Night Ranger Hole In The Sun is the newest album from one of the favorite 80s bands. Dawn Patrol (1982) and Midnight Madness (1983) were two awesome albums from a band that might have pigeonholed themselves as being too mellow, but these guys can seriously rock. 7 Wishes (1985) was the last studio album I liked a lot. Since the late 80s they’ve released five studio albums: Man in Motion (1988), Feeding off The Mojo (1995), Neverland (1997), Seven (1998) and their newest album Hole In The Sun. Where does Hole fit in their body of work? I’d say in the middle. It’s not among their best, but it’s no embarassment.
Warning: before buying this album through musicane - read the section at the bottom of this post
I’ve had Hole In The Sun in the playlist cycling and trying to get into it. The problem with Night Ranger is their first two albums were so good that everything that follows is being compared to a high benchmark. It’s a good thing they have some great musicians in Jack Blades who got together with Damn Yankees and more recently with Tommy Shaw in the project Shaw-Blades (recommended). Blades keeps the bass line down as well as Night Ranger vocals.
Brad Gillis is the whammy bar master axe grinder who was good enough to enjoy a short stint with Ozzy on the Speak of the Devil album covering Sabbath songs. If you don’t think that Gillis can play, just pick that album up someday. Add Jeff Watson as a co-guitarist (their description, not mine) and you have a solid one-two punch on the six strings. Hey, and Kelly Keagy is no slouch pounding the skins either.
As for the guy with the shades on the back of the Midnight Madness CD (Alan Fitzgerald?)? Seven seems to have been his last studio album with the band. Fitzgerald is also absent from "the band" page on nightranger.com. Disappointed to see him missing too as keyboards are an important part of the classic Night Ranger sound. Don’t worry, they have Great White’s Michael Lardie on the keys on the album.
Unfortunately you won’t find Watson or Lardie on the 2008 Night Ranger tour to support Hole In The Sky.
That’s right, Watson and Lardie have both left Night Ranger again already. Watson has been replaced by Joel Hoekstra and Lardie by Christian Cullen. Who are these guys? I’d have to Google them to learn more because apparently they aren’t important or well known enough to make "the band" page on nightranger.com yet. Why do they diss new band members like this? Somebody get their webmaster motoring.
Track List and review notes
1. "You’re Gonna Hear It From Me" - thundering drum intro with nice use of power chords and floor tom. Makes a statement that this isn’t album isn’t going to be as mellow as Night Ranger fans might expect. I like this one.
2. "Tell Your Vision" - Another good rocker track. Didn’t immediately like this one, but it grew on me quickly. Solo rips. The main riff reminds me a lot of another song by another band, but I can’t think of the name. This album is off to a strong start.
3. "Drama Queen" - I’m not sure who’s singing the main vocals on this one, but the vocals seem off. This one has a Def Leppard type of feel to it and would be better with Joe Elliot singing, especially with the whole "come on, come on, come on…" part. The dueling guitar solos are pure Night Ranger and great stuff.
4. "Whatever Happened" - breaking out the cry baby wah for the intro and outro, nice. Rest of song kind of reminds me of "All Star" by Smash Mouth. Would have liked to have more of that wah peddle doing something like Gary Richrath did on Wheels or Turning album by REO Speedwagon. A little too fluffy.
5. "There Is Life" - the first mellow track which starts with a piano. Think "Sister Christian" or "Sentimental Street" but without the strong lyrical hooks. The chorus is sticky, but it doesn’t have classic written on it. Not bad, not great, but solid and satisfying.
6. "Rockstar" - I don’t care for the tinty verse sound or the chorus. Seems too whiny. This is my least favorite track thus far.
7. "Hole In The Sun" - The guitar solo is great. Easily my favorite part of many lesser known songs like this by them. The rest of the song is just OK. This feels like we’re on B-side material.
8. "Fool In Me" - Acoustic guitar. The second mellow track on the album with a nice melody and lyrics but the bongo drums ruined it a bit for me.
9. "White Knuckle" - strong guitar intro and some effective keyboard work. This feels like one of those grow on you over multiple plays tracks.
10. "Revelation 4AM" - Another mellow track, some good bass work here.
11. "Wrap It Up" - this one’s not for me.
12. "Being" - mellow track number four and the weakest of the bunch. Would have rather seen them end the album on a rocker note.
13. Don’t Tell Me You Love Me (Acoustic) - see below
14. Sister Christian (Acoustic) - it’s nice hearing acoustic / unplugged versions but the inclusion of these tracks on the album seem more like a sales thing than adding anything that thrilling to the original versions. Don’t get me wrong, the acoustic guitar playing is skilled and entertaining, but I’d rather hear the originals.
Thinking that some fans might only buy the album if it comes with bonus acoustic tracks of past versions. Personally, I think if they want to do bonus songs, they should provide live versions of the new studio tracks so fans can get an idea of how the songs would sound live rather than trying to return to the hits well from the past. It makes sense that people are going to want to hear how the tunes would sound live on the upcoming tour. Bands that don’t do complete versions of their studio tracks live are missing a sales/marketing opportunity.
Rocky Musicane purchase experience Purchasing the new Night Ranger Hole In The Sun album through Musicane 320kbps proved to be more challenging than it should have been. Musicane is in beta, so they should be given a little slack, but nightranger.com is promoting using them — and so am I in the top of this post, so I want readers to be on high alert.
First off I kept receiving "invalid token" errors when trying to pay via PayPal. Then I used my PayPal credit card and the transaction went through the first time, but also displayed error messages. When I logged into PayPal, I learned that they had charged me three times for the same album.
Grr. I fired off an email to customercare [->] musicane.com to see if they would please cancel the two extraneous charges and waited for a response. Right away I was given an automated ticket number to track the sale information, but didn’t hear back from a customer support person right away on a Monday. Not a great sign. I’ll update this section as to what happens, but I added a "warning:" message below the link above for readers. You might want to get this CD at Amazon or your local music store instead of buying online like I did.
The quality of the MP3 files is high, although it didn’t come with album art. I was able to get that from the Night Ranger official website.
Summary and grade My first listen-through on the album yielded different feeling than subsequent ones have. It’s no Dawn Patrol or Midnight Madness, but you likely expected that. It’s not even 7 Wishes, but I’d put this ahead of Seven and tied with Man In Motion. There are a few scattered tracks that I really like here. I’ve never seen Night Ranger live and feel like this album and accompanying tour would be a good opportunity. Do regret the fact that I can’t play any of these tunes on Rock Band or Guitar Hero (why not?), but that has nothing to do with my review grade that follows. Grade: B
If you can hold your grudges over Metallica’s rocky past with the internet and sharing and look at what they are doing today with sharing their music online, it’s impressive. At LiveMetallica.com since 2004 you can buy Metallica concerts, often within 48 hours of the concert date in both MP3 ($9.99) and FLAC ($12.99) format. I’m not aware of many other bands that offer this much material, this soon, after concerts air. I still have my eye on buying the Key Arena concert we went to in 2004. These are mixing board recordings and the one in MP3 formath I have purchased thus far sounded good, albeit a bit disappointing at 128kbps.
At their newer site MissionMetallica.com you can register for free and gain free access to download several full past concerts plus get nearly daily updates on the upcoming album: Death Magnetic.
And speaking of Death Magnetic, the 7/17 update shares the album art for the new album (pictured above). You can download from MissionMetallica the album art in the following resolutions: 1280×1024, 1024×768, 800×600 as well as instant messenger buddy icons. One thing missing from the MissionMetallica.com website are RSS updates and podcasts. There are regular updates with some meat on the bones, check this screenshot out:
Experience #2: $24.99 includes everything that Experience #1 (FREE) includes (whichI’ve written about in this post) plus download of Death Magnetic at midnight on street date at 320kbps + downloads of two entire shows from the summer tour + almost 2 hrs. of additional "fly on the wall" footage + 250 additional photos, ringtones of riffs from the new album + exclusive contests and $10 off merch or Fan Club membership at Metallica.com.
Experience #3: $32.99 includes everything from Experience #1 and #2 + Death Magnetic CD with FREE shipping. I’ve got my eye on this one.
Experience #4: $124.99 includes everything from Experience #1,#2 and #3 + a limited edition collectible 5LP 180 gram box with 5 individual sleeves.
Album art looks like Twilight Zone meets The Mummy. I’m psyched. I know, St. Anger was a letdown, but I’m ready for Death Magnetic and liking what the boys are doing with their music and multiple websites these days. If Death Magnetic is good they should go a long way to earning back some lost fans. Probably not the ones they were in favor of suing, but hey, it’s a start. Check it out.
That Was Just Your Life
The End Of The Line
Broken, Beat & Scarred
The Day That Never Comes
All Nightmare Long
Cyanide
The Unforgiven III
The Judas Kiss
Suicide & Redemption
My Apocalypse
Additionally, on Friday’s they offer 5 albums for $5 each. Sure, they might be taking a loss on some of these, but they are getting me in the habit of checking in daily to see what they have to offer, and of course as long as I’m there, I may end up picking up a song or too.
The folks at Amazon are smart, Chris. They have found a way to make money using Twitter, something that people have been wondering how to do since it became popular among the tech crowd.
AmazonMP3 is doing everything Chris mentions above in their Twitter feed in 140 characters or less. I’m sure this is 98% automated and a great example of how to use Twitter to keep people updated as well as to encourage shopping.
In the last week along I’ve bought a complete MP3 album and a couple individual songs that started the shopping from deals in the AmazonMP3 Twitter feed, something I can’t remember doing from another Twitter feed. @amazonmp3 is the only Twitter RSS feed I’m subscribed to in my RSS reader, as well to be certain I don’t miss a single message. Highly recommended for online music shoppers.
Rock Band 2 is coming this September and CNET shared the complete tracklist of 84 songs which, if you don’t want to completely spoil the surprise, don’t follow that link.
A few of my favorites include a track of the upcoming Guns N’ Roses Chinese Democracy album (when will this album be released?) and:
The Who "Pinball Wizard" Judas Priest "Painkiller" AC/DC "Let There Be Rock" Bad Company "Shooting Star" Fleetwood Mac "Go Your Own Way" Ratt "Round and Round" The Guess Who "American Woman"
Rock Band is also releasing a feature that will allow 4 on 4 battle of the bands over Xbox Live. Oh yeah, bring it.
One of my earlier requests was that artists would be releasing complete albums for play in Rock Band and/or Guitar Hero the same time their new albums came out. Motley Crue (Saints of Los Angeles review) and Judas Priest (Nostradamus review) both missed out with their new releases, but Metallica will answer the call and release the complete album of Death Magnetic, due out in the Fall on Guitar Hero. I keep writing this is a huge opportunity for bands and clearly some are seeing this with comments from Metallica like (emphasis mine):
We are so psyched that we’ll be the first out of the gate with this simultaneous release . . . who knows, maybe a few years from now this will be the norm when your favorite band’s new record comes out.
Amen. This is shaping up to be an awesome — and spendy — second half of the year for music video games with sequels for both Rock Band and Guitar Hero, not to mention drums and vocals being added to Guitar Hero. Guitar Hero is also going to have a way for gamers to create and share their own songs. Start saving those pennies now.
Don’t have much sympathy for counterfeiters, but I see a few problems with Laser Printers having special dots that reveal the serial number of the printer to the Secret Service. Why wouldn’t counterfeiters simply not register the printers? Or buy the printers second hand through a party that paid cash? Knowing the serial number and time/date sold doesn’t completely finger the buyer as the counterfeiter, does it?
“There’s nothing about this technology that limits its application to counterfeit investigations,” says Seth Schoen, a computer programmer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Some people who aren’t doing anything wrong may have their privacy threatened.” Schoen’s tests have found the dots produced by 111 color laser printers made by 13 companies including Xerox, Canon, Hewlett-Packard, Epson and Brother.
Privacy concerns seem not to be the biggest issue here. The bigger issue is whether or not this would actually help track down the counterfeiter. I’m not Perry Mason, but while the serial number might identify the printer used, it doesn’t mean:
1) the counterfeiter is the same person who bought the printer.
2) the store can identify who it sold the printer to. Does every store track the identity of the printer sold. I know if you buy a warranty or something, the store will get that information, but what if a warranty isn’t purchased?
Even though I’m not a counterfeiter and don’t plan on ever being one this gives me even more reasons NOT to register any laser printer I buy in the future, as well as give the store personally identifying information about me with my purchase. I don’t like how stores always try and identify me for every little purchase anyway. I’m buying a CD and you need my phone number? Why?
However I use rewards and cash back cards and those identify me, so my purchases are already being tracked and identified by several places. Go figure.
I’ve been thinking about my experience getting back into a band lately and what makes up a good bandmate. Subjective, I realize, but there are definite traits which make someone harder to get along with in a group setting. Rather than focus on the negatives, let’s review and hopefully discuss in the comments below some positive tips.
When I was originally invited to jam with three other guys I wasn’t expecting to be invited back but it was a good feeling when that happened. The initial jam session was one of those less than formal things, awkward for the first five minutes perhaps, but as I’ve returned to jam over the last couple months I’ve collected a list of things our band needed that we didn’t have and slowly filled in those gaps.
Hey wait, what if I can’t find a band to play with?
Finding other musicians that enjoy the same types of music isn’t easy. While I wasn’t really looking to being in a band before being invited to play with this band, I have been looking for others to play with since and that process needs its own how-to. There are sites like Bandmix.com which might help out, but the following tips assume that you have already found a band to be in and that you enjoying playing the same basic types of music. A death metal guitarist is probably not going to be a good fit for a jazz band.
The band organizer role
I wouldn’t call myself the leader of our band, and truth be told I’m not sure a band leader is absolutely required, but I’ve definitely taken an organizational role. I think it’s critical that at least one person — it can be by committee if multiple people want to fill this role — be an organizer. There are a bare minimum number of things a band needs to, well, be a band.
Before getting into tips showing how to be a better bandmate, let’s look at what is required to call the group of musicians you’re playing with a band.
Band requirements
1. Musicians with equipment. You aren’t a guitarist without a guitar, no more than a drummer is without drums. First phase: buy or rent the equipment. Phase two: learn how to play. It is possible to learn how to play in a band setting, but most bands aren’t going to tolerate a new member who doesn’t have the basics down before looking to play with others.
Guitars: you should learn a few songs all the way through, including guitar solos and be able to tune and keep in tune your guitar. Learning tab is handy too. Learn common chords like E, A, D, G, C, B, F and be able to fret them cleanly as both open chords and barred. I’d check the internet for one of a zillion different websites that covers scales and learn a few scales too. I’m not hardcore like some are about scales, but if you plan to play lead guitar and solo, scales will help your playing immensely. Rhythm guitar? Not so much. Also make sure to change your strings after 15-30 hours of playing or when the sound starts to sound dull.
Drummers: Be able to play, keep a beat and perform periodic and creative fills. Keep the drum heads tuned. Have plenty of extra sticks handy. If the drummer can’t keep time, everybody can get messed up. Timing is everything.
Bassists: the one and perhaps only part of a band that can be average or fairly new and still get by. This is a good place for people brand new to play. Playing badly is still playing badly, but you really only need to know how to play in key and keep the rhythm. Not trying to diminish importance of a skilled professional bassist, but I think even seasoned bass players would admit of all the parts of a band, a bass is a logical, safe starting place for someone brand new to a band.
A great bass player will help a band immensely while an average bass player can sink into the background and not be annoying. An average drummer, guitar player and/or vocalist are a lot more noticeable than an average bass player — and not in a good way.
Vocalist: take care of your pipes and memorize the lyrics. Obvious: make sure you don’t come to practice with no voice and sans lyrics. You can read off a lyrics sheet for awhile, but if you plan to gig out lyric sheets are not very cool to carry around. Get the lyrics down.
Keyboards: know how to program and play your keys. Helps being able to read sheet music because the band can give you the sheet music for songs and you can get up to speed. Same as guitar, know a few songs all the way through and being able to play without making (many) mistakes.
2. Place to practice. This could be a basement or garage or pretty much any place that is ok sound-wise. Should be relatively dry as electrical equipment and moisture don’t get along. Also need to have the temperature be tolerable. It can get pretty hot. You also need to be able to practice where the noise level doesn’t adversely impact neighbors. The later at night your practice the bigger an issue the noise becomes. If you’re playing in the middle of the day you can probably get away with being a little noisier, but if you crank up the Marshall stack after 9pm, don’t be surprised if the police come knocking.
3. Regular practice schedule. A band that never practices isn’t a band, it’s a bunch of guys that play music together once in awhile. Whatever schedule and time works for the band as a whole, stick to it so it becomes habit. I know we practice on Sunday nights at 6pm unless it’s a holiday weekend. Easy to remember and not something that has to be written down. Pick a schedule, stick to it, show up and play.
That’s it.
Notice I didn’t get into picking a band name or logo or website or slick myspace page. The band I’m in currently doesn’t have any of these things. We have played one original song only one time and haven’t recorded a lick of video or audio yet. I suspect we’ll be playing more originals as time goes on, but first we are figuring out what kinds of music we sound best playing and tightening various cover songs. That process can take some time when you’re only playing once a week. Once we have the music down because hey, it’s all about the music, it’s easy to worry about promotional activities and gigging out.
I think coming up with a name for your band happens after you have actually written and performed original music and make plans to record and/or play that music at a gig. Who gives a crap if your band has a cool name if you don’t have #1-3 above locked down first? So, no, we don’t have a band name or some catchy myspace page, but we’re still a legitimate band. You will be part of a band too if you are doing #1-3 above.
At home we have a drum set, PA, bass, guitars, amps and mixer. We have a place to play, but we don’t have a regular practice schedule. Therefore I’d say we’re not a band, just a family that practices playing music together once in awhile. If we setup a regular schedule, we could become a band.
Enough descriptions, now that you know how a band is defined let’s get to the good stuff.
Tips how to be a better bandmate
1. Be willing to learn, practice and play music you don’t like. A major frustration I’ve read about is not having compatible music tastes. If you don’t like playing song X or band Y, suck it up and compromise. This doesn’t mean playing in a band with an entire genre of music you can’t stand like playing country or rap if you only like rock, but it does mean being flexible with different types of country artists if you are in a country band or being willing to cover pop songs when you are in a rock band. That kind of thing.
I remember a situation when I shared a Whitesnake song with the group and the artist was universally panned. Oh well, no Whitesnake then. Move on. Personally, I think Whitesnake has some killer songs, but there are thousands of bands to choose music from that you don’t need to be hung up on covering one artist that the rest of the band doesn’t like. A good band mate shouldn’t get hung up on having to play any one artist.
2. Leave the drugs and alcohol out. I enjoy playing with other band members who are not stoned or drunk and treat my band mates with the courtesy of not showing up — ever — messed up. If you want to get high, do it on your own time, not during practice or performances. The band I played with in high school this was a huge problem. So much that after a few songs, we sounded much worse. It always bothered me because I felt like we weren’t respecting the music and our progress was being hampered. Playing music and having fun doesn’t require drugs or alcohol.
We’ve all heard the stories about rockers who seem to be “better” when they are high or drunk, but I’ve yet to meet even one real musician in a real world practice and/or performance scenario that was a better player high than straight/sober. I’m sure there people who are awesome musicians straight and are better than average players when they are high, but it’s a shame not to see musicians at their absolute best. Not trying to be preachy but drugs and alcohol impair, not improve.
3. Bring at least one new complete (or almost complete) song to each practice session. Let’s face it, if you play the same music over and over again without trying/learning/playing any new songs, yes you will get better at those songs, but eventually things will get boring. I make it a goal to come to each new practice session with at least one new song the group hasn’t played together before. I think a good band mate tries to grow in their craft and bring in new songs that the group might be able to play together. Some songs work out of the gate and others will require multiple plays to stick.
There is a limit to how many new songs make sense. People that get together to play don’t want to waste too much of that time learning new songs, so just mix in at least one new song every practice session. I actually shoot for 3-5 new songs, but no less than one new song. This way if the first song doesn’t go well, there are a couple other new ones to try.
4. Keep track of what songs gel right away. The best songs you perform are worth playing again and again and added to a regular playlist. They should be practiced and refined so that every band member feels good enough to be able to go in and out of them in any order.
In order to know what songs we’ve played (and played well), I keep track of every song alphabetically sorted by artist in a text file. I use an asterisk for songs we have not played in front of the song and the + for a partial song performed. I keep two three ring binders. The bigger binder contains lyrics for all the songs we’ve ever played. The smaller binder contains the lyrics and list of the songs we’ve played that sound the best.
To make it from the big to small book a song has to sound pretty good. This way, we have a list of songs that the group could choose from to play at live gigs someday and/or practice regularly if there are no plans to gig out.
5. When it comes to covers, listen to the originals as group and individual. I keep several special playlists on my Zune with the original and/or live recordings of each song we are playing. If I don’t have the song — a new song perhaps another band mate has shared with the group — then I’ll go buy it from AmazonMP3 or one of the other online stores over the next week.
At band practice I plug the Zune into the mixing board and the group can listen to the original to get certain parts of the song down. This would be good for sharing original song ideas too.
A bit of music philosophy here: I don’t think covers should be exact copies of songs unless we’re talking about games like Rock Band and Guitar Hero. I know some bands try to cover things exactly. I think it’s more important to give a respectful treatment to the song. This means that a) you get all the vocal parts down and b) you include the main musical parts of the song. By listening to the original you will learn what is important in a song and can improvise and enhance from there. Frankly, I find exact covers — or close to exact — boring and uninspired.
If the others in your band disagree and want to create exact copies of songs, then you have an important choice: practice to get the songs down as close to the original as possible or search for a different band that has a more liberal approach to covers.
Our band enjoys guitar solos so we take songs like Tom Petty & The Heartbreaker’s “Breakdown” which the original song is less than three minutes and make it a 5-7 minute song with some creative changes and nice solo breaks. We also don’t play it with keyboards which I think adds a slightly different dimension. Not going to say anything bold or crazy like our version is better than Petty’s, but I think if you heard it at an event or in a bar, you’d not only recognize the song but think the treatment was good.
6. Be flexible, willing to switch instruments and/or from lead to rhythm. Three of the four people in our band, including me are flexible and willing to change from lead guitar to rhythm as well as play bass. Our drummer is the only set player in the group. When it comes to singing, two of the four in our band take turns with the lead vocals, although I could see us getting a dedicated vocalist for all the songs and the current vocalists becoming backup singers.
I put this tip last because it won’t apply to bands who have set members, but it is handy for bands who are trying to work through what combination of players works best with each song. It is also good when one of the group can’t make practice. We have two very capable drummers, so if our regular drummer doesn’t show, the other member can step in competently.
Respect, patience and having fun
I could have made the bolded title above the only tip because a lot of being in a band is about respecting other members. It’s also about having patience to work through new songs and troubled spots in existing songs. Above all others, it should be fun playing music. If you don’t enjoy playing music, or get super stressed in expectation of a playing with others, a band is the last place to be.
I’m looking forward to when we start creating some original music and recording. And perhaps beyond that if all continues to go well someday if/when an opportunity arises to play a gig and realize that we have to pare down a list of songs to the ones we enjoy playing best. It would be awesome if that list of songs was well over 100. Then again, if we never gig out, it’s just fun as heck playing and learning new songs. Money? Fame? Not part of any of our band’s agenda at the present time. No idea what the future holds but in the meantime we all seem to be having fun.
Should you ever decide to be in a band or are already in one, I hope this helps you become a better bandmate. You’re welcome to and encouraged to add additional tips below or trackback from your blog. I stopped at six tips, but I’m sure there are plenty more.
Band’s need to be pushing to get all of their music on the game systems in both Rock Band and Guitar Hero format. How do I yell this any louder. There aren’t enough licensed music games in the pipeline!
Yeah, every Tuesday we get treated to a few new songs. Any idea how many years it will take to get a decent sized music library at this rate of publishing? According to the Zune our family has over 690 albums and 5,555 songs. On Rock Band we have purchased probably 80% of all the music released to date (I didn’t do an exact count) and maybe, maybe we have a couple hundred songs.
Not enough.
We’ve bought several albums because we played the music on these games, so it does translate into CD and/or digital music sales. I see a day in the future when we’ll see bands come out with new albums in Guitar Hero and Rock Band format (or rather some unified format(?) or wishful thinking?) the same day they sell their album in stores. This remains a huge opportunity that at least at the moment isn’t plagued by piracy.
As soon as anybody can make their own music game files, expect to see cover music coming from sources that aren’t the official artists and once again the artists will be left without a cut of the pie. Where today the blame is on P2P, tomorrow it will be on cover music on game systems.
One way to help curb this would be to simply get as much authorized music game files into the system as fast as possible and allow an easy publishing system for artists to be able to make their music available for sale and direct profit. More artists will get on board if there is an easy publishing system. Something like Amazon is doing with the Kindle for writers to publish and get paid.
There is always going to be music piracy, no matter what format. No way to eliminate it. Best thing artists can do is to embrace what new forms of publishing are out there and keep making great music. Heck, Guns N Roses white elephant album Chinese Democracy had tracks released before they have published it yet (when are you going to publish this anyway, Axl? In this decade. Maybe? Hopefully.)
On the Xbox 360 side I’d say XNA, but that isn’t really non-programmer friendly. Most artists aren’t programmers. They need a system, perhaps some kind of pro tools plugin that will let them export in a format and publish their music for sale to the masses. Not many artists are going to have the technical skill, time and/or patience to sit down and spend hours or days coding a single song. If some other party steps in for a small cut of the sales pie, they might be willing to go that route for the technical heavy work.
Before you laugh off this idea, think about how many different avenues there are for bands to be heard? The pool of music in the music games genre is still pretty small. Giving indie and pro artists the publish directly — keyword: easily — would be a huge win for everybody.
To date there have been only *3* full albums available on Rock Band (and zero albums are available on Guitar Hero yet): Judas Priest Screaming For Vengeance, The Cars debut album and most recently The Pixies. We bought the first two and skipped the third. With millions and millions of song and who knows how many hundreds of thousands (or million plus?) albums are in existence, you’d expect the music business to latch on and sell, sell, sell.
How many total albums will be available by the end of the year? Any guesses? I think it will be less than a dozen, which is a shame. Next year though if sales are strong, we could see this continue to blow up and the number albums available get into the hundreds. How cool is it being able to play along with your favorite songs? Fake music games are here to stay, bet on it.
And when will we start seeing some REAL music games? I remember a story about a game like Guitar Hero where you played on a real guitar called Guitar Rising (will be released in “late 2008″ according to the website). Learn how to play along with songs using real instruments. The music industry needs to change. Reading tab or traditional music notation is boring. Games could put the fun back into practice and could unleash the next Eddie Van Halen or Jimi Hendrix plugged into a PC or console system. Why not?
It’s no secret that I’ve been a huge fan of the various fake music games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band. This weekend we took some time to purchase and review the two most current offerings in the Guitar Hero franchise: Guitar Hero On Tour Nintendo DS ($49.99) and Guitar Hero Aerosmith ($99 at Wal-Mart) for the Xbox 360.
Guitar Hero On Tour Nintendo DS
Guitar Hero On Tour has an interesting, but uncomfortable glove-like control pad that literally wraps around the DS. When I saw a demo of it online a couple months back (sorry, can’t remember what the publication was to link), I didn’t think it would be as uncomfortable to hold and play. It is. I felt uncomfortable with it after playing a couple songs. Carpal Guitar Hero Tunnel syndrome anyone?
It was a nice touch to include an adapter for the game that fit those of us with the older style Nintendo DS. Just have to unscrew a couple flat-head screws and pop out the control circuit, then put in the replacement one. Takes a couple minutes.
The game itself has an already lampooned mechanism for activating star power: either yell something into the microphone or blow in it. If you blow in it or yell at it you look equally foolish. Why didn’t they include some picture of an amp or something to knock over on the right screen? Who wants to give their Nintendo DS a blowjob?
The pick is the one part that feels good in the hand but no so much with the back and forth motion on the virtual guitar displayed on the touch screen. To whammy you just move the pick in a similar motion over the whammy bar. It’s not nearly as satisfying as using the whammy bar on the full size game.
I give high marks for effort and am glad to see something on the DS for portable rocking out, but I’m not sure we’ll be taking this game many places because it is awkward and not as much fun to play as the full-size version.
Also, my son pointed out that if you have longer fingers like him, it’s a little more tricky. And there are only four buttons instead of five (no orange button), which is another knock for hardcore Guitar Hero players. Guitar Hero fans will buy this, heck, you probably have, but I wouldn’t recommend for non diehards. Grade: C-
Guitar Hero Aerosmith
The first thing to disappoint is that the game wasn’t available separately at Wal-Mart. Maybe other stores are selling the game elsewhere, but Wal-Mart was forcing their shoppers to buy the Aerosmith guitar bundle which cost $99.87 or some weird penny price like that. I thought about hitting Best Buy or Circuit City to see if it was the same deal there but it was a hot day yesterday and I didn’t want to spend it shopping.
According to Amazon, the game sold separately won’t be available until tomorrow, Tuesday July 1, 2008. So for two days of impatience, we’re paying. We should have waited. Oh well. I don’t blame them for releasing the game this way, so the review score doesn’t reflect this annoyance.
Since we bought the package to get to the game, I’m not going to review the guitar itself. It’s essentially the same Guitar Hero III guitar controller, as best as I can tell. We left it in the package. Might be handy to have an extra axe in case the others go down and when you figure they are selling the guitars standalone for $59, it’s actually a deal buying the package.
Guitar Hero Aerosmith takes the player through the career of Aerosmith and boasts some 25 tracks from the band’s extensive music library. It’s nice hearing and being able to play along with great songs like “Kings and Queens” and more well-known songs like “Sweet Emotion” but if you aren’t an Aerosmith fan be warned: you will likely be disappointed.
I don’t know why anybody would buy a game with Aerosmith music if they didn’t like Aerosmith, but if that fits you, then I’d pass. If you are a Guitar Hero collector, as I said above, you probably already were waiting in line Sunday morning at 12:01am. That wasn’t us. We went Sunday afternoon.
Mad props for another Guitar Hero game, but we didn’t see that much new here to warrant a completely new game. Why not just release Aerosmith song paks? I know, I know, there’s an Aerosmith storyline that goes with the game, it’s not just the songs, but at the end of the day — and the career mode — you’re left with replay value being the songs themselves. I’d rather have paid $30-40 for the songs than $100 for the game and extra controller, but that’s just me.
I’m not at expert skill level at these games and tend to play and be challenged by the ‘hard’ difficulty for most of these type games. I don’t have enough time to practice and get as good at these games as I’d like. I’d rather use this time playing real music instruments. At the same time, I do enjoy them and think they offer a huge benefit to the struggling music business.
My middle son and younger son are both experts at these games and were able to beat both Guitar Hero on Tour for the Nintendo DS and Guitar Hero Aerosmith at expert difficulty in a few hours. Aerosmith has 31 base songs (with 9+ more unlockable) and Guitar Hero On Tour has 25 (not sure how many more unlockables). None of the songs, according to our sons were extraordinarily difficult. Nothing that matches “Through The Fire and Flames.” This was a letdown for them. They were hoping for something to shred and more challenging.
As the one who purchased the games, I was disappointed there wasn’t more challenge as well. Why not throw in some speed death metal tracks just to keep the replay factor high for players like them?
Here’s an idea — and missed opportunity — release each new version with new types of game controllers. Don’t have just another guitar, have it be one that has special effects that the other doesn’t have. That’s not my idea, BTW, Activision competitor Rock Band is planning to do just that by promising new type instruments (keyboard, maybe?). Oh yeah, sign me up.
My son who beat it on expert (pictured above), said Guitar Hero Aerosmith is “ok.” The time to beat this on the expert setting, was much too easy (for him). Therefore, at least in our household, I don’t see this one having very much replay value, so I’m marking down for that. Just being a new Guitar Hero game isn’t enough when one can buy new songs online every week. Nobody in our family are huge Aerosmith fans, but the music selection is good. Not sure I’d want to emulate Joe Perry though. Grade: C+
Loved Motley Crue’s first few albums but have drifted away as a fan since then. Or rather, I’ve kept hoping they’d put out albums as great as Shout at the Devil. Who can’t love a party band that can jam like them who are equally notorious offstage for sniffing ants with Ozzy?
Sadly, they became too much about being glam rockers of the 80s with cheesy commercial radio tracks like “Girls, Girls, Girls” when we wanted their harder, edgier side in tracks like “Red Hot” and “Live Wire” and “Too Hot for Love.” I like their cover of Helter Skelter better than the original Beatles version. That says how much I liked this band at one time.
At one time.
It’s similar to the way I felt about Great White (note: I’m not saying Great White is a better band than Motley Crue) who started as a hard rock band and then went all blues and too mellow, but at least Great White has remained fairly prolific with new material the last 20+ years.
Can’t say the same about the Crue, who have put out only *9* studio albums in the last 27 years (maybe one album every three years isn’t that anemic) including yesterday’s newest release Saints of Los Angeles. Only 7 of the 9 albums contain the four founding members of the band:
Vince Neil - vocals
Mick Mars - guitars
Nikki Sixx - bass
Tommy Lee - drums
Before we get to the strong and weak points of the Saints album, which I purchased on AmazonMP3 ($8.99) and took off Judas Priest Nostradamus to listen to instead for awhile, let’s revisit Motley Crue’s studio albums to date.
Motley Crue Studio Albums
1. Too Fast for Love (1981)
2. Shout at the Devil (1983)
3. Theater of Pain (1985)
4. Girls, Girls, Girls (1987)
5. Dr. Feelgood (1989)
*6. Motley Crue (1994) - *John Corabi on vocals (instead of Vince Neil)
7. Generation Swine (1997)
*8. New Tattoo (2000) - *Randy Castillo on drums (instead of Tommy Lee), later replaced by female Hole drummer
9. Saints of Los Angeles (June 24, 2008)
Studio albums 1-3 (purchased in this order: Shout at the Devil, Too Fast for Love, Theater of Pain), are highly recommended to add any rocker’s collection. It gets a little more sketchy (for me, anyway) after that.
While Girls, Girls, Girls disappointed this fan, it brought great commercial success for the band Dr. Feelgood had some good tracks like the title track and ballad “Without You.” I’d put Dr. Feelgood as purchase #4 for your Motley Crue studio album collection.
I never took to the self-titled album where Vince Neil didn’t even sing. WTF? How do you put out a self-titled album and not have your original singer? Quiet Riot did this too when once upon a time (1986 I believe) they fired recently deceased Kevin Dubrow and replaced with the raspy, Rough Cutt singer, Paul Shortino. I liked Shortino, BTW, but his time with Quiet Riot was short lived.
Van Halen did something similar with the critically panned (and for good reasons) Van Halen 3 with Gary Cherone at the pipes, but strangely Van Halen 1 and Van Halen 2 both had Diamond Dave behind the mic. Shouldn’t VH2 have had the second singer of the band, Sammy Hagar? Who says rock and roll needs to make sense? Braincells be damned.
It wouldn’t be fair for me to rate Generation Swine or New Tattoo, because I don’t recall listening to either of them, much less buying them. They might have some good songs, or totally suck, so get those reviews elsewhere from somebody who has listened to them (or wait for me to buy them and review them). The reality is Motley Crue ceased being as interesting to me when they broke up the first time. I do realize Vince Neil rejoined the band for Generation Swine and Saints of Los Angeles is an intriguing enough listen for me to go back and see if I missed anything noteworthy.
New Tattoo doesn’t have Tommy Lee on drums, so I’m a little less interested in buying that one. For those who don’t know much about Motley Crue, Tommy Lee has the chops and is considered one of the best rock drummers around. Replacing somebody of his caliber is like replacing Neil Peart of Rush. This isn’t like replacing the drummer for Loverboy.
But hey, now that the original Motley Crue is back together again (third time? fourth time?), let’s get to the stuff that was released yesterday and see what’s good.
Saints of Los Angeles Track List with my thoughts
1. “L.A.M.F” - is this supposed to be like the opening to “Shout of the Devil” (in the speaking sense), only using Los Angeles as the backdrop? I like the Shout intro better but this is alright.
2. “Face Down In The Dirt” - solid track with some good riffs. Nice musical intro to the album.
3. “What’s It Gonna Take” - girls singing as backing vocals toward the end ruined this a bit for me. Seems like ripping (the wrong) page out of the Girls, Girls, Girls book. Otherwise, some good moments.
4. “Down At The Whisky” - a lot of L.A-based rock bands have a fond connection to playing at The Whisky, which I believe is sort of like the Madison Square Gardens of small clubs. This is a decent song about The Whisky with some great drumming by Tommy Lee. I was a bit disappointed that Mick Mars didn’t break out with a ripping solo. The song was made for it, but the solo he does put in there seems kind of mailed in (too short and not much flash or flare).
5. “Saints of Los Angeles (Gang Vocal)” - with the title track, I expected the boys to pull out all the stops. It starts with a very effective bass track by Nikki Sixx. The opening guitar riff explodes and Vince is in top form. Very nice.
6. “Mutherfucker of the Year” - how can any rocker not appreciate a song with an MF bomb as its title? The opening is an all out left-right speaker assault. This one jams from intro to close. Some familiar, but expertly placed guitar wah effects by Mars.
7. “The Animal In Me” - old school Crue with a great thumping bass (Nikki) and drums (Tommy). Vince nails the catchy vocals and Mick Mars shreds the axe. Motley Crue is clicking on all cylinders with this one. Crank it up. I liked this one on the very first listen and it is my favorite track on the album.
8. “Welcome To The Machine” - great guitar solo and drums (I know, I keep saying that but it’s hard not to appreciate Tommy Lee pounding the skins).
9. “Just Another Psycho” - I need to listen to this one more.
10. “Chicks = Trouble” - a throwaway track for me. Didn’t care for it. Music jams but it doesn’t gel.
11. “This Ain’t A Love Song”
12. “White Trash Circus”
13. “Goin’ Out Swingin’” - need more listens to the last five tracks, nothing really sticking out as great.
Summary and Hmm thoughts
Must admit I was surprised a bit by Saints. I figured it would be mostly crap, but there are some good jams on there. I’m going to go back and visit Generation Swine and maybe the other albums. Saints doesn’t give me the same Crue pleasure that their first three albums and Dr. Feelgood did, but it’s not bad. I have a feeling it might be their best album since Dr. Feelgood but can’t say that officially because I’ve been out of the Crue loop.
Motley Crue is on the short list of bands that I like but haven’t seen live to date yet. Going to keep my eyes peeled the next time they come to town. If you like the earlier Motley Crue stuff, give Saints of Los Angeles a listen. It’s not as raw as Too Fast for Love or as gritty as Shout, but it’s not the crap glam rock that drove fans like me away for awhile. It’s also not some huge breakthrough album that will sell better than their biggest albums of the past, but it’s refreshing to see the Crue getting back to their roots, somewhat.
The first half of the album is very strong but it fades kind of like the B-side of Theater of Pain. I might get flamed for saying this, but where is the rock album token ballad? Coming from a band with solid ballads like “Home Sweet Home” you kind of expect one ballad? Yes, no? Oh well, I don’t think the lack of a ballad hurts Saints. Now if only the boys stay together and put out more albums like this, and limit time spent in Vince Neil’s tattoo parlor, I bet they suck back in more of their older fans. Grade: B-
Judas Priest has remained my favorite heavy metal band for 25+ years now. I was delighted when Rob Halford rejoined the band, but enjoyed the time Tim ‘Ripper’ Owens (of Iced Earth) spent with the band. I’ve seen Priest in concert several times and they never disappoint live.
While some might argue JP aren’t as heavy as they used to be, they were and still are pioneers in the genre. With their newest epic studio album Nostradamus, 23 songs telling a story in a way musically that only Judas Priest can tell.
Long in the works, ‘Nostradamus’ takes epic storytelling to a whole new level, as it recounts the life of this mysterious, world-known 16th Century French prophet. Some of the events that Nostradamus experts have interpreted as his predictions include the great fire of London in 1666, the rise of Adolf Hitler, and most recently, 9-11, among countless other renowned events.
Here I thought they were just going to release another 10-15 song album and to my delight I discovered 23 songs waiting in the AmazonMP3 track list. I know what I’ll be listening to for awhile. Oh, and yes, I’ll be going out and buying the CD as well. Probably one of the two special editions:
In addition to the regular jewel case double CD version of the album, collectors will undoubtedly be interested in hunting down a copy of a Deluxe Double CD housed in a 48 page hardbound book package. But that’s not all - a Super Deluxe Box-set version will also be available with triple vinyl, the double CD, an expanded booklet & a poster.
Nostradamus track listing
These are the songs on Nostradamus in order with a few comments as I listen (will continue to update this, so check back after the post is published):
1. “Dawn of Creation” - a Priest album that starts with piano and continues with organ to intro the next track, it’s no Hellion but portends well for what follows. Prepare to be rocked in the next track.
2. “Prophecy” - just try to listen to this a few times and stop singing ‘Nostradamus’ - I’m guessing this will be played on their tour to support the album.
3. “Awakening”
4. “Revelations”
5. “The Four Horseman”
6. “War”
7. “Sands of Time” - the line “sands of time running low” an accidental (intentional?) tribute to fellow metal heads Iron Maiden?
8. “Pestilence And Plague”
9. “Death” - verse has the pace and feel of the classic Sabbath tune “Black Sabbath”
10. “Peace”
11. “Conquest”
12. “Lost Love”
13. “Persecution”
14. “Solitude”
15. “Exiled”
16. “Alone” - the acoustic guitar work on this track is some of the best of Priest’s career. If you were disappointed with how synthesizers were used in Turbo, this will restore your faith. Halford has a scream near the end that is one of his best ever. If you ever doubted that he still has the pipes, listen for it and enjoy. “Alonnnnnnnnnneeeeeeee!” Chilling. We keep playing this one over and over, it’s that good.
17. “Shadows In The Flame”
18. “Visions”
19. “Hope”
20. “New Beginnings”
21. “Calm Before The Storm”
22. “Nostradamus” - a thrasher in the spirit of “Screaming for Vengeance” and “Freewheel Burning”
23. “Future of Mankind” - one of the best dual guitar solo tradeoffs and a fitting close. KK Downing and Glen Tipton smoke the fretboards.
AmazonMP3 has easily slipped into my favorite place to shop for music online. I’ve collected all Judas Priest albums available through AmazonMP3 in the Judas Priest Store embedded in the post below (RSS readers might need to click through to the post to see)
Chronological order of Judas Priest studio albums
By my count this is Judas Priest’s 16th studio album beginning in 1974 and still rocking 34 years later:
1. Rocka Rolla (1974)
2. Sad Wings of Destiny (1976)
3. Sin after Sin (1977)
4. Stained Glass (1978)
5. Hell Bent For Leather (1979)
6. British Steel (1980)
7. Point of Entry (1981)
8. Screaming For Vengeance (1982)
9. Defenders of the Faith (1984)
10. Turbo (1986)
11. Ram It Down (1988)
12. Painkiller (1990)
13. Jugulator (1997) - Ripper Owens on Vocals
14. Demolition (2001) - Ripper Owens on Vocals
15. Angel of Retribution (2005) - Halford returns as vocalist
16. Nostradamus (2008)
Judas Priest Studio Albums - best to worst list
If you’re looking to buy the past Judas Priest studio albums, my son and I collaborated on buying and listening in the following order. If you feel like the buying order should be different, we welcome your comments below (we had a fun debate over this), trackbacked from your blog, FriendFeed, whatever. I linked the albums available in the Judas Priest store (via AmazonMP3) with the price as of this writing:
I haven’t had enough time to fully listen and enjoy Nostradamus yet but through the early listens I’d already place it in their top 10 studio albums. Our oldest son thinks it should be #7, ahead of Point of Entry, but I’m not sure if any tracks have the staying power of Desert Plains or Heading Out To The Highway. Time will tell. The title track “Nostradamus” is perhaps the only real thrasher and could easily have been on Painkiller or Ram it Down. The Halford scream at the end of the haunting song “Alone” puts it way, way ahead of anything on Rocka Rolla and Demolition (with Ripper Owens).
Summary and grade Nostradamus is clearly stronger than their reunion with Halford album Angel of Retribution and despite Turbo maybe being more commercially successful than other better albums, Nostradamus belongs in company with Ram It Down, Stained Glass and Painkiller. Their worst studio efforts to date are Rocka Rolla and Demolition, so save those for last and try not to hold against the band if/when building upon your Priest music collection.
Overall, it’s a good time to be a Judas Priest fan. Feels a bit like the late 80s as they were off the heavy success of Vengeance and Defenders tours. Judas Priest are going to be in Seattle at the WaMu theater next month, July 22. Yes, I want to go. Tracks from the tour are already making their way to YouTube.
If I were to grade Nostradamus on first listen, purely in scope, it deserves no less than a B. Tracks that stuck out on first listen include: “Prophecy”, “Alone”, “Nostradamus” and “Future of Mankind.” I feel like I’m going to be listening to this album for a long time. Next stop: the limited edition CD! Grade: A-
Update 6/20/08 8:28am PST: Yesterday, after posting this review I did two things:
1. Went to hang out in the official Judas Priest chatroom. Why? Wanted to see what other Priest fans were saying about Nostradamus. Nobody in the channel was giving the album bad reviews. In fact, a few were annoyed by some negative reviews on Amazon. If the album sucks, you’d definitely hear about it in the official chatroom, but so far the early opinions — there at least — are positive.
2. I went to Best Buy and bought the Deluxe CD version. It’s on sale for $24.99 (regularly $34.99) and comes with a full booklet and a free ticket to one of 12 different concerts on their tour. Good luck on that though because I checked the closest venue to me: Mountain View, CA which is still 800+ miles away and the free tickets were all used up. The package is nice though, it comes with a 48-page book containing the lyrics to all Nostradamus songs and some fantastic artwork:
One CD is in a special compartment at the beginning and the other is at the end. The spine of the book is professionally bound.
This is quality workmanship. We saw the Super-Deluxe version which contains the vinyl for sale at Best Buy for $69.99, BTW. Good prices for both version comparatively to what I’m seeing online.
I’m now at 200+ song listens to Nostradamus and getting even more into the storyline. You’ll see some of my passion in the comments below. This is a great story and one where following the lyrics are not optional. I’m sure one of the lyrics sites has them already, but go buy the deluxe version already with the booklet. If you like albums that tell stories, you’ll gobble this one up.
Don’t have much sympathy for counterfeiters, but I see a few problems with Laser Printers having special dots that reveal the serial number of the printer to the Secret Service. Why wouldn’t counterfeiters simply not register the printers? Or buy the printers second hand through a party that paid cash? Knowing the serial number and time/date sold doesn’t completely finger the buyer as the counterfeiter, does it?
When I was originally invited to jam with three other guys I wasn’t expecting to be invited back but it was a good feeling when that happened. The initial jam session was one of those less than formal things, awkward for the first five minutes perhaps, but as I’ve returned to jam over the last couple months I’ve collected a list of things our band needed that we didn’t have and slowly filled in those gaps.
Band’s need to be pushing to get all of their music on the game systems in both Rock Band and Guitar Hero format. How do I yell this any louder. There aren’t enough licensed music games in the pipeline!
It’s no secret that I’ve been a huge fan of the various fake music games like Guitar Hero and Rock Band. This weekend we took some time to purchase and review the two most current offerings in the Guitar Hero franchise: Guitar Hero On Tour Nintendo DS ($49.99) and Guitar Hero Aerosmith ($99 at Wal-Mart) for the Xbox 360.
Can’t say the same about the Crue, who have put out only *9* studio albums in the last 27 years (maybe one album every three years isn’t that anemic) including yesterday’s newest release Saints of Los Angeles. Only 7 of the 9 albums contain the four founding members of the band:
While some might argue JP aren’t as heavy as they used to be, they were and still are pioneers in the genre. With their newest epic studio album Nostradamus, 23 songs telling a story in a way musically that only Judas Priest can tell. 
