic formula, sticking close to pop conventions like heartbreak lyrics and strident choruses (although Bon Jovi does at least hint at things to come with ?Shot Through the Heart?). The band is nearly redeemed by Slippery When Wet, an album which in its better moments??Livin? on a Prayer,? say, or ?Wanted Dead or Alive??actually delivers enough melodic razzle-dazzle to make the band?s shameless posturing almost forgivable. Unfortunately, the band?s massive sales encouraged the lads to show how little success had changed them, which they did through the bombastic Springsteenisms of New Jersey.
Bon Jovi the band went on hiatus, during which time frontman Jon Bon Jovi released the solo album-cum-soundtrack Blaze of Glory (written for the film Young Guns II), which updates ?Wanted Dead or Alive? but otherwise makes the Wild West seem suspiciously like East Jersey. After regrouping, the band quickly returned to form with the cheerfully clichéd Keep the Faith, which at least balanced the bombast with the corny but heartfelt ballad ?Bed of Roses.? Cross Road, a relentlessly tuneful best-of, has charms enough to be a guilty pleasure for all but the most cynical, and even adds to the canon with ?Always.? (A second best-of, This Left Feels Right, dilutes the catalogue?s charm with later and lesser hits.)
From there, the band continued on as if the Nineties never happened, cranking out variations on the old formula and somehow continuing to fill arenas. It hardly matters that These Days sounds like it should have been called Those Days (though it?s hard not to admire the shamelessness of ?Lie to Me?). Destination Anywhere, Jon Bon Jovi?s second solo project, sounds more like a collection of demos than a fully-realized album, but it did give the singer the opportunity to flex his melodrama muscles on ?August 7, 4:15.? Crush is summed up in the chorus to ?Two Story Town,? which complains of ?the same old sights, the same old sounds,? but Bounce finds the band briefly revitalized by the tragedy of 9/11. Not that the blunt, jingoistic ?Undivided? deserves comparison to the similar-but-superior ?The Rising,? but it wouldn?t be Bon Jovi if the band didn?t continue to aspire to Springsteen.
The smirking face on the cover of Have a Nice Day sets the tone for Bon Jovi?s (often bitter) thoughts on middle age. The subjects of the songs ?just want to be loved? but aren?t afraid to apply a little working class hero elbow grease to get the job done right. ?Who Says You Can?t Go Home,? a corny duet with Sugarland?s Jennifer Nettles, became a surprise Number One country hit, setting the table for the full-on Nashville cred grab Lost Highway in 2007. The album fails miserably when it kowtows to country conventions (the Big & Rich collaboration ?We Got It Going On? is one of the most embarassing songs Bon Jovi has ever released). But when the fiddles and home-spun phrases are kept to a minimum, the songs are entertaining enough, suggesting what Garth Brooks may have sounded like in the late 2000s had he kept recording.
The band is back in familiar generic stadium rock territory on The Circle, which splits the difference between weighty, U2-style ruminations (?When We Were Beautiful?) and sub-Springsteen-ian anthemry (?We Weren?t Born To Follow?) that clearly still strike a chord with the faithful: It debuted at Number One on The Billboard 200, the fourth chart-topper of Bon Jovi?s career.
Like the Boss on Tracks, Bon Jovi plundered its vaults big time for 100,000,000 Bon Jovi Fans Can?t Be Wrong, a four-disc boxed set featuring 50 (!) unreleased and rare songs. This completists-only behemoth has some worthwhile material, but wading through a host of bar band-level blues rockers, ho-hum demos and songs with Richie Sambora and Tico Torres on vocals is quite a slog.
Portions of this album guide appeared in The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (Fireside, 2004).
★★★★ Freak Out! (Verve 1966)
★★★★½ Absolutely Free (Verve 1967)
★★★½ Lumpy Gravy (Verve 1968)
★★★★★ We?re Only in It for the Money (Verve/Bizaare, 1968)
★★★ Cruising With Ruben & the Jets (Verve/Bizaare, 1968)
★★★★★ Uncle Meat (Bizaare/Reprise, 1969)
★★★★ Hot Rats (Bizaare/Reprise, 1969)
★★★★ Burnt Weeny Sandwich (Bizaare/Reprise, 1970)
★★★★ Weasels Ripped My Flesh (Bizaare/Reprise, 1970)
★★★★ Chunga?s Revenge (Bizaare/Reprise, 1970)
★★ The Mothers: Fillmore East—June 1971 (Bizaare/Reprise, 1971)
★★ Just Another Band From L.A. (Bizaare/Reprise, 1972)
★★★★ Waka/Jawaka (Bizaare/Reprise, 1972)
★★★★ The Grand Wazoo (Bizaare/Reprise, 1972)
★★★ Over-Nite Sensation (DiscReet, 1973)
★★★ Apostrophe (DiscReet, 1974)
★★★ Roxy & Elsewhere (DiscReet, 1974)
★★★½ One Size Fits All (DiscReet, 1975)
★★★ Bongo Fury (DiscReet, 1975)
★★★ Zoot Allures (Warner Bros., 1976)
★★★ In New York (DiscReet, 1978)
★★★ Studio Tan (DiscReet, 1978)
★★★ Sleep Dirt (DiscReet, 1979)
★★½ Sheik Yerbouti (Zappa, 1979)
★★★ Orchestral Favorites (DiscReet, 1979)
★★★ Joe?s Garage: Acts I, II & III (Zappa, 1979)
★★★★ Shut Up ?n Play Yer Guitar (Barking Pumpkin, 1981)
★★★½ Tinseltown Rebellion (Barking Pumpkin, 1981)
★★★½ You Are What You Is (Barking Pumpkin, 1981)
★★★ Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch (Barking Pumpkin, 1982)
★★½ Baby Snakes (Barking Pumpkin, 1983)
★★ The Man From Utopia (Barking Pumpkin, 1983)
★★★ Boulez Conducts Zappa: The Perfect Stranger (Angel, 1994)
★★★ Them or Us (Barking Pumpkin, 1984)
★★★½ Thing-Fish (Barking Pumpkin, 1984)
★★ Francesco Zappa (Barking Pumpkin, 1984))
★★★½ Meets the Mothers of Prevention (Barking Pumpkin, 1985)
★★★★ Jazz From Hell (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1986)
★★★ Does Humor Belong in Music? (Barking Pumpkin, 1986)
★★★★ Guitar (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1988)
★★★★½ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 1 (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1988)
★★★★½ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 2 (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1988)
★★★ Broadway the Hard Way (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1988) ★★★★½ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 3 (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1989)
★★★★½ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 4 (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1991)
★★★½ The Best Band You Never Heard in Your Life (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1991)
★★★ Make a Jazz Noise Here (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1991)
★★★★ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 5 (Rykodisc, 1992)
★★★★ You Can?t Do That on Stage Anymore, Vol. 6 (Rykodisc, 1992)
★★ Playground Psychotics (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1992)
★★★½ Ahead of Their Time (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1993)
★★★★ The Yellow Shark (Barking Pumpkin/Rykodisc, 1993)
★★★½ London Symphony Orchestra, Vols. 1 and 2 (Rykodisc, 1995)
★★★★ Strictly Commercial: The Best of (Rykodisc, 1995)
★★★½ The Lost Episodes (Rykodisc, 1996)
★★★ Läther (Rykodisc, 1996)
★★★ Have I Offended Someone? (Rykodisc, 1997)
★★★★ Strictly Genteel: A Classical Introduction to Frank Zappa (Rykodisc, 1997)
★★ Cheap Thrills (Rykodisc, 1998)
★★★½ Mystery Disc (Rykodisc, 1998)
★★★ Cucamonga (Del-Fi, 1998)
★★ Son of Cheap Thrills (Rykodisc, 1999)
★★★★★ Threesome No. 1 (Rykodisc, 2002)
★★★★ Threesome No. 2 (Rykodisc, 2002)
★★★★ Zappa Wazoo (Vaulternative, 2007)
Frank Zappa dabbled in virtually all kinds of music—and, whether guised as a satirical rocker, jazz-rock fusionist, guitar virtuoso, electronics wizard, or orchestral innovator, his eccentric genius was undeniable. Cross Dion and the Belmonts with Harry Partch, and you get some idea of Zappa?s musical sensibility; as a humorist—and humor is crucial to Zappa—he comes on like a hybrid of Lenny Bruce and the Three Stooges. Elusive, indulgent, at times inscrutable, Zappa?s tone and intention are often hard to determine; they seem calculated to provoke equal measures of fury, awe, and giggling. An early crusader against rock censorship, he was always political, if sometimes perplexingly so, but his ultimate significance resides in his music. Brandishing as his motto a quote from French avant-garde icon Edgard Varése, ?The present-day composer refuses to die!,? Zappa was indeed as much a modern classical composer as a rock legend, and his erasure of the lines between high and pop art remains one of the most emancipatory gestures of the Sixties.
With a riff aping the Stones? ?Satisfaction,? ?Hungry Freaks, Daddy? provided the anthemic intro to Freak Out! Lyrically, the record?s antilove songs and daft non sequiturs raised the rebel flag for the misfit clowns and underdogs Zappa and his first band, the Mothers of Invention, would henceforth champion; the music was both a triumph and mockery of psychedelia, folk rock, blooze, and doo-wop. Considerably more demanding, Absolutely Free pushed the envelope even further—comprising fragmentary jazz allusions, vibraphone noodlings, chanting, and operatic vocals, its determined messiness seemed totally mad. On ?Plastic People,? a ?Louie, Louie? guitar motif disintegrates into freeform swinging, all in service of a poke at LBJ and American suburbia. By 1968 and We?re Only in It for the Money, with its mock–Sgt. Pepper?s cover art, orchestral segments, and general ferocity, the Mothers had already achieved their masterpiece.
The prototype of the technically brilliant aggregations upon which Zappa would come to insist, the late-Sixties Mothers were basically a crack rock outfit with woodwind capability. Money was, of course, in large part the musicians? work, but the vision was assuredly Zappa?s. ?Who Needs the Peace Corps?,? ?Flower Punk,? and ?Harry, You?re a Beast? were early explorations of his trademark themes: paranoia, political and sexual; hatred for the bourgeoisie; and a utopian insistence on completely free expression. In search of that goal, Zappa detoured from the Mothers in 1967 by putting out Lumpy Gravy, his first solo work. Recorded with a 50-piece orchestra, this difficult but often lovely record of John Cage-ish modern music paved the way for the Mothers? second major set, Uncle Meat. A collage of 31 sound bites—tape edits, nonsense phone conversations, ?songs,? mind-boggling instrumental passages—Meat was an inspired monstrosity, a kind of musical version of William Burroughs? ?cut-up? method of literary construction (the insertion of random passages within an otherwise linear text). This album reinvented pop music; the only problem was that its zonked brilliance could never be ?popular,? so Meat also marked the coalescence of one of Zappa?s characteristic stances: the cryptic prophet howling in the wilderness.
On Hot Rats, Burnt Weeny Sandwich, Weasels Ripped My Flesh, and Chunga?s Revenge—all four released within a single 12-month period—Zappa?s creative juices flowed with a consistent quality that he never again achieved. While members of the Mothers would resurface throughout his career, the band as such was kaput, and Zappa began working with a bewildering array of talents (Little Feat?s Lowell George, violinist Don ?Sugarcane? Harris, drummer Aynsley Dunbar, keyboardist George Duke). There were vocals on all these albums, but it was the music that mattered. Propulsive neojazz alternated with gorgeous classically derived pieces evoking phantasmagorical dreams. A collaboration with childhood friend Captain Beefheart resulted in Hot Rats? gritty standout ?Willie the Pimp,? and on the same album?s ?Peaches en Regalia,? Zappa the composer reached a majestic peak.
In comparison, the next Mothers records, Fillmore East and Just Another Band, sounded either lame or silly. Adding ex-Turtles singers Howard Kaylan and Mark Volman, a.k.a. Flo and Eddie, only increased the yu(c)ks factor. The Miles/Mahavishnu-style fusion of Grand Wazoo, Waka/Jawaka, and One Size Fits All made for an impressive clutch of Mothers-less outings; Over-Nite Sensation and Apostrophe, however, were squawking, predictable, and only desperately ?hilarious? (despite good work by ex-Cream bassist Jack Bruce).
Although Zappa?s approach resists generalization, it became apparent by the mid-Seventies that the albums concentrating on humor would be the least satisfying; the musical experiments would be the ones to watch out for. The records that balanced both approaches varied—Bongo Fury was a stronger Beefheart performance than a Zappa one; Zoot Allures was comparatively bland—but the ?funny? Sheik Yerbouti, with its disco parodies and churlishness (?Broken Hearts Are for Assholes?), was much less engaging than Shut Up, a three-disc set wherein Zappa simply turned loose his astonishing guitar playing. By the time of Joe?s Garage and such fare as ?Why Does It Hurt When I Pee?,? the sophomoric smuttiness of Zappa?s humor had gotten very old (sexism remained this freethinker?s egregious blind spot), and his turn toward strictly instrumental music was welcome. You Are What You Is found the naughty lad reclaiming the stand-up stage, but this time, the musical parodies were varied enough to carry the day. Mock versions of reggae, ska, Journey-style power ballads, and country music, plus a hilarious Doors takeoff, produced the most inventive comedy he?d attempted in years.
Later joke-predominant albums (Tinseltown, Broadway) were fairly tasty, especially the rock send-up Them or Us, but the real excitement was elsewhere. London Symphony Orchestra, originally released as two separate discs in the Eighties, finally found Frank in an all-orchestral setting, with impressive results; Jazz From Hell, executed mostly solo by Zappa on Synclavier, displayed his longtime mastery of music tech. His most ambitious releases, however, were retrospectives: Guitar, a sequel to the Shut Up series that featured 32 live solos recorded between 1979 and 1984; and the staggering 12-CD You Can?t Do That package. Twenty years in the making, the set presents previously unreleased live work from 1968 to 1988. Obviously intended for Zappaddicts, it?s hardly the best place for a neophyte to start, but its monumentality is unquestionable.
A far more modest project, The Yellow Shark, features the Ensemble Modern?s wonderfully simpatico readings of some of Zappa?s thornier compositions. His finest ?classical? venture, it was also the last album he saw completed before his untimely death in December 1993. The absence of any new Zappa music since hasn?t stemmed the tide of new releases one bit. Most are mixed bags, although Ahead of Their Time, The Lost Episodes, and Mystery Disc are all noteworthy for presenting rare or never-heard selections from the Mothers? late-Sixties/early-Seventies golden era. Cucamonga, a collection of Zappa?s pre-Mothers (mainly doo-wop) recordings, is intriguing, but only for established fans. The 2000s saw a cavalcade of Zappa releases, including the Joe?s Corsage series of rarities. Zappa Wazoo was one of the decade?s best Zappa records, a two-disc live show from 1972 that features a 20-member brass band blowing its way through complex, dense and inventive compositions from the Grand Wazoo album.
Compiling the best of Zappa on a single disc is an impossible task; considering that, Strictly Commercial and Strictly Genteel are surprisingly effective. But the real prize is Ryko?s first Threesome, which brings the first three Mothers albums together in a single box. If you?re looking for a perfect Zappa entry point, your search is over.
Portions of this album guide appeared in The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (Fireside, 2004).
★★★★ 13 Songs (Dischord, 1989) ★★★½ Repeater + 3 Songs (Dischord, 1990) ★★★½ Steady Diet of Nothing (Dischord, 1991) ★★★★ In on the Kill Taker (Dischord, 1993) ★★★★ Red Medicine (Dischord, 1995) ★★★½ End Hits (Dischord, 1998) ★★½ Instrument Soundtrack (Dischord, 1999) ★★★★½ The Argument (Dischord, 2001) ★★★★ Fugazi Live Series, Vol. 9: 9-4-93 Pontiac, Michigan, Plaza Amphitheater (Fugazi Live, 2004)
Fugazi has been such a righteous force in underground rock for so long—charging reasonable prices for concert tickets, scrupulously avoiding any taint from the corporate-level music biz—that it?s easy to forget they?re an actual band. But singer/guitarists Guy Picciotto (whose earlier band Rites of Spring pretty much invented emo) and Ian MacKaye (whose earlier band Minor Threat was the formal pinnacle of hardcore) and the mighty rhythm section of Brendan Canty and Joe Lally are a staggeringly powerful combination. For a decade-and-a-half, they challenged themselves and their audience constantly, giving some of the hemisphere?s hardest punk rock an increasingly arty, thoughtful spin.
Compiling two early EPs, 13 Songs leads off with Fugazi?s best-known song, the white-hot dub-punk anthem ?Waiting Room,? and keeps going with one feral rocker after another. Picciotto?s ?Margin Walker? articulates the specific rage of wanting to destroy the culture that excludes you, but the real knockout here is ?Suggestion,? an explosive attack on everyday sexism, sung by MacKaye from a woman?s POV. Repeater is a development and refinement of the same basic approach, this time as a refutation of mass culture: ?We owe you nothing/You are not what you own,? MacKaye bellows on ?Merchandise,? and Picciotto?s ?Blueprint? finds him screaming ?I?m not playing with you!? over and over. There?s a bit of filler (two instrumentals and a remake of ?Provisional? from 13 Songs), and more energy than craft at work, but you can?t accuse them of being undercommitted.
With Steady Diet of Nothing, they slow down and dig in, making the music both tougher and more complicated. Lally?s bass parts are three parts Joy Division to one part dub; you can hear the band?s years of playing together turning into tricky, spacious instrumental patterns, as on ?Stacks.? MacKaye addresses the Gulf War in ?Nice New Outfit? (?There?s blood in your mouth, but not in mine?), and there are rumors of war elsewhere in the lyrics, but they?re mostly the sort of raw impressionism that the late-Nineties emo generation subsequently picked up on.
Illness is everywhere on In on the Kill Taker, literally or metaphorically—it shows up all over the lyrics, and there are sick, nasty guitar noises starting or ending most of the songs, like the blistering feedback coda of ?23 Beats Off.? The band actually quiets down and builds tension a few times, but it?s usually to give them somewhere to lunge from. Picciotto?s words get weirder and are open to interpretation—?crush my calm, you Cassavetes?—but he declaims them like he?s taking his revenge. There?s also a fabulous Mac-Kaye punk-rock quickie, ?Great Cop? (as in ?You?d make a ??).
Red Medicine continues along the same path into even denser, darker territory and suggests that Fugazi is feeding on lots of stuff that?s very different from its own music. ?Fell, Destroyed? even borrows a hook from Tenor Saw?s dancehall reggae hit ?Ring the Alarm,? and ?Version? is an ambitious, if not exactly successful, noise-dub experiment. The MacKaye knockout this time is ?Bed for the Scraping,? with its battle cry of ?I don?t want to be defeated? —in his mouth, it comes out as ?idawannabeedafeeda.?
The disjunction between the anthems and the arty moments of End Hits is schizzier still: MacKaye?s ?Five Corporations? savages music-biz hegemony with laconic precision, and Picciotto sings ?Guilford Fall? like his head?s exploding, but then there are pieces like the hushed bass gurgle ?Pink Frosty? that are unrecognizable as the Fugazi of 10 years earlier. (That?s a good thing, but the combination makes for difficult listening.) The recording is curious, too, switching between the audio equivalent of long shots and close-ups. A soundtrack to a documentary about Fugazi?s first decade, Instrument includes oddities, instrumental doodles, and a half-dozen demos, mostly of End Hits songs. It?s mostly ragged and unformed, but for confirmed Fugaziphiles, it?s a solidly interesting peek into the band?s creative process.
The four core members of Fugazi (plus live percussionist Jerry Busher, playing with the group for the first time on record) are clearly pulling in different directions on The Argument, and the result, miraculously, is their best album—somehow, they seem to have discovered that pleasure has radical possibilities too (backing vocals! cello! tunes, even!). Picciotto?s ?Full Disclosure? is as headlong a punk charge as they?ve ever made, but they?ve also figured out how to make their points by implication and understatement, musically as well as lyrically. The songs shift their textures restlessly as the band flexes its collaborative instincts, playing as if with a single pair of hands.
Fugazi has played only a handful of shows since the release of The Argument. They insist, however, that the band is not finished, and they?ve been releasing old shows as part of the Fugazi Live series; The September 4, 1993 set is particularly blistering.
Portions of this album guide appeared in The New Rolling Stone Album Guide (Fireside, 2004).
Roger Waters will take The Wall on the road this autumn, 30 years after Pink Floyd first performed the classic double album onstage. Three decades ago, Pink Floyd played the album in its entirety as a white brick wall was constructed between the band and the crowd throughout the show. Films were projected onto the wall during the performance and giant inflatable Gerald Scarfe creatures floated above the audience. In short, it was one of the greatest stage shows of its time during its brief run, and now Waters is promising to bring an updated version of the legendary set into the 21st century.
The Wall boasts Pink Floyd classics including “Comfortably Numb,” “Another Brick in the Wall Pt. 2,” “Mother,” “Run Like Hell” and “Young Lust,” and ranks among the best-selling albums of all time alongside The Dark Side of the Moon, which both Pink Floyd and Waters solo have previously performed start to finish. Following Pink Floyd’s short-but-epic run of The Wall in 1980-81, which was documented on the live album Is There Anybody Out There? , Waters performed the double LP one more time as a solo artist in 1990 in Germany to celebrate the fall of the Berlin Wall. Twenty years later, he’ll do it again during a 35-date trek that launches September 15th at Toronto’s Air Canada Centre.
“Thirty years ago when I wrote The Wall, I was a frightened young man,” Waters told Spinner. “It took me a long time to get over my fears. In the intervening years it has occurred to me that maybe the story of my fear and loss with its concomitant inevitable residue of ridicule, shame and punishment, provides an allegory for broader concerns: Nationalism, racism, sexism, religion, whatever! All these issues and ‘isms are driven by the same fears that drove my young life.”
Roger Waters’ official Website will relaunch today at 2 p.m. ET, perhaps with ticket onsale info. Until then, check out Waters’ The Wall dates below:
Roger Waters
Sept. 15 – Toronto, ON @ Air Canada Centre
Sept. 20 – Chicago, IL @ United Center
Sept. 21 – Chicago, IL @ United Center
Sept. 26 – Pittsburgh, PA @ Consol Energy Center
Sept. 28 – Cleveland, OH @ Quicken Loans Arena
Sept. 30 – Boston, MA @ TD Garden
Oct. 5 – New York, NY @ Madison Square Garden
Oct. 8 – Buffalo, NY @ HSBC Arena
Oct. 10 – Washington, DC @ Verizon Center
Oct. 12 – Uniondale, NY @ Nassau Coliseum
Oct. 15 – Hartford, CT @ XL Center
Oct. 17 – Ottawa, ON @ ScotiaBank Place
Oct. 19 – Montreal, QC @ Bell Centre
Oct. 22 – Columbus, OH @ Schottenstein Center
Oct. 24 – Detroit, MI @ Palace of Auburn Hills
Oct. 26 – Omaha, NE @ Qwest Center
Oct. 27 – St Paul, MN @ Xcel Energy Center
Oct. 29 – St. Louis, MO @ Scottrade Center
Oct. 30 – Kansas City, MO @ Sprint Center
Nov. 3 – New York, NY @ Izod Center
Nov. 8 – Philadelphia, PA @ Wachovia Center
Nov. 9 – Philadelphia, PA @ Wachovia Center
Nov. 13 – Fort Lauderdale, FL @ Bank Atlantic Center
Nov. 16 – Tampa, FL @ St. Pete Times Forum
Nov. 18 – Atlanta, GA @ Philips Arena
Nov. 20 – Houston, TX @ Toyota Center
Nov. 21 – Dallas, TX @ American Airlines Center
Nov. 23 – Denver, CO @ Pepsi Center
Nov. 26 – Las Vegas, NV @ MGM Grand Garden Arena
Nov. 27 – Phoenix, AZ @ US Airways Center
Nov. 29 – Los Angeles, CA @ The Forum
Dec. 6 – San Jose, CA @ HP Pavilion
Dec. 10 – Vancouver, BC @ General Motors Place
Dec. 11 – Tacoma, WA @ Tacoma Dome
Dec. 13 – Anaheim, CA @ Honda Center
Justin Bieber brought My World 2.0 to Saturday Night Live this weekend, rewarding his young fans for staying up past their bedtimes by not only performing two songs but also making his live acting debut in a few skits. Bieber first hit the stage during host Tina Fey’s opening monologue, assisting the SNL alum and Date Night star in a sing-along of “I’m Every Woman.” The Bieber-Fey love-fest continued throughout the night — Biebs even name-checked Fey at the tail end of “U Smile” — but the May-December romance really hit its uncomfortable peak in a sketch called “Teacher,” which you can watch above.
Fey plays a high school teacher who has difficulty suppressing her attraction to Bieber, a student named Jason Deeps who she hilariously compares to a “dreamy Christmas elf.” The bit starts off shaky as Bieber is obviously reading his lines off his returned test paper, but when it comes time for the Canadian crooner to burst into song during Fey’s dream sequences, he’s right at home on live TV. Alas, his character doesn’t share his teacher’s infatuation and leaves the classroom threatening to hire Gloria Allred to represent him.
Bieber’s second skit once again cast him in a high school scene, this time at a dance where he finds love with a gawky girl who adores her mother as much as his nerdy character admires his own father. Between the sketches, Bieber performed a pair of My World 2.0 tracks, “Baby” and “U Smile,” and he even handled Ludacris’ guest rap verse in the former. It was a big night for Bieber, who tweeted his appreciation when the show wrapped up: “Will never forget 2nite. It was INCREDIBLE!! Thank u for the opportunity and thanks to everyone at SNL and Tina Fey for just being fun.”
After having to replace a bassist (and brother) between their last two albums, the members of Chevelle were happy to have a drama-free interim leading up to their new "Sci-Fi Crimes."
If Céu had her way, everyone would be just a little bit lazier. The Brazilian singer/songwriter hails a life of leisure on her second studio album, "Vagarosa," released July 7 on Six Degrees Records. The album was inspired in part by her 10-month-old daughter, Rosa.
Thanks to tours with The Dead and the Allman Brothers Band, a new Gov't Mule album and tour and a planned solo album, Warren Haynes is having his busiest year ever -- and is enjoying it immensely.
After building an underground fan base with a string of popular mixtapes, the Washington, D.C., rapper Wale is primed to bring his offbeat charm to the mainstream.
On the heels of its 'Best Children's Album' Grammy win for "Here Come the 123's," They Might Be Giants is readying the release of another kid-centric set, "Here Comes Science." The album and animated DVD is due Sept. 1 on Amazon and iTunes and everywhere Sept. 22 on Disney Sound.
A pair of home town stadium concerts over the weekend gave Kid Rock and a couple of his support acts an opportunity to showcase new material for the 40,000 fans who attended each show.
Prince fans from across Europe converged on Montreux for two shows by the American musician whose rare appearance on the continent stretched well into Sunday morning. The 51-year-old star closed the two-week Swiss Montreux Jazz Festival with a mix of old hits including "Little Red Corvette," "Peach" and "Purple Rain" and fresh titles such as "Elixir" from his new album with singer Bria Valente.
