Rock and Roll Hall of Fame concerts, 10/29/2009 and 10/30/2009

I attended the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame’s 25th anniversary concert at Madison Square Garden last week. The lineup was incredible, not least of which were Metallica’s duets with guests Lou Reed, Ozzy Osbourne, and Ray Davies. I covered both nights in the press room, watching the event on closed-circuit TV and doing junket interviews with many of the artists, for The Village Voice’s “Sound of the City” blog. I’ve pasted the teasers for both below.

Bruce! Sam! Billy! Bonnie! Live From The Ludicrously Star-Studded MSG Rock Hall Extravaganza

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 25th Anniversary Celebration
Madison Square Garden
Thursday, October 29

The first half of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's two-night benefit concert and 25th-anniversary celebration lasted six hours, ended at 1:30 a.m. and featuring star-studded sets by curators Bruce Springsteen and the E-Street Band, Stevie Wonder, Paul Simon and Art Garfunkel, and Crosby, Stills, and Nash, with guests ranging from Billy Joel to Tom Morello to doo-wop legends Little Anthony and the Imperials. All these artists showed a real humility and gratitude for the 60-odd-year-old genre: "Everybody's got their own Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in their hearts," as Springsteen put it. And no matter what you think of the museum itself or the state of rock at the moment (the closest thing to a hard-line rock album in this week's Billboard Top 10 is the New Moon soundtrack), the evening proved what a great emancipator the music still is.

Continue reading " Bruce! Sam! Billy! Bonnie! Live"...

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Live: Even Lou Reed Gets Sentimental At Rock Hall MSG Blowout #2 (Featuring U2, The Boss, The Black Eyed Peas, And Some Dude Named Mick)

Ooooh plus "Iron Man"

Rock and Roll Hall of Fame 25th Anniversary Celebration
Madison Square Garden
Friday, October 30

"When we were down, rock 'n' roll lifted us up," says Tom Hanks in his introductory remarks for the final night of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's benefit-concert extravaganza at Madison Square Garden. "Rock 'n' roll music was American," he later adds. "And it changed the world." Despite his use of the past tense, tonight is anything but a eulogy: Friday's slate features a wider palate of curators than the previous night, this time including Aretha Franklin, Jeff Beck, Metallica, and U2. The headliners' guests, a pop-music dream-team ranging from Ray Davies to Ozzy Osbourne to the Black Eyed Peas, also do a better job than last night's cavalcade of explaining how far rock has come.

Continue reading " Live: Even Lou Reed Gets"...

More videos:

Lou Reed and Metallica perform the Velvet Underground’s “White Light/White Heat”

Jeff Beck performs “A Day in the Life”

Bruce Springsteen and Sam Moore perform “Hold On, I’m Coming” and “Soul Man”

L.A. Times Interview

Recently, the Los Angeles Times book blog interviewed the authors of Precious Metal: Decibel Presents the Stories Behind 25 Extreme Metal Masterpieces. The book contains my “Hall of Fame” pieces on Napalm Death’s Scum and Obituary’s Cause of Death. For the blog, I contributed a story about meeting Gorgoroth in Norway, which became the basis of this article. Albert Mudrian and Adem Tepedelen also contributed stories, and the L.A. Times blogger was Christopher R. Weingarten.

Sonic Youth, 7/3/2009

Sonic Youth bassist Kim Gordon has gotten a lot more freedom through the years as the band has added members like multi-instrumentalist Jim O’Rourke and now former Pavement bassist Mark Ibold. She’s had so much freedom that, after she puts down the bass at concerts, she has perfected a flailing dance that I call—without creativity, I admit—“The Kim Gordon Dance.” At their performance Friday at the United Palace, I caught it with my camera as best I could from where I was sitting.

Ladies and Gentleman, the Kim Gordon Dance:

Honestly, the set was one of the best times I’ve seen them. They mostly played songs from their new album The Eternal, but the oldies the group pulled out were great: “Tom Violence,” “Catholic Block,” “Pacific Coast Highway,” “Brother James” and, my favorite of the evening, “Death Valley ’69” (full set list below). This song made me especially happy because earlier in the day, my girlfriend, Lisa, and I had gone to MoMA and seen the “Looking at Music: Side 2” exhibit. There’s a video post there showing Richard Kern’s video for the song in it, so it was exciting to hear it twice in one day; the exhibit is totally worthwhile, by the way, with great no-wave and first-wave punk photos and artifacts, like a old Teenage Jesus 7-inches and a Patti Smith “self-portrait.” At the show, the band members were jokey with one another. At one point, when Moore was fiddling with a guitar strap, Ranaldo said, “Strap it on!” Moore barked back, “I’d like to strap it on you.” Ranaldo rejoined, “Again?!” Maybe this explains why Gordon dances…

Set list:

Sacred Trickster
No Way
Calming the Snake
Poison Arrow
Tom Violence
Walkin Blue
Anti-Orgasm
Leaky Lifeboat
Antenna
Catholic Block
Malibu Gas Station
Massage the History
World Looks Red
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What We Know
Pacific Coast Highway
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Brother James
Death Valley ’69

Jane’s Addiction/Nine Inch Nails, 6/7/09

Tonight, Jane’s Addiction and Nine Inch Nails played Jones Beach Theater, along with Street Sweeper Social Club. One thing I felt fortunate about growing up in Colorado was seeing shows at Red Rocks, but I have to say, seeing concerts literally on the water—as with Jones Beach—feels special, too. And even though Jane’s frontman Perry Ferrell kept saying, “Tonight is a historic event,” it sort of was.

Not only was this the original lineup of Jane’s Addiction’s first time playing in the New York area since 1991, but—if Ferrell’s memory serves correct from the way he introduced “Jane Says” at the end of the set—this is also the band’s 25th anniversary. The group played a hit-filled set, including (going by memory and not in order) “Had a Dad,” “Mountain Song,” “Ocean Size,” “Ted, Just Admit It…” (accompanied by a canopy depicting sex and violence and Natural Born Killers footage, see below), “Stop!” “Ain’t No Right” and “Been Caught Stealing.” (Why no “Classic Girl”?) Throughout the set Ferrell was swigging a bottle of wine in between poses and spouting off about grabbing his crotch, and how sometimes you’ve got to do it. (This was around the time it dawned on me that JA is pretty much an even split between the Doors and Led Zep, with a little Bootsy Collins thrown in.) At one point during “Ocean Size,” I think it was, Ferrell said, “I was just getting to the sexy part,” which had me in stitches because it was so non sequitur. It was nice to see original bassist Eric Avery back in the fold, but he seemed out of it for most of the show or upset. Nonetheless, they played a great set and—for not having seen them in 10 years—it was, I guess, historic, for me personally.

Tonight was the first time I had seen Nine Inch Nails live. What struck me most about about their show was that frontman Trent Reznor and the rest of the band hate instruments. Each member threw a guitar at one point (as my friend Reed said, “That acoustic guitar didn’t stand a chance, Robin Finck”), and Reznor threw several mic stands at drummer Ilan Rubin. “Burn,” from the Natural Born Killers soundtrack was a surprise, a cover of “I’m Afraid of Americans” was welcome, and “Wish” was fun, but I would have liked to hear even more stuff from the first few releases (especially since this year is the 20th anniversary of Pretty Hate Machine). I found it odd that they were playing in the middle—going on during daylight—even though they played a full set, including an encore of “Hurt.” The dichotomy between the NIN and Jane’s Addiction fans was pretty black and white, and many of the NIN fans seemed to leave during the Jane’s set. At the end of the night, there was a girl on the way to the parking lot with a “Free Hugs” sign, and we can only imagine which band she had come to see.

Openers Street Sweeper Social Club—a new group featuring Rage Against the Machine guitarist Tom Morello and Coup rapper Boots Riley—were quite good, too. They came onstage to Darth Vader’s theme in Star Wars. Throughout the set, Riley kept saying, “We’re more than a band. We’re a social club.” Their novel feat, aside from Morello’s always incendiary guitar playing, was doing an almost note-for-note rendition of M.I.A.’ s “Paper Planes.” The music sounded better than the original samples. The band’s debut is out June 16, and I like it quite a bit. In a way, this band was the glue between DIW optimism and recession-fueled negativity that held together the other two bands tonight even though they played earlier. In fact the only drawback from the whole night—and detractor to the bands’ anti-consumerism ethos—was the venue’s high prices for drinks (and they don’t serve alcohol). It’s a good thing its on the water.

Street Sweeper Social Club

A swan on the harbor during Street Sweeper’s set
Nine Inch Nails

Jane’s Addiction

True Norwegian Death Metal

There are a few countries have become well known, if not fetishized, for specific types of extreme metal. England has doom metal and grindcore, the U.S. and Sweden have distinct kinds of death metal and, of course, Norway has black metal. But as the world focuses on the black and white—or in this case just the black—it’s easy to overlook some of Norway’s pretty cool death-metal accomplishments. Although the country blazed into prominence (literally) in the early ’90s, when bands like Mayhem, Darkthrone, and Burzum reignited music fans’ interest in black metal—and although their neighbor to the east, Sweden, has gotten far more credit for death metal—the country of corpse paint and fjords already had a sturdy foundation in great death metal. With that, I hope to draw some attention to some grievously overlooked, and unfortunately many out-of-print, “True Norwegian Death Metal” albums (ranked in order of quality). Enjoy these however you can.

1) Molested, Blod Draum (Effigy, 1995)
Between the violin, didgeridoo-type sounds, and mouth harp(!), Blod Drom is as intriguing as it is terrifying. Even when they stayed traditional, Bergen’s Molested created some of the best, most forward-thinking death metal of any country during the ’90s, bolstered by the relentless riffs and bilious growls of Borknagar frontman Øystein G. Brun and some breakneck, off-time blast beats by sometime Gorgoroth drummer Erlend “Sersjant” Erichsen. Utterly essential. (Ars Magna Recordings is planning a re-release of all of Molested’s albums this year, click here for more info.)

To read the rest at Revolvermag.com, click here.

Melvins’ 25th Anniversary, 5/15/09

Sludge rockers Melvins celebrated their 25th anniversary at Webster Hall last night. As a special treat, before playing their classic 1993 album Houdini in its entirety, big-haired main man Buzz Osborne—dressed in his trademark druidesque robes—introduced us to the “original 1983 lineup”: Mike Dillard (“who just got out of prison”) on drums and Matt Lukin (“who also just got out of prison and needs a place to stay”) on bass. Thing is, it wasn’t the sometime-Mudhoney bassist Lukin, for whom they have ill feelings—it was 1984-to-present drummer Dale Crover, who kept the joke going, by saying “I have weed,” in his facetious angling for a place to stay. Talk about grudges.

The trio’s “1983” set consisted mostly of the sort of hardcore on Black Flag’s album from that year, My War, and consisted of songs available on the band’s Mangled Demos From 1983 CD. The music was far cry from the noise-rock and pseudo-soundtrack music the group is playing today, but was still pretty exciting. Reflecting on his career at one point, Osborne said, “Why the hell did I do this? I could have done anything. I could have been a fucking lawyer, like, three times over already.” Dillard played well, especially for having been off the grid for a while and for having to open for Crover, one of the greatest drummers ever. (Aside: With the exception of bassist-drummer Greg Hokanson and, uh, Kurt Cobain, all three of these musicians played in Cobain’s pre-Nirvana project Fecal Matter.)

At one point Dillard left the drum stool to play a snare that was set off to the side of the stage for Houdini’s all-drum closer “Spread Eagle Beagle,” which the band would play later, and Crover assumed the drum throne. Dillard then left the stage, and Buzz and Dale played sans drummer for a while, including an awesome cover of Alice Cooper’s “Ballad of Dwight Fry,” from Melvins’ Lysol album. (Incidentally, the band Big Business, two of whose members have comprised Melvins’ other half—literally—for the past three years, is touring as at the same time of this tour—so no two-drummer setup tonight; also, despite speculation, sometime Melvins bassist Joe Preston, who is in town, didn’t show up either, which is wise, because in interviews the band members still say worse things about him than they do Lukin.) There aren’t many bands who can open for themselves, since this was “An Evening With the Melvins,” and play enough styles of music that you felt like you’d seen three bands. During the middle, no-bass set, I got to thinking, For all of the duo’s bass-player changes through the years, when I was watching this I was wondering why they ever bothered with bass players at all, it sounded so raw and dirty.

Then, with no pause at all, sometime Mr. Bungle bassist Trevor Dunn, clad in his own camouflage druid robes, came out for the beginning of the Houdini set and put my supposition to rest. Dude flung his bass in the air and faceplanted the headstock right into the stage to make the loudest, lowest feedback I can remember (it didn’t hurt I was in the front row right in front of his amp). From there, it all made sense.

From “Hooch” to the over-10-minute drum extravaganza “Beagle,” the band made the record sound nastier than the studio versions. “Lizzy,” “Set Me Straight” and “Honey Bucket” stand out as three highlights, mostly because of Buzz’s petulant snarl. Feeding off that, at one point Crover was hitting the gong behind him so hard that it fell right over. During “Beagle,” both Dunn and Dillard banged on snares on either side of Crover (mostly not in unison) for an insufferable amount of time. Osborne just walked offstage and sat down during this song. Dunn and Crover closed the show with a drum-and-bass blues jam, during which Buzz came back and thanked everyone for coming out. “I want to thank your wives for letting you come out tonight,” he also said, as well as, “I want to thank your parents for not making you go to school tomorrow.” (“Tomorrow” is a Saturday.) With that, the band was done; it was 10 pm and time for Webster Hall to turn into a dance club. I left feeling like I’d seen something special—not just another Melvins gig. I’m looking forward to seeing what they do the next time they come through.

Dale Crover as “Matt Lukin”:

Mike Dillard on drums:

Buzz and Dale, sans bass:

Trevor Dunn:

The Thermals, 5/9/2009

I got caught in a mosh… at the Thermals. The last time I saw the punky Portland indie-rock trio was at the basement of Fontana’s during a music fest, and while the audience pogo’d as if it was back in fashion, it was nothing compared to what I experienced Saturday night at the Bowery Ballroom. I was flummoxed to see the boys’ club take over the front, and it seems to have gotten to the band a bit, too. A friend told me that the night before, bassist Kathy Foster said, “Don’t make us go Fugazi on you,” since that band famously stops whenever things get rowdy (“Music is not a contact sport,” after all), and at the show I saw frontman Hutch Harris openly made fun of crowdsurfers and, bearing a snarl, even almost elbowed one when he got too close. While it came nothing close to a metal show, it got annoying quickly.

The band made up for it, though, and their wider audience is well-deserved (even the girl who wore a skull mask, below). Although they’ve gotten some criticism for their new album’s lack of politics, they make up for it with sweaty enthusiasm live, playing songs like “A Pillar of Salt” and “A Stare Like Yours” as if they were on the new album. (“When I Was Afraid” stands out as the best live-version song from Now We Can See, or at least the most memorable the next day.) Thank God the Thermals can surpass the audience’s adrenaline overload with their own hyperactive optimism.