Return to Forever are (left to right): Al Di Meola – guitar, Chick Corea – Keyboards/piano, Stanley Clarke – bass, Lenny White – drums. They reunited after being apart for 25 years and are just kicking off their tour. Tonight was their third show, after their first two shows in Austin.

First off, let me state that I was already a huge fan of this band, as well as a huge follower of both Al Di Meola’s and Chick Corea’s works. Therefore I do not pretend to be objective in this review. This concert kicked Houston’s rear, to say the least.

I was very aware of the musicianship displayed, right from the start. Lenny White gave the impression that, although he does not play a “tuned” instrument, you could hear him playing thematically, right along with everyone else. Each group member traded phrases back and forth with the others, and it was almost creepy how they seemed to read each other’s minds while improvising. At one point, Stanley Clarke was doing a solo on the electric bass and walked over to Chick’s Rhodes keyboard and the exchange they had was something I truly wish I had on video or at least on audio. Clarke improvised an amazing melodic pattern that Corea instantly blended into, playing complimenting chords precisely on the rests of Clarke’s passage, as if he somehow knew the improvisation before it was executed. I am obvisouly having trouble writing out what actually happened. Just take it from me, it was absolutely magical, and it is one of the reasons I love music so much.

Lenny White appeared to be on a musical-political campaign this evening. He spoke between songs at one point about how we may notice that there are no singers or dancers on stage, it’s simply musicians, and that instrumental music needs to make a comeback. He even called on us to help start a musical revolution. I was floored to hear that, since I have been waiting for a revolution like this for a very long time. I could go on about how most of today’s music is complete trash, but that’s another post. Lenny’s best quote of the night: “In an era of boy bands…we are a MAN band!” to which the crowd burst into applause.

Let me just say something about Chick Corea. I wish I could attribute his virtuosity to his countless years of playing with so many different musicians on very high levels, but I went back and listened to some of his old stuff, and he was just as good as then as he is today. I mean, this guy, when he’s playing onstage, if you closed your eyes, you would swear that 3 guys were playing different keyboards at the same time. He is a sight to see on stage. He literally made it look like he was sitting comfortably in his keyboard chair and merely raising his arms to keyboard level and relaxing, and his hands were going crazy all on their own! The level of comfort in his playing is truly astounding.

While I am unable to list every song they performed, I can say that I recognized Romantic Warrior. It must have lasted literally about 30 to 40 minutes, featuring each group member as a soloist for an extended period of time…each. Chick gave an amazing solo performance to start the tune out, then Al Di Meola absolutely shredded on his Ovation acoustic guitar, then left the stage while the rest of the soloists had their turns, then returned for the close of the piece. Di Meola manages to pick every last 16th note triplet by some miracle. It’s truly amazing to see this insanely fast picking in person.

Stanley Clarke was next to solo. He did things on the upright bass that most electric bass players will never be able to pull off on their instruments. At one point he was slapping and popping the upright profusely, with harmonics, and it sounded for a moment like Jaco Pastorius’ Okonkole y Trompa, with the 16th note harmonics that sound like frantic bongos, being so percussive.

Then Lenny White had his turn to solo on the drums. At first he played a little of this and that, which was great, but then he started a bebop swing with his left hand on the ride cymbal (sounds like two 16th notes and an eight note pattern as with most fast bebop, “chicka-dah chicka-dah, etc), and his left foot on the hi-hat (he’s a left-handed drummer that keeps his hi-hat on the left side and all other drums situated just like a right handed drummer, with the exception of the ride cymbal moved to the left side).

What then happened was the most amazing thing I have seen on drums, ever. And I have seen many amazing drum solos (including some of my own. HA! ) While keeping relentlessly steady with his left hand and foot, he played an entirely different drum solo with his right hand and right foot on the bass drum. The right side of his body was completely independent of the left side. The drumming on the right side would change time signatures and even tempo completely, while the left side stayed precisely constant! He even allowed the right side to phase into the timing of the left side, then phase back out again. I can’t begin to explain to you how difficult it is to accomplish this on the drums. My jaw hit the floor and the crowd went wild for White’s performance. (Side note: I have never seen Terry Bozzio play live, but I imagine he may be one of the only other people who could pull something like this off.)

I am truly happy to have seen this band in a relatively intimate setting, compared to the scale of jazz festival s, which are usually held in amphitheaters and I would have to sit on grass. No, the Verizon Wireless here in Houston is grass-free. My friends and I sat about 12 rows back from the stage and to the right, on the Chick Corea side of the stage.

I highly recommmend that you see this tour, because it will most likely not come around again. These guys are very busy musicians with multiple projects each waiting for them, I’m sure. Many of the shows are sold out, so you may have to do the VIP thing just to get in. Best of luck to Chick, Al, Stanley and Lenny. Hopefully this tour will help bridge the gap between generations and begin the music revolution of which Lenny White spoke tonight.

May the syncopated improvised fusion-groove be with you,

Josh Haley

rtf site

SICK PUPPIES!!! This is one of the ONLY bands from the late 90’s and beyond that I truly hold dear to my heart. These guys truly GET IT. Honest, deep-feeling music with no apologies and no boundaries and endless energy. Their studio recordings are amazing in themselves, but to see them live would be a completely unforgettable experience. I finally got to see them in concert on Monday. I had to drive to Austin to do it, but it was worth it. Heck, I would have traveled much farther!

The opening acts were pretty darn good, too. Saving Abel was loud and proud and had some pretty mean deep grooves going on.

Dropping Daylight was great. They brought a ton of energy to the stage and really got the crowd warmed up well. The newest song they played, which talks about suburbia and getting out of its madness was my favorite and has a great guitar riff/hook to it. Check it out.

Here’s a group photo for the tour from last month. From left to right: Dropping Daylight’s bassist, lead singer, lead guitar, drummer, Sick Puppies’ Shimon Moore – guitar and vocals, Mark – drums, Emma Anzai – bass and backing vocals, Saving Abel’s lead singer, drummer, bass player, lead guitarist/ backing vocals.

But the real reason we were there was to meet Emma Anzai in person, I mean, to see the Sick Puppies play live. Can I just tell you how freaking OFF Emma went??? She defies the laws of physics, using her entire petite-sized body to thrash all over the stage during her performance. I used to think I was pretty animated onstage when I played bass for an audience, but DAYUM, girl! You not only make it look so easy, you make it look gooooood! Just check out her moves on the opening song Cancer here on the oart of it that I captured on video. She goes off right from the get-go! The mic on my camera couldn’t handle the wattage being thrown at it, so it is extremely distorted, but you will definitely get the gist of it.

Click here to view the embedded video.

And then from the song Pitiful. She looks almost like she has a pattern for her head-thrashing moves. I love it!

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Click here to view the embedded video.

The entire band was TIGHT, I mean, seriously together and able to pull off amazing syncopated rhythms with ease and complete synchronicity. These guys all claim to be self taught, i.e. no formal training in music. This makes me question the years I spent in school dedicated to music. If only I hung out with an undeniably charismatic and funky bass player while I was a drummer, or managed to plug into the live music scene in Hawaii more while in school…But enough about me…Here’s a couple more stills of Emma:

Yes, she sings backup vocals, and it makes this band sound so much different than the stuff you hear out there nowadays.

And if this picture doesn’t show you just how emotionally and physically connected she is to her music…

The Puppies played almost every song from their latest album Dressed Up As Life, and a couple of classics and even a provocative cover of Destiny’s Child’s Say My Name.

The highlights for me: uh…THE WHOLE THING FRICKEN ROCKED!!! But I have a special place in my soul for Anywhere but Here, Cancer and Pitiful. Emma was all over the stage, thumping her relatively new black ash-bodied Warwick 4-string bass. James, the guitar tech (whom I recognized from the King’s tour) showed me Emma’s new rack for her amp heads before the show. These are just the Ampeg SVT-Classic amp heads and a nice Avalon Ultra Five direct box. Also a Fuhrman power conditioner is used, most likely to tame any surges and protect the tubes in these Ampeg heads. The venue, Emo’s, was so small that only one of her rigs was needed and was all that could fit onstage anyway.

Very impressive

James the guitar tech let me in on a secret/rumor/possibility…. Supposedly King’s X is planning to tour in July with Living Colour and Extreme!! WHAT??? ARE YOU KIDDING ME? I would pay 100 bucks to see that show! BTW, the new Extreme is 50% the recently dissolved Dramagods, which kick most incredible ass. I reviewed their album that never officially came out here..
That show, if it really does happen, would be THE show to see this summer, by far. I have seen King’s X and Living Colour before and they both move me immensely with their music and always will be favorites of mine. Add some Dramagods/Extremism to that mix and I just might lose my mind! Let’s hope it’s a go! Thanks for the tip, James!

After the show the Sick Puppies, Shimon, Emma and Mark, hang out as long as they can to sign autographs and take photos with us fans. Fans buy more merchandise. Everybody wins. My friend and I took turns taking pics.

God bless Emo’s and the Sick Puppies for allowing cameras into their concerts! I like this whole connection/intimacy thing that these bands are able to do now. It’s rough on the feet to stand in one spot for about 3 and 1/2 hours straight, but it’s SO worth it! Incredible, really.

And so this ends my review of one of the most incredible concerts I have ever been to. Long live Sick Puppies, and Emma Anzai – you’re my bass-thumping heroine!

-Josh

PS – one of these days I really need to post a deeply and well thought out review on their album. It deserves it for sure.

PPS – Thanks, Justin for the trip, car, room and hanging out!

Links:

www.myspace.com/sickpuppies

sickpuppies.net

http://www.youtube.com/user/sickpuppies1 (not sure if this one is official, but it has some great vids)

Click here to view the embedded video.

Syesha Mercado – “Got To Get You Into My Life” Not good at all. Totally went flat and could have been SO good, since she was doing the Earth Wind and Fire version and she’s, well…black. But it was too stiff of a performance.

Chekezie – Home boy went OFF tonight on “She’s a Woman”! I totally dug his performance and the arrangement, which started kinda bluegrassy at first then rocked out. He would have made James Brown as well as Lennon and McCartney proud. Then Ryan went absolutley nuts onstage until he ran out of breath it was completely odd. He even rubbed his sweaty head and had to wipe his hands constantly. VERY STRANGE!

Ramiele Malubay – sang “In My Life”…very….slowly. Ugh… I have heard this song a million times but NEVER have Iscreamed to myself “THIS SONG JUST WON’T END!!” but tonight, Ramiele made it so. I like her OK and she does have a good voice and horrible hair, but needed a much better arrangement and a lot more charisma.

Jason Castro – sang “If I Fell” and did a pretty good job, but he better watch out. pretty good is not enough. And it’s a bummer because I like this guy and think he could go far.
Carly Smithson – belted out a huge and awesome version of “Come Together” slightly reminiscent of Aerosmith’s version. She has some serious pipes on her and they served her well. She seems to be really proud of her tattoos on her arm. I wish she would cover them up once or twice, but oh well. Tattoos were meant to be shown off I guess.

David Cook – sang a daring version of the haunting “Eleanor Rigby” and I say he nailed it! This was a killer rocking version of the song and I bet his song gets a lot of downloads on iTunes. I’ll be looking out for the MP3 for sure.

Brooke White – sang and played piano on “Let It Be” and she very wisely stayed put at the piano and let her vocal and the simple arrangement shine. I think it’s a mistake for the contestants to do “diva” stuff for Beatles songs like Syesha did, but Brooke’s performance was perfect and she had her Idol moment tonight for sure. She was moved to tears by the end of it, since it was a dream come true for her.

David Hernandez – slaughtered “When I Saw Her Standing There”. Terrible, terrible terrible. Not even close to good. Opposite of good. Vacuum cleaner sucky.

Amanda Overmeyer – “You Can’t Do That”. Of all the Beatles songs to sing…you can’t do that and expect to get through to next week. But then again, votefortheworst.com is pulling for you, so you just might make it. And am I the only person who thinks she looks and sounds just like Rosanne Barr, give or take a couple hundred pounds?

Michael Johns – sang “Across the Universe”, one of my faves. He kept it simple and I thought he did an OK job. Nothing big happened, so eh. Like Randy says all the time, “it was a’ight, a’ight”.

Kristy Lee Cook – sang “Eight Days A Week” hillbilly style, which was an interesting idea, but it didn’t work. Simon compared her to Dolly Parton…hmm, let’s just leave that that.

Meanwhile, Ryan Seacrest and Simon Cowell were really getting ugly on live TV with the back and forth jibing.

David Archuleta – HE FORGOT THE WORDS!!! OH MY GOODNESS!! This kid is so talented, then he totally blows it with “We Can Work It Out”. He looked super nervous. He said he knew the Stevie Wonder version of the song…which leads me to ask myself..how did I get this far in life not knowing that Stevie covered this song?

So who takes away top honors tonight? I say the top 4 in order are:

1. David Cook
2. Chikezie
3. Brooke White
4. Carly Smithson

Who’s going home? If I have my way, David Hernandez. “Slider… (sniff sniff) you stink.”

:p

Click here to view the embedded video.

1. David Archuleta
2. Jason Castro
3. David C.
4. Michael
5. Chikezie
6. Luke Menard
7. David H.
8. Danny Noriega

So that makes my predictions for being voted out David H. and Danny, but votefortheworst.com is rooting for Danny, so Luke will probably be one of the two to go. You heard it here.

Josh

Kristy Lee Cook Kristy Lee Cook Kristy Lee Cook Kristy Lee Cook…oh sorry, daydreaming again….at night…uh, so… tonight the top 10 girls sang and it was not a good night for most of them. Below are my picks for this round, after the jump:

Here are the results (in my opinion) of the top 10 Guys in week 2 of the live performances, after the jump:

By “Hoss” I mean me, and by “Election” I mean opinion. Taken from the top 12 Gals in week 1 of the live performances, after the jump:

Votefortheworst says to keep Danny Noriega and Amy Davis. I agree with their picks for the worst, but of course do not want them to stay. What do you think?

By “Hoss” I mean me, and by “Election” I mean opinion. Taken from the top 12 Guys in week 1 of the live performances, after the jump:

Tonight another dream of mine came true: to see Van Halen with David Lee Roth live in concert.

I have been a faithful Van Halen follower since the late 70’s when Eddie Van Halen’s first released guitar solo Eruption changed the world of electric guitar and rock and roll forever. Every rock guitar player today knows the name Eddie Van Halen and is influenced by him one way or another.

But I saw Eddie do his thing live on three different occasions before tonight…twice in Honolulu, Hawaii and once right here in Houston, but with Sammy Hagar as the front-man. Tonight I finally got to see the original Van Halen (almost…bassist Michael Anthony is no longer with the band) with David Lee Roth, yes, Diamond Dave himself, fronting the band once again.

Be it known that I LOVE Sammy Hagar, even before he joined Van Halen. He will always be the Red Rocker, and now the heavy metal equivalent to Jimmy Buffet, with his Wabo-rita-let’s-all-go-to-Mexico and eat-fish-and-wear-aloha-shirts-and-drink-Mas-Tequila attitude-with-a-different-latitude. Some of my favorite Van Halen songs/moments come from when Sammy was with the band. But there is something amazing about being able to say that I indeed saw David Lee Roth with the band live, in concert, in Houston. They simply kicked ass.

Eddie was sober and healthy looking. Alex never missed a beat on drums. New bassist Wolfgang laid low but was able to have a few moments in the spotlight. Roth was same old Roth…tons of attitude, martial arts and sexual innuendo. Oh, and he can still sing, too.

I will say this about Roth’s vocal chops of present: I think I can Roth-Hawk better than he can. In most songs tonight, when we expected him to make his signature sqwuak of a scream, he just wouldn’t do it. His voice must be thrashed from “all those crazy years gone past”. I didn’t mind helping him him out, even though I was sitting in nosebleed seats at the Toyota Center. Actually, my friend mentioned tonight that this would be the last time he settled for the cheaper seats, because it’s just too important of an occasion to be trying to save a couple of bucks. I have to agree.

The sound mix, at least from my angle, left much to be desired, but it didn’t seem to matter after a few songs. The band just drew us all into their catalog of songs from the old Van Halen days, not one of them being a song from after 1984 (the year and the album). OK, for all of the geeks out there who really need it to be said, yes, technically there was one passage of music that was not written until about 1990 or so. The 316 bit that Eddie did for his solo. There, I mentioned it, now go get a life.

In an effort to get this blog out there, I will end my comments here for now. Following is the setlist from the show last night and some notes. I hear Van Halen is touring well into April. I hope you all get a chance to see them!

Setlist and notes:

• You Really Got Me
• I’m the One
• Running with the Devil
• Romeo Delight (Wolfgang tapping on bass…not bad)
• Roth on Harmonica/Scat leading into…
• Somebody Get Me A Doctor
  • During the breakdown of the song, they go into a Crossroads tribute. Nice!
• Beautiful Girls
• Dance the Night Away
  • (Dave’s hat trick. His top hat is magically held up by his crotch.)
• Atomic Punk (without all of the Roth-hawk screams…sigh.)
• Everybody Wants Some
  • (Roth vocal imitation of a Harley – impressive! vs Eddie’s guitar. Eddie won! I also loved how when Dave finally got around to the line “I like the way the line runs down the back of your stockings” the crowd went nuts!)
• So This Is Love
• Mean Street (That tapping is still just as impressive as the first time I heard it!)
• Pretty Woman
• Alex Drum Solo
• Unchained (Wolfgang gets to say “C’mon Dave, gimme a break”)
• I’ll Wait (canned keyboard parts)
• The Cradle Will Rock (also canned keys)
• Hot For Teacher
• Little Dreamer
• Little Guitars (I almost lost my mind that they actually played one of my faves…this lesser known track)
• Jamie’s Cryin’ (great but hard not to hear Tone Loc’s Wild Thing now. Damn him!)
• Dave acoustic guitar/storytelling
  • He talked about the actual ice cream truck his friend had. They threw away the ice cream and kept the beer cold for the party that night. Also about how he sang this song to his Mexican girlfriend? OK, Dave.
• Ice Cream Man
• Panama
• Eddie Guitar Solo
  • Little Guitars intro
  • Spanish Fly
  • 316
  • Drum stick tapping blues
  • Cathedral
  • Eruption
• Ain’t Talking ‘Bout Love
• Encore: 1984/Jump

Over 2 hours solid of Rock and Roll history I was very glad to be a part of! Somebody give me a shot!

Here’s a decent video from a different night showcasing a few of the songs. Thanks to youtube user VandeGroep.

Click here to view the embedded video.

On the way home today, listening to 103.7 Jack FM in Houston, they kept playing song after song that I knew and liked. After a while, I realized that they were leaping from decade to decade and genre to genre all over the place:

They went from Motley Crue’s Dr. Feelgood to Gwen Stefani’s Sweet Escape to Rod Stewart’s Hot Legs to Stone Temple Pilots’ Interstate Love Song, all with no hesitation. These are all songs and artists that I happen to like, so apparently there is a market out here for this approach to radio programming!

And their mantra was basically “We play what we want. No requests. No dedications. What we want. Period.” And then a bunch of great music began to play again.

Right before a commercial break I heard (paraphrasing) “It’s commercial time. We get cold, hard cash from advertisers. You get a bunch of great songs in a row. That’s it.” I love the idea that a radio station is taking the approach that its listeners are smart enough to understand how things work in the world of commercial broadcast radio (and tv for that matter.) No pandering. No apologizing. Just playing music from all over the genre map.

The unpredictability of the song programming is like hitting shuffle on my iPod (well, not an actual iPod. I have a Cowon iAudio 5. Much more flexible than an iPod. ) Now that I think about it, I don’t remember hearing much in the way of a real person on the station, except to break in for a traffic update here and there, so this could be a money-saving feature to simply hit shuffle on the music catalog and have an engineer stay at the station to hang out and make sure that the power doesn’t go out or something.

“Jack FM. We don’t have time for requests. We’re too busy playing what we want!”

“Jack FM. One station. All kinds of music.”

Nice!

I even heard a teaser that had a sound byte from Saga’s On the Loose! Now who the hell plays that on the radio, like, ever? I love Saga! It’s about freakin’ time! These guys rule!

The band jumped right into “Grind“, another great track from their 1995 self-titled album. I was reminded at the genius of the band’s sound. The guitar part and bass parts are usually not “the same” as in rhythm and chords. This song illustrates it well. On the surface, it sounds like both instruments are doing the simple “jung-jung..jung-jung” double eighth-note rhythm. But the subtle difference is that the bass holds onto it’s second of the two notes and slides down each time, making the already heavy notes seem 20 times heavier, so heavy that the player can’t keep them up as they keep sliding down.

The guitar part is those same two notes, then two more, but as chords, outlining the root and minor third of the song’s tonality. The cycle of this rhythm can be construed as nothing other than a relentless grind, which, combined with the lyrics make quite the homogeneous dark song. When the song reaches the chorus, the vocal harmonies simply soar and for a moment, an inexperienced listener might not understand why that “positive”, “upbeat” sound of the chorus would belong in this genre of music at all, less such a dark song. BUT IT WORKS! So very well. It’s difficult to describe how well this songwriting works! On to the next song performed:

Jerry Cantrell cranked out the intro to the first song on their first album Facelift (1990), “We Die Young“. This picked the pace of the set up quite a bit and everyone was rocking out. It also gave DuVall a chance to really strut his vocals. Even by this third song in the set list, it still hadn’t sunk in to me or many around me that we were actually watching Alice In Chains perform live, right in front of us. It was truly surreal. For long-time fans, it is especially sweet since we know the history and how once Layne Staley died and AIC disbanded, they had told the media that that was it. No more Alice In Chains, that they would never get back together or write new music as Alice In Chains without Staley. Thank God for people who say “never” and tempt God/fate what have you, because they finally came around and agreed to get back together AND write new material as Alice in Chains, which makes the likes of me VERY excited!

Borrowing from the faster pace of “We Die Young”, the band launched right into “Them Bones“, which is THE definitive Alice In Chains song, in my book. This is the song that has it all: odd time signatures, dark and crunchy guitar, parallel 4th and 5th vocal harmonies, dark and crunchy guitar, desperate, painful themes and dark and crunchy guitar. At only 2 and a half minutes, this song gets in quick, punches you in the nuts and gets right out, leaving the listener to wonder what the heck just hit them, yet wanting more!

The tone slowed back down with the slippery bass line intro to “Rain When I Die“, an increbilbly dark and powerful song that starts with the guitar solo before the first verse. (Side note: I am SO in admiration of the fact that this song is in 6/4 time as well. How many friggen metal songs pull off 6/4 so seemlessly? This guitar riff is SO perfect for it, I just have to say.) I honestly don’t know exactly how well DuVall did with this song because I was busy singing along with this song at the top of my lungs! Singing along with this song (and later on “Rooster” was a huge highlight for me.)

Sheeeeee won’t le-eeeeeeet me hi-iiiiiide.
Sheeeeeee don’t want meeeeeee to cryyyyyyyyy!

(fyi, this particular youtube vid includes a guest gutarist from Kill Hannah)

Cantrell then cranked up the grungy-crunchy intro to “It Ain’t Like That“, another chance for DuVall to show off his vocal chops and sensitivity to the original singer’s version. The one thing I noticed about this song live that separates it from the original is the chorus. The original recorded chorus uses 3 eighth notes in triplet groupings and the song stays in time, as in, does not slow down. In the live version, they really slowed it down on this part to about the speed of quarter note triplets and it gave the chorus an incredible punch and emphasis that was not there previously. I really dugg it. Hard to describe. OK, I found a vid from another night so you can see what I mean. (They do it sorta in this vid but it seemed like it hung forever last night at my concert)

There were two songs that I was REALLY hoping they would play last night…Junkhead and Down In A Hole. And that’s exactly what they played next! I was about to lose my mind!

Junkhead, as many of their songs are, is about drugs.

“You can’t understand a user’s mind, but try with your books and degrees.”

and

“What’s my drug of choice? Well, what have you got?”

This song continually testifies to me the anguish and pain and helplessness that a heroin addict must feel, which keeps me even farther away from the stuff than I already am. I love the effectiveness in which this band is able to communicate these feelings through this music, to people who have not experienced what they have, like me. Pain by proxy, I guess, and for some reason, I really, really dig it.

(Here’s a version of it live before the studio release AND with Layne Staley! Enjoy!)

Down in a Hole is a less grinding song than Junkhead, but is no less poignant in demonstrating helplessness and isolationism:

Down in a hole and I don’t know if I can be saved
See my heart I’ve decorated like a grave
You don’t understand who they thought I was supposed to be
Look at me now a man who won’t let himself be

Down in a hole, feeling so small
Down in a hole, losing my soul
I’d like to fly,
But my wings have been so denied

This song is also one of their best musically crafted songs. The woven vocal harmonies throughout are very slick and enticing, almost a lullaby that Staley was singing to himself while alone in that hole of which he sings. The live version is well done and the moody lighting helped illustrate the story.

The classic grunge guitar sound can be heard in all of their music, but the intro to Angry Chair, which they played next, is one of the most recognizable grunge guitar intros ever. The droning of the parallel 4th/5th vocal harmonies on the verses is contrasted by the chorus section with the more melodic:

I don’t mind, yeah
I don’t mind, I-I-I
Lost my mind, yeah
But I don’t mind, I-I-I
Can’t find it anywhere
I don’t mind

The tempo of this song allowed the band to slide right into their very popular hit “Man In The Box.”. The crowd went nuts! So did I! As I looked closer at the band on stage, I realized they were being joined by a 5th person who was tall, black and holding a microphone. IT WAS DUG PINNICK OF KING’S X!!! I completely lost my mind at that point! I wanted to scream, sing, call someone, write it down and rush the stage all at once, I was so beside myself! I ended up simply watching as intently as I could to get as much detail on this impromtu treat that was hapenneing right before my eyes! Dug and DuVall alternated phrases, and I have to tell you, when it was Dug’s turn to sing…oh my…THAT GUY CAN SING! He “Put A Little Soul” into that performance for sure! He changed up the lyrics a bit in a soulful way that was completely amazing! I still can’t believe what I saw. Just a few minutes ago, I commented on Dug’s myspace about it, letting him know how fricken awesome that was! I did overhear yougner people in the crowd asking “who the heck is that guy?”, but I know. No, WE know, Justin and I. Hell yes!!!!

I’m the dog who gets beat
Shove my nose in s%t
Won’t you come and save me, save me

Well somebody needed to come save ME after a surprise like that! That was just too much! After the song, Dug waved and hopped backstage and the thundering unmistakable bass line intro to “Would?” blared. Yes, the question mark is part of the song title, so shut up.

This is another popular Alice song that defined grunge and their sound back in the day and was even featured in the Singles soundtrack, a grunge-days early 90’s movie with Matt Dillon and Bridget Fonda, but I digress.

Into the flood again
Same old trip it was back then
So I made a big mistake
Try to see it once my way

DuVall shined on this performance and proved that he belongs in this band at this time. Seeing the entire crowd shout the end of the song with fist pumps was very cool:

IF…..I……..WOULD……COULD…….YOU?

Hell……….YES! That was so awesome. And I just knew they would play that song. I also had a feeling they wouldn’t be able to escape alive from the pavillion without playing Rooster, and they did not dissappoint! Rooster was next and was the closing song.

Once again, the crowd played its part in the eerie begining (and end) to Rooster:

Oo-oo-oo-oooh Ooh Ooh Ooh Oohooh ooh ooh ooh

The whole crowd was united and surprisingly in tune! Throughout the beginning of the tune, cell phone lights and lighters were all lit, everyone chilling and letting the song pour over them:

Ain’t found a way to kill me yet
Eyes burn with stinging sweat
Seems every path leads me to nowhere
Wife and kids household pet
Army green was no safe bet
The bullets scream to me from somewhere

Here they come to snuff the rooster
Yeah here come the rooster

(and then this next downbeat is when it gets very loud and the crowd goes INSANE!)

Ah, YEAH
you know he ain’t gonna die
No, no, no ya know he ain’t gonna die

When I hear the guitar “singing” the melody after this part (especially in the many, many times I have heard it on the studio version), Jerry lets the last note of the phrase, a minor 7th in the key of the song, it just sits there and rings and makes no apologies and it, to me, has always been a goose-bump or chills moment in the song. To experience that live was INCREDIBLE. I actually shut my eyes for most of that part and just let it wash over me. I wonder if anyone else besides Jerry knows what I mean about this. (it begins at 2:34 in the studio version. Just……go and listen to it, please.) It’s one of my favorite moments in all of Alice’s music.

The song had to end at some point and it was time for them to leave. They graciously stayed on stage for a good minute or so (some bands just bolt when they’re done…ahem Rush!) and you could tell that they were very grateful to all of the support and that they wanted to play more. I predict they headline a tour in a year to support and album that is supposedly in the works! That would be as important to me as the Beatles reuniting after John died, were it to happen. In a way, I guess it did for those two songs. Of course, now we are down to only 2 Beatles, but that’s another story.

Please! Long live Alice in Chains and their unique and amazing sound, and with the absence (I believe) of drug abuse, what will their new material sound like? What will it be about? They still have so much to draw upon, I am certain.

After the stage change, Velvet Revolver came on and played for an hour and a half or so. I have never seen a Guns n Roses show from back in the day, and didn’t know much Velvet stuff, so I wasn’t expecting much. (You can read more about about that part of it at Mike McGuff’s blog here.) VR was OK, but it completely paled in comparison to Alice’s historical show. They played Patience, It’s So Easy and Mr. Brownstone from the GNR repertoire and Intertstate Love Song and Sex Type Thing from the Stone Temple Pilots repertoire, all of which rocked very much. But what does it say when the GNR and STP songs completely outperform the VR songs? Sad, really. I guess I can say I saw Slash and Duff, though, so that’s cool. But I feel so disrespectful even talking about them in the same breath as ALICE IN CHAINS!!!! I will never forget that concert last night! Thanks Justin!

Josh

Rather than go into generalizations of the album, I will list details, per track and allow you to come up with your own general idea of the way this album makes me feel. But I will say I already love this album very much and it will stand as a very important album to me from now on.

1. Megaton

Drop C tuning. Very King’s X sounding riff starts out the song. The guitar’s effect is like an organ sound with a leslie spinning, a sound from the 60’s and 70’s. The verse/lyrics are almost all 16^th note upbeats, which plays off of the drum and bass beat. Very cool. At The pre-chorus section is very open, lyrical with “ohs” in the background.

3:09 – The bridge leading to the guitar solo is actually the band “trading fours” like in a jazz quartet or trio, when all instruments play for 4 beats or 4 bars, depending on the song, and the next four beats or bars are either a drum solo or another instrument soloing while only the drums play…In this case it was the guitar and bass trading off. They don’t do this for too long, since this is not jazz, but just enough to make the track sound very playful and allowing the musicians to have some fun with it. I can’t think of a single rock or metal song that used this device in a song.

The guitar solo begins with the same note played as 4 16^th notes, changing notes every 4 16ths over the minor key. The leaps in pitches for this part of the solo and the rhythm remind me of Missing Persons’ Windows (listen to the guitar part playing straight 16ths and leaping 5ths and 4ths like in this song). It is somewhat doubled / harmonized by the synth, giving a deep texture to the track. The drums get a chance to do some closing fills or mini-solos at the very end.

2. Lockdown

There’s a Moog in my Metal! This song absolutely rocks!
This song has one of the best drum intros I think we will hear in a very long time. The 16^th note funk feel is established in the very first 2 bars without. The chorus sounds a lot like most of the “alternative” rock out today, which is not my favorite, but this song makes the whole thing sound so fresh, that it may just be what I needed to get into that sound. I imagine that people who are into bands like Puddle of Mudd would relate well to this song’s chorus. The bridge slows the whole song down a bit in feel at least, since the rest of the song is so constant of a 16^th note drive. Then the wicked guitar solo ensues with quarter note cowbell banging away in the background.

3. Bury You

This song could be considered a catchy rock ballad. The vocal on this are very silky and smooth, over a relatively standard andante (walking) swing-rock groove á la Aerosmith. The pre-chorus and chorus allow singer and guitarist Nuno Bettencourt to sing in his upper register, which is very strong and clear. He does not use vibrato at all which lends to the silky smooth sound.

The chords used are not the standard 3 power chords. They stretch the tonal center enough to make it more interesting but not so much that it becomes indulgent and loses half its listeners.

4. Broken

I can’t help but think of Led Zeppelin’s The Battle of Evermore, the one with the mandolins playing 2 against 3 meter; the beat drifts back and forth between the two. It’s a great acoustic piece to offset the massiveness of the other really heavy tracks. Even the ballads can get loud and heavy, so this brings it all down to a very intimate level. The bridge uses some synth to give it a little texture, and at the end it even sounds a little like the intro to the Beatles’ Strawberry Fields Forever, thanks to what sounds like the mellotron synth. A very “mello” string/flute sound. It gives it that throwback sound…60’s/70’s all over again.

The acoustic guitar playing is excellent and quite refreshing, not only for this album, but in general in the current state of rock and popular music. The drumming is very subdued, as if they only allowed the drummer to use brushes and sand bags to play on this track. It lets the guitar and vocals shine while lending a folk-sounding but driving beat. The vocal on this track is very bluesy. Well done.

5. Pilots

This track begins with a pipe-organ intro that is reminiscent of Bon Jovi’s Slippery When Wet, but much more mature sounding. Then comes the syncopated guitar riff that makes the song what it is. The guitar strokes dance around the 4/4 beat. Anytime you break up the beat into 16ths and make accents or beat patterns in groups of three AND use the 2^nd 16^th beat of the first quarter-note beat…you have what I call the classic “King’s X” floating beat. It is prevalent in their music as well as in much Earth Wind and Fire and other funk music. It is very 16^th note-funky, although in this song they are able to make it seem flowing and rocking rather than just funky. The great vocal and harmonizing soars over the syncopation. The lyrics are somewhat subtly about an infatuation with a stewardess on a redeye flight.

6. Interface

This is a sad song about heartbreak and separation “I’m tired of what we are, I’m tired of all the pain, I’m losing you and you are losing me”

The great thing about this song are the nuances. Every now and the then the drums just stop for a few beats, as if it hurts too much to continue, like it’s difficult to get through the song. Also, the guitar on the vamp or pre-verse part plays these harmonics with lots of reverb (doubled by the synth) painting a picture of teardrops falling, hitting a puddle (at least, that’s what I see.)

The vocals during the verse are low in register and volume, keeping the feeling personal, drawing the listener in. The chorus is in a higher register and strong, the wailing almost of a tortured soul. The chorus harmonies sound a LOT like Nuno himself when he sang “More than Words” with Gary Cherone in Extreme. The guitar solo is minimalist in its simplicity, heavy fuzzy distortion, with lots of feedback and simple but tortured lyrical lines.

7. Heavy

Heavy, indeed! The guitar/bass riff on this song is right out of Rage Against the Machine or King’s X, Audioslave or Moke. Very hard, steady and very cool. Add to that the synthesizer and it’s a fresh take on the whole sound. With the chorus and Nuno almost yelling “On your mark, get Set, Go! Go! Go!”, it has a very positive, energetic vibe.

The drums play in half time to the constant steady 8^th note guitar riff (making it a slow 16^th note riff, if you look at it that way), making it very groovy.

The verse sets the dark tone, relentless in its groove’s repetition, then at 1:24 something completely amazing and unexpected happens: the song just opens up to higher register, strummed jazzy 13^th and 7^th, suspended 4^th and 9^th chords, with synth strings backing, giving it a completely refreshing new sound, and it hits you that you are listening to a new genre of music. The drum pattern is basically the same through this part, keeping the song from sounding like someone simply slapped a chunk from a different song altogether into this one, and it unifies it while allowing the rest of the music to “depart” temporarily to a more tonal and beautiful place. Absolutely amazing the first time I heard it.

In the middle of the song, a second theme/chord change structure is used. This theme is then layered on the first. The repeated chords sound like Yes’s Starship Trooper at the end, when it loops and loops and just builds. A bridge lyric then a guitar solo ensues over these changes. The synth in the background here is like Led Zeppelin’s “All My Love” off of In Through the Out Door.

Overall, this is one of my favorite tracks on the album because of the completely new sound they have managed to come up with here and for the positive vibe it exudes.

8. Something About You

This song is the most mature of the set of songs. It has something about it…that makes it seem like it could last a long time and be covered by other bands later, etc. Fender Rhodes lends a folky sound to the otherwise standard rock ballad instrumentation. Later, rock organ adds texture. The vocal phrasing is clever and almost Dylan-like. The bridge goes over some very refreshing chord changes, breathing new life into the song and sending back the standard chord changes for the bluesy guitar solo. The song is overall very sensuously sung and could easily get a lot of airplay.

9. Fearless Leader

This is the black sheep track of the album for me. It has great analog synthesizer sounds throughout and a rocking beat. The turn-off for me is the lame “hey!” and the almost rapping vocal part in the verses. The closest thing I can compare the singing on this track to is Moke’s Slide on the verses. It also could be compared to many Rage Against the Machine vocal stylings.

The song in the end is not nearly as memorable as the others, but is still a rocking song if I can get over the couple of hang-ups I have about it.

10. Sometimes

I really liked this song when I heard it the first few times. Then I read the lyrics and I was blown away. Here is the chorus:

You plus me relentlessly
We’re taking on the future
I’m not about to lose you

You plus me insanity
Ride the storm before the calm

I totally wrote a poem like this for my wife a long time ago. I’ll have to dig it up for proof, but I could not believe it when I saw these lines. That feeling you get when you hear a song and you feel like it should have been you that wrote it, well this one hits me right to the core, for sure.

The second verse is very romantic and honest like just barely overcoming the fear of the prospect of a huge step in a relationship:

Sometimes it’s real
Sometimes it feels like a pre-recorded life

Sometimes you might forget to breathe
Use my lungs and breathe in with me

The 6/8 flowing 2-beat feel of this song is infectious and purposeful.

The synth solo (using a square lead patch with portamento – one of my favorite synth sounds) is amazing. It releases the tension built up in the bridge, which uses more dissonance and tribal-like drumming. The solo carries you away above it all and gently places you back down into the chorus later. This synth solo reminds me of Styx and Yes music from back in the 70’s when it was more common to use that type of synth sound in an improvised manner.

As if it weren’t enough, I was absolutely blown away yet again by the “outro” to this song. There are two things about it that are very cool:

One . Ok, the tonal center for the chorus is a very strong Bb major. The melody itself is “You plus me” 3, 5, 1 in triad speak, making the Bb major key as solid as it can be. Then the outro plops the listener right into D major with the flat 7^th (also known as D7). The D, A and C in that chord all fit nicely into Bb major, BUT the one note that makes it a completely different tonal center is the F, which is the major third in the D triad. As some may know the 3^rd of a triad is one of THE most important characteristics of any triad. It lets us know if it is a minor or major triad. The fifth of a triad is usually a perfect fifth in much western music, but F in the key of Bb would be known as an augmented fifth, a very unstable interval/chord. Since the listener’s brain is freshly pounded with Bb as the tonal center, it is then almost surreal to hear the F over D droning on during the outro. It blew me away. I LOVE endings like this, where the tonal center completely shifts.

Two. I also love how this outro seems like a tribute or is reminiscent of King’s X. They have a couple of songs that end with a looping droning mellow guitar part over snare drumming, just like in this song. (Listen to the outro of King’s X’s The Burning Down and Picture for comparison)

I am totally in love with this song.

11. S’OK

The intro to this song is some great double stop hand picking on a lightly distorted guitar, à la Eddie Van Halen on Little Guitars. The chord changes remind me of the intro to Every Little Thing She Does is Magic by The Police. And things are moving along quite nice and mellow, until 0:53 when they break into a massively heavy groove, again not unlike King’s X and Rage Against the Machine/Audioslave or Moke. This time, the synth bass lends itself to an even beefier texture for the riff.

The lyrics are rather vague, but generally say that it’s going to be OK, to overcome fear and so forth. It’s refreshing to hear upbeat, positive music that also shreds the proper sacrifices to the blues-metal gods!

Speaking of shredding, the guitar solo on this song is particularly insane, but not too indulgent (for too long anyway!) and showcases Nuno’s chops quite well, sweeping and false-harmonics flying all over the place near the end of it!

The song leaves you wanting more, so it’s an easy song to leave on repeat for a while. It would be great to hear it on the radio sometime.

12. Replay

This song sounds a bit more like grunge than the others. It is a reflective ballad on the current state of affairs in the world. Colors of 9-11 and perhaps even Iraq are used (I don’t know for sure if that is what they were writing about, but it brings those themes to my mind).

And you see it over and over
In replay it’s never easy to know
That it’s all been done

The chorus makes me think of seeing the planes hit the twin towers over and over on 9-11 and the days following, but again, it may be a completely different thing the writer is going for.

The song has a soberness to it that provokes thought on its seriousness. The vocals for the ending third or so of the song are in a higher register, sounding a bit like Bono from U2, and sounding more optimistic, like things in the world might get better soon. I wouldn’t call the track filler by any means, but it does get outshined by the other tracks.

13. It’s Nice to Meet You

This song is just flat out FUN! It is catchy and rocking and grooving, in a bluesy classic-rock way. It employs rich vocal harmonies that use major 7^th chords not typically heard in rock music, but is so masterfully used in this song.

The vocal harmonies in the pre-chorus are almost pop-like, yet the metal-grooving guitar bass and drums are relentless underneath. The synth adds even more texture, again, and creates a throwback feeling to the late 60’s and 70’s synth prog-rock. Imagine the Black Crowes’s rhythm section from Hard to Handle , Yes keyboards for texture, and John Lennon’s vocal from Tomorrow Never Knows and the tight soulful vocal harmonies of King’s X and voila! This is what you get. And it is fresh-sounding and GOOD!

The guitar solo in this song is very soulful, yet as it is played over the pop-style major 7^th chord structure, it also has pop appeal to it, which you can’t help but love, even if you’re a rocker that’s afraid to admit it!

If that weren’t enough, the clever lyrics are about a bullfight, from the bull’s perspective! I don’t think anyone in rock and roll has been able to pull that off!

14. Sky

This song seems to be melancholy. The writer wants to escape the things that are troubling him. The piano is the main instrument for this song, and adds to the song a sober sadness,. The melody for the verse is beautifully lyrical, with leaps up and down the scale.

The end of the song is reminiscent of many psychedelic Beatles songs with odd chord changes repeating and repeating while layers of other sounds occur overhead.

~
Josh–

Check them out on here on MySpace:

VAI, the band.. it’s a BAND this time…you must understand, February 21, 2002
Reviewer: “heyjosh” (CA United States) – See all my reviews
This is one of those magical albums with a union of such musicians that the result of the union becomes infinitely more powerful than the sum of the individuals.

We all know how insanely great Steve is (been hooked ever since Flex-able), but think for a moment about the other musicians: TERRY BOZZIO on drums. This guy has a style (especially on this album) that completely blows me away. NOTHING like it out there. (Check out “Still My Bleeding Heart”, especially at the end).

1st time listeners, what just smacked you upside the head was the percussive yet soulful and at times powerfully shrill vocals of Devon Townsend. This Canadian power-vocalist means business. If you don’t care for screaming vocals, fine, but the passion and power of his performances cannot be overlooked.

Add TM Stevens’s funky yet unobtrusive bass chops in to the mix and we already have an incredible band that I would listen to.

Bring it all together with the unparalelled chops and MUSICALITY (here’s the key many reviews before have missed) of Mr. Vai to this band and album, and you have Sex & Religion.

While the thematic content of much of the album is somewhat controversial (ritual suicide, loud disagreements…over morality), it is overall a very passionate album. Each member of this band has completely convinced me that they played their hearts out on this. Yet the grooves and melodies and sweetly crunchy guitar riffs are not sacrificed.

Highlights: “In My Dreams With You” is a beautifully nasty ballad. “Survive” is a great vocal/guitar anthem set to tribal funk that will not be ignored. “Still My Bleeding Heart” amazes me every single time I hear it. Bozzio and Townsend go OFF!! “Touching Toungues” is a moving instrumental that provides balance to the album (also note the vocals used as instrument by Devon. Very nice!) “State of Grace” is middle-eastern flavored instrumental precursor to Fire Garden.

This album pumps me up when I feel down and allows release when I feel angry. But that’s just me. I give it 5 stars. The only thing that breaks my heart is the fact that this band is no more and probably never again will be. Each musician has moved on to many other things and directions since this album. Sure was great while it lasted.