I read somewhere that Joe Perry told the Guardian UK that Aerosmith doesn't see the need to write any new material and that they're content to rehash the classics when they go on tour. Seems to me that in the past five years, they were doin some sessions here and there and I guess the situation with Steve Lillywhite didn't pan out eh? Fact is that Joe Perry released more new albums that his regular job band. I mean we can't get enough of Walk This Way or I Don't Want To Miss A Thing since somewhere in the world somebody is playing a Aerosmith song. I'm in favor of making new music when you should, in fact I still like Done With Mirrors better than anything off Get A Grip or Nine Lives. Then again I also think that Aerosmith did better music when they were wacked out on drugs. Getting straight only led them to Jim Vallance or Desmond Child or Marti Fredicksen and though that got them back into the spotlight, those prissy ballads like Angel or Don't Want To Miss A Thing really knocked them down a few notches on the cool meter. Still I don't find myself going to a Aerosmith show, the tickets cost way too much but if I want to remember the good old days then I'll pull out Live Bootleg and relive my lost youth that way.
In my last top ten, I made the inquiry of whatever happened to Bob Wiseman, the multi talented keyboard player of Blue Rodeo and I'm guessing he must have googled and came across last weeks top ten and commented about that. I guess it shows how much the US looks upon it's friends north of the border but Wiseman is a lot better well known up there being busy with his solo career and scoring music for films. But it rekindled my interest in Blue Rodeo and his albums and I listened to all of them up to Lost Together, which may or may not be their best known record in the US. Always thought that the next album Five Days In July was their best selling down here but again what popularity Blue Rodeo had down here was killed by the revised Soundscan to which albums pop up in high positions and then tumble down, unlike the old ways an album had to climb the charts. To these ears Diamond Mine (1989) has grown more upon me than Lost Together, although both albums still are A minuses in my book. Outskirts being a debut and Casino their most pop. Blue Rodeo owes a lot to their canadian bros The Band but upon Diamond Mine that may have been Wiseman's album in the way he plays keyboard, going from Garth and Richard to Augie Meyers and Ray Manzerek and sounding like a madman John Cale on Fuse. Getting Glenn Ditchem from Andrew Cash's band on Lost Together turned out to be a big plus on Lost Together, he turned out to be their best drummer and still continues to play with Blue Rodeo to this day. And they are one of the biggest bands in canada although in the US, they will forever remain a cult band which is a shame. Jac Holzman though so much of them that he reissued their Atlantic albums for his shortlived Discovery label in the 90s. To which I discovered them through the pawnshop myself and bought most of their albums off and on in the early 00s. I donno if calling them Americana would serve a purpose, Canadicana perhaps a better term? Sometimes putting a top ten together doesn't get much interest but in the case of last weeks it did answer my question and I thank Bob for setting the record straight.
The weather here in June sucks. Because we get about 10 to 15 storms in this area and the average is 5.1 inches of rain, which I think is way too much. We seem to get these storms one after another at this time and this year is no exception. It has rained 4 of the 5 first days so far but thankfully it has been less than the last couple years. It also brings up bad memories of the 2008 year to which we had something like 15 inches of rain in a two week span thus causing the great flood of 2008 of 31.3 feet of angry Cedar River that went so far into Cedar Rapids it actually reached my old place of residence on the SW side about four feet. I am not a fan of rain, we get way too much and we get water in the basement and I cuss and scream over that. I need to tell the landlord here that perhaps getting a sunk pump might prevent that. I get nervous when we have a flood watch out or having stall fronts that park over this great state and we get a train of rain going over the same area over and over again. I think last night we dodged a bullet since most of the heavy rain stayed to the south and west of here and went into Missouri. I think the big thing is that most of the storms come from the northwest rather than the south. The 2008 storms, the majority came from the south and thanks to the evil Gulf Of Mexico we got soaked in more ways than one. But with me going to Michigan and spend time with my GF, I get worried that I might come back to a watered down basement and our landlord not watching the place. Which explains why I don't like going anywhere during the rainy season but I need a vacation from my GD job and the printers that continue to fail or break down. My co workers need a vacation from me. So hopefully the next week of being up in Frankenmuth or Hale or Ann Arbor will ease my worried and overblown mind and when I return back here will be a lot more peaceful and easier to get along with. Should be a lotta fun.
