Out Demons Out!

Metal will always be with us, even for those of us who don't listen to it as often as the true believers do. Case in point, 20 years ago when I listened to 3WK Classic Rock Radio and they played a great 60's pop song called "Sunshine" by the legendary English band Gun. I liked it so much I bought a used copy of it on eBay. What I didn't reckon was checking out the phenomenal flip side, an insanely wild metal romp called Race With The Devil.

Gun were probably smitten by Cream judging by the choir-like harmonies which provide the fanfare in this song. It then blasts into a furious galloping boogie tempo with that blazing guitar line made immortal by Adrian Gurvitz and worshiped by all metal fans worldwide. The lyrics read like some incendiary western pulp novel: "You better run, you better run from the devil's gun. Strange things happen if you stay, the devil will get you any way...." and then Gurvitz rips out a maniacal laugh reminiscent of The Crazy World of Arthur Brown. The addition of horns in the production never comes off as too obtrusive; it actually punctuates the rhythm quite well. Great stuff!

The Gun

Gun didn't really strike it big in America, but the Gurvitz Bros. continued making records in the power trio format, even forming a band with ex-Cream drummer Ginger Baker called the Baker Gurvitz Army. After all was said and done, nothing could top Race With The Devil. Not long ago an old broadcast video of Gun performing the song (it was probably Beat Club) was available on You Tube, but has since been taken down. Drat!

Black Oak Arkansas

Black Oak Arkansas play a comparatively loose version of the song. The three guitars harmonize prettily, taking a little bit of the edge off the song. Jim Dandy Mangrum sings in an almost Las Vegas croon, recalling David Lee Roth. No big surprise as Mangrum was a heavy influence on Roth in the early Van Halen days, both visually and musically. While I wouldn't call this the definite cover version (unless you're a serious Ethel Merman fan), there's something almost irreverent in the way they refuse to take the song too seriously. Everything's a party with these guys!

Girlschool

Girlschool make up for their lacking vocal talent with their powerful guitar interplay and in this regard acquit themselves rather well. I like the tempo on this version, too, although other live videos on You Tube show them dragging the beat. Just like Black Oak the fanfare is carried by the guitars rather than with vocals, a good call by them. This is probably the best live version by them I've seen so far, and here they are in top form.

Judas Priest

Ah, Judas Priest. Nobody can rock a cover tune like the Priest, whether it be a brooding Fleetwood Mac song (The Green Manalishi) or a moody Joan Baez ballad (Diamonds And Rust). Rob Halford puts his balls to the wall and flawlessly tackles the Nordic God fanfare all by himself with enough operatic relish to strangle Wagner himself. Glen Tipton and K.K. Downing bring the hoary Sixties classic straight into the Eighties with an awesome, modern guitar sound, never losing the intensity of the tune.

Metal will always be with us, whether we like it or not. There's something unshakable about it. Even if you don't like it you'll discover a song or two so pure and honest in its vision that you'll find yourself listening, anyway. It doesn't care about your age or politics or even what the fuck you're wearing. And that's the key to its universality.

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Here in L.A. we have lots of billboards promoting a new TV comedy on FX called Sex & Drugs & Rock & Roll, complete with faux Never Mind The Bollocks lettering. While I haven't seen the show and know nothing about it the billboard bothers me a great deal. I have nothing against comedies, I love 'em to death. What bothers me is the way Hollywood has perpetually depicted rock bands through the years as a bunch of clods who haven't got a brain cell to split between them.

I wish I was in on the joke about rock bands being bozos, because the truth is more rock musicians commit suicide than any other kind of artist. Try to find the humor in that!

I suspect that the real reason why filmmakers are always spoofing rock bands is because they're secretly jealous of the power bands have over shitty movies and TV shows. Behind every shitty screenwriter and director is a guy who wishes he could play badass guitar or front a band. Get over yourselves, Hollywood. A two-hour high octane action film will never hold anyone's attention the way a powerful, rockin' two minute song can.

The Troubadour (9081 Santa Monica Blvd.) = What better band to play The Troubadour on Santa Monica Blvd. than Turbonegro , the Norwegian Tom of Finland tribute band playing songs like "Rock Against Ass", "I Got Erection", "Rendezvous With Anus", and the sublime "Sell Your Body".
I thought the bartenders were pretty friendly for such a big club, so I always tip them well. Unfortunately later (15 mins) I have to pee out my cocktail and find out the men's room is as small as a cat bed. Noooo!
So then you walk around the club, walk, walk, walk, and then you realize that the sound and visibility in the club varies from corner to corner, so keep rambling because there is no "sweet spot" there. Just keep rambling around.
I finally let it go in the alley, but the great thing about a Turbonegro show at a WeHo club like the Troub is location, location, location.

El Rey Theatre (5515 Wilshire Blvd.) = Standing proud in the sleepiest part of Miracle Mile where no one ever sleeps is The El Rey Theatre. The El Rey is a nice concert hall because it's smaller than the Hollywood Palladium but bigger than your average nightclub.
When I think of The El Rey two stories come to mind: seeing Morphine on their last tour before Mark Sandman passed away, his sleepy, grumpy slide bass guitar rumbling and shaking the old theatre silly and Dana Colley's baritone saxophone bitch slapping my ear drums around...and making me love it. It was bodacious, it was foxy, it was Morphinous.
The second time was when I modeled for the Retail Slut fashion show - my prop was a gigantic magnum of champagne which I spat across the room while dressed in Melrose goth sloth finery. The LA Weekly gave me a special item in their gossip column, "The Low Life", and I quote:
"The models worked that runway with attitude to spare: one swaggering male mannequin took a swig of bubbly and lobbed a big spurt that splashed our poor photog". I don't know if Janice Dickinson would approve, but she's been a bad girl lately, too.

Amoeba Music (6400 W. Sunset Blvd.) = There's a scene in every children's film where the lil' urchins are about to be banished to an evil factory to toil for the rest of their lives and it's cold and gray and unfriendly. Well, I think I've been there. It's called Amoeba Music.
Your tot will surely get the chills when you take them there, for they won't see heart-warming Oompa Loompas but guys with pockmarks, zits, dandruff and other hygienic violations sullenly elbowing you out of the way for that valuable copy of "Radiohead Live In Poland". Out of my way, I'm looking for entertainment!
The true collector (usually a guy whose high standards in girls makes him celibate until he's 43 years old) flips through the records at lightning speed as you can be impressed by this one (1) dexterous skill they possess.
After waling in with a laundry list of 10 records and maybe finding one you kinda-sorta want, you get in line, the one that winds towards the back of the store. You feel like little Olaf Nilsson at Ellis Island come to the big country to become American like Mr. Thomas Jefferson. Scheiss!
You spend the next 20 minutes staring at every tattooed arm and leg in line, and then it's your turn, i.e. the cashier's waving their arms frantically at you and looking pissed because you can't see them from 5 miles away. Ka-ching! Finally you escape the cattle call and feel like a million bucks because just like in the movies you escaped the evil factory for wayward children.

Anaheim Convention Center (800 W. Katella Ave.) = Weel, shit, I finally made it to the NAMM (aka North American Music Manufacturers) show at the beautiful Anaheim Convention Center. What did I see there? Well...
THE USEFUL:
-Parking was very easy if you show up early. If you show up late don't despair, there's only 500 hotels all over the area with gigantic parking lots. Your ass is covered.
-The staff and even the security guys were very friendly and helpful. I was waiting to get "Punk'd", it was too copacetic for comfort.
-The phone signal inside the Convention Center was very low. My wife and I tried sending texts to each other across the hall and didn't get them until ten minutes after we sent them. This is pretty frustrating if you're lost in a big clusterfuck like the NAMM show.
THE FUNNY:
-I was in the world's biggest Guitar Center. All I could hear was either bad metal guitar or geriatric blues-dude guitar (think "Ghost World" bar scene). Every old creep thought he was Stevie Ray Vaughn. Well, he's dead, just like Buddy Hackett.
-Ten years after quitting the music biz and sound men are still the most arrogant assholes on the planet. They all walked around with a big Peavey-sized cabinet up their ass.
-Celebrities galore graced the NAMM show: Paul Stanley, Mick Mars, my wife said, "What the fuck am I doing here? I might as well be back at work". (She makes clothes for metal bands).
THE COOL:
-Every instrument was represented there, they even had see-through ocarinas (WTF?). Is there a more lesbian instrument than a see-through ocarina?
-I'm not a big violin lover but the electric violins were insane, some of them were shaped like jet fighters and some were cast in cubist Picasso-styled shapes. Wild!
-The best guitar maker was Johnson Guitars, showcasing axes shaped like shotguns, AK-47's, Gumby, King Tut hieroglyphics, you name it, these crackers were off the hook!
-There were multicolored saxophones, multicolored music stands, it was every bit a feast for the eyes as it was to the ears.
I finally made it to the NAMM show, and I had fun. I hope I never go back there again!

Capitol Records Tower (1750 Vine Street) = If there's a sight prettier than the Leaning Tower of Pisa it's a building shaped like a stack of records on a spindle. I always thought the Capitol Records Tower was the coolest sight in Hollywood, but what a tore-up structure.
A musician I played with worked there and said the building hasn't seen much change since it was built, and I suppose that includes asbestos issues (yikes), structural funk and other antique building problems.
I was inside twice. Once, when they had their record collector swap meets in the parking lot (a long time ago), and : twice, when I attended a recording engineer training course and we had a class in the enormous recording studio in the Capitol Records basement. They told me Nat King Cole pinched a loaf down there. I was in the presence of greatness.
Check out the gigantor wall mural of Miles Davis, Tito Puente and Billie Holiday. Ironic how Ringo Starr and Brian Wilson aren't on the mural and they brought more money to those bastards at Capitol than the artists chosen.

Rainbow Bar & Grill (9015 W. Sunset Blvd) = Ah, the Rainbow Bar & Grill…the decline of rock civilization unfolding before your eyes…mp3 killed the video star, but I digress…
The “legendary” pizza everyone raves about will take about an hour plus before you even get to see it on your table. And it’s not all that, really. If you want to eat right away, I would suggest (believe it or not) the Greek salad which is surprisingly goods, seasoned well and absolutely delicious.
Celebrities spotted at the Rainbow: Lemmy of Motorhead who probably gets his mail delivered there, the Osbourne Family (pre-TV show fame), Kevin Dubrow of Quiet Riot RIP, and a heavy-metal Cecil B. DeMille cast of thousands.

Hollywood Bowl (2301 N. Highland Avenue) = Everyone has to hit the Bowl at least once in their lives. Last time I visited the Bowl was for the Motley Crue/Aerosmith show. First thing we did was park at Hollywood & Highland and hit the Bowl shuttle on Orange Drive. I was the only guy on the shuttle besides the surly bus driver; every metal tramp, stripper and strumpet was riding the hooker shuttle, whoo! Cheap blondes in buckskin bikinis were craning their necks scoping me out while my girl was laser-beaming stink eye at them. Let the rock ‘n roll begin, and begin it did. Since my girl made clothes for Mick mars (Motley Crue) we got in through the VIP entrance behind the Bowl. The reason I mention it is because it was fun watching Leif Garrett try to talk hi way in for free after the guest list staff didn’t see his famous name on the list (“Dude, don’t you remember me from Behind The Music?”)
As we walked in I noticed Slash walking by us, his bodyguards were three steps behind him and running to keep up. Some bodyguards. I hope he puts a stop payment on their pay checks.
We got a great box in the orchestra pit (seats four). The sound was decent (ah, the review begins), visibility is good no matter where you’re seated with lots of video screens in case you’re not a squinter. Motley Crue were great; wish they did “Too Fast For Love” and “Afraid”, but they did “Dr. Feelgood” so I went home happy.
As soon as Motley Crue were done and Aerosmith opened with “Toys In The Attic” (my favorite R.E.M. song) it was our cue to leave. If I want to hear Aerosmith there’s always KLOS and trailer parks.
The bimbo shuttle wasn’t happening so we walked down Highland, everyone incredulous we would bail on Steven Tyler’s mega-lips, even the rent-a-cops schitting a brick (“how could you?”)
The most outraged of all was MTV has-been Jesse Camp and his entourage walking up as we were walking down the road. “Dude are they done already?”
No, but we were. Who wants to hear the same old song and dance?

Whiskey A Go-Go (8901 W. Sunset Blvd) = The Wiggy A Goo-Goo, those were the days, and they were funny ha-ha days, too.
You’d be on stage rockin’ and shakin’ yr. ass and there’d be video monitors all over the place and while you’re singin’ up there you’re staring at yourself performing and it’s a lot like boppin’ in front of the bedroom mirror when you’re a kid only a lot of poor people paid to get in so your ego is magnified times 100 and once two girls fought over me at the bar upstairs and I ended up going home alone because it wasn’t really about me after all, was it?
The Whiskey is a funny place because The Doors played there and now a tribute band called Wild Child plays there and once Van Halen played there and now a tribute band called Atomic Punks play there and I played there a lot and how soon will my tribute band be playing there?

The Coach & Horses (7617 W. Sunset Blvd) = I was in a very-Bad-MOOD before I went to the Coach & Horses because my former band sent me a pseudo-litigious e-mail about some mySpace crap I had no involvement in. By the end of the night at the C&H I was grinning like a little chimp flinging Number 2’s at the zoo.
The door man (Paul? Too drunk to remember) was the nicest I’ve met in years. The bar is dark as hell with a jukebox that made my jaw drop. As soon as I heard “Hold Tight” by Dave Dee, Dozy, Beaky, Mick & Tich I knew I was home.
The drinks were stiffer than Walt Disney’s corpse: My first 2 scotch & sodas were rabbit punches but the third was the haymaker. I almost lit my nose instead of the cigarette I jammed into my gob. The bartenders here rule like a wrench. Dammit, I was so larried up I could have sung a Johnny Mathis aria at Miceli’s.
The night ended with a cab ride home from a cabbie named Hamlet, I schitt you not. Coach and Horses is chill to kill.

The Roxy Theatre (9009 W. Sunset Blvd) = When I played The Roxy Theatre the sound was very crisp and clean on stage, great monitors finally I could hear my Lizabeth Scott On White Crosses Croon and screeching saxophone over the din of feedback guitars, kick-ass monster mix, etc.
The sound man was Don Henley-style cocky and rude but the end result was brilliant, angel’s flight to the ears cheers mate, but buy yourself some manners, Don Henley clone.
The lighting guy was excellent. Never met him before in my life but he knew all the dramatic moments I our songs instinctively and lit us at all the right moments to chilling effect.
The dressing rooms are pretty small but big enough to make out in. I road tested that option myself.
If everything about the Roxy seems small it’s because the club got its start as a dilapidated striptease club bought by Lou Adler, John Phillips and some silent partners. The first show they put on there after they gussied it up was an unknown rock musical from England called “The Rocky Horror Show”. Not a bad start, eh?
In short, the Roxy isn’t the greatest club to see a show at but it’s one of the best for performing in. You will love it.

Frankie & Johnnie’s New York Pizza (8947 W. Sunset Blvd) = If the Rainbow is for rock royalty (haha) then this joint is for the dispossessed rockers, the street skanks and the merely curious. They’ve got beer and wine, if you want it harder (hey girls) go to Turner’s and flask it, baby. F&J’s isn’t like the ‘Bow but at least you get your pizza in less than an hour. And individual slices thin and thick crust can be had in two shakes of a lamb’s tail. Yes, the pizza’s just OK but I like it.
The Italian sandwiches are big and happy and affordable. Their dessert selection’s not bad, either. Apple cheesecake and tiramisu are some of the specialties there. I love the Sunset Strip.