Coming across some research about Ritchie Blackmore I came across the old clip submitted on You Tube of his 1974 cleaning house concert at Cal Jam as Mr. Blackmore went through about five guitars and a few other oddities to throw into the crowd on the 54 minute (edit for time) Space Truckin'. What I think is the highlight is not Ritchie's Bitch complex and meltdown but rather Glenn Hughes and Ian Paice keeping the space trucking beat going. I remembered seeing this on a In Concert series on ABC back around late 74. As much as people like his guitar playing, meeting him in person was a different story. Great guitarist, arrogant prick is the consensus. See Ritchie take his frustrations out on a innocent cameraman.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1aQ9P4qi8uo
See the crowd run away from flying monitors and crappy amplifiers that quit working. See Ritchie trying to get those Marshalls working with a out of tune guitar and see him smash it up and get another. And smash that up. See Blackmore play guitar with his foot. It wasn't too much of a surprise to see Blackmore finally leave Deep Purple soon afterward to form Rainbow, and reform Deep Purple with the legendary lineup of Ian Gillan and Roger Glover. And see him leave not once but twice. To which the band finally get some stability when Steve Morse replaced him and still plays with them from time to time. In the meanwhile there's Blackmore's Night. And the only person that can put up with him, his wife Candace Night. Haven't heard any of that stuff and not high on the priority list either.
But then again I suppose that I too be pissed off if I had to play a 54 minute of Space Trucking too.
George Blanda passed away Monday, he was 83 years old. He played 26 seasons but his best years were in the AFL with the Houston Oilers and later Oakland Raiders. Forever known as leading the Raiders to five straight victories or ties in the final minute, Blanda made it fun to root for the Raiders. He retired in 1976. If you ever wanted to know more about the grand old man, try to find Wells Trombley's Blanda, one of the best autobiographies ever written.
And now, a collection of songs of the week. Here's hoping I can get the titles and albums right this time.
1. Love Is Ending-The Charlatans 2010 We might as well forgo the UK since they have been around for twenty years whereas The Charlatans USA have been dormant for about the last40. You Crossed My Path was a disappointment but this album starts out nice and loud and has that trippy vibe that we love from this band. Produced by Martin Glover aka Youth from Killing Joke, the new album called Who We Touch. Their best since Tellin Stories.
2. Bombay Calling-It's A Beautiful Day 1970 Time has pretty much forgotten this band although I'm sure the odious bastard Matthew Katz had a lot to do with this too. Katz also killed Moby Grape as well and you can get crappy remastered of Moby Grape's classic albums via San Francisco Sound CDs although for a time Sundazed reissued the albums for about three weeks before Katz threatened his 100 lawsuits to stop that. Sony Music in the UK issued a couple of IABD albums on a single cd and I came across one. This song would later appeared as the beginning of Deep Purple's Child In Time a few months later.
3. Cold Gin-KI$$ 1974 Gotta put the dollar signs in becuz Gene $immon$ loves those dollar signs. Written by Ace Frehley but Gene sings instead since Ace didn't feel comfortable to sing it.
4. Are You Ready For The Country-Waylon Jennings 1976 Neil Young wrote it but Waylon had it top the country charts in 1976. For a country song it sure rocks.
5. Coffee And Cigarettes-Jimmy Eat World 2010 One of the earliest Emo bands that have outlasted most of the competition JEW returns with a brand new album and for the most part it is pretty good although track 8 and 9 are two turds in a row but I'm still listening to the rest of the album and still withholding judgement till I hear it all.
6. Mystic Eyes-Them 1965 Pure evil garage rock from Van Morrison and the boys. Kinda reminds me of driving down a dead end street at 100 miles an hour without any brakes. Morrison sounds like there's hellhounds on his trail and that two note organ at the end of song sounds menacing.
7. Homesick-Train 1998 Hey Soul Sister is the Broken Wings of this decade. And one of the reasons why I'm beginning to hate Pat Monahan. First of all Johnny Colt, the last rock and roller in Train leaves and second they give us Save Us San Francisco, an album so bankrupt for ideas that they recycle The Doobie Brothers' Black Water. Which leaves us with Hey Soul Sister, which is now embalmed all across soft rock radio station around the US. And not only that it's in a fucking commercial. Save Us SF is a piece of crap album, so I take you back to their first album, when they were starting out and making somewhat decent jam band music. But then again you don't need to pay full price, just hang at the pawnshop and they'll have a few copies at a dollar apiece.
8. You Don't Treat Me No Good-Sonia Dada 1992. To which Jerrod Neimann covered and got a top ten country hit this summer and I knew I heard this song before and knew Sonia Dada did it but couldn't find it till I stumbled across it while trying to get the playlist going for the R.Smith Sunday Night Show. Their version doesn't vary much from Neimann's, theirs is about a minute longer. Haven't heard much from Sonia Dada since Test Pattern came out a few years ago. Such a shame, they were a band that I followed once I discovered them. Beaker Street has been known to play a song or two from time to time.
9. Video Inspiration-Axe 1982 One of those many bands of the early 80's that popped up briefly then disappeared soon after. Not sure if this was the hit or the B side Now Or Never but I tended to play this one more than Now Or Never. Before signing with Atco, they made a couple blotched efforts for MCA/Curb (a failed version of the Four Tops I Can't Help Myself comes to mind) but the Offering did give him a FM hit with Rock And Roll Party In The Streets. Fun stuff.
10. Take A Little Walk With Me-Eric Clapton 2010 Was it worth paying an extra five bucks getting the Barnes & Noble bonus track? You tell me. His new album is his best in years and it seems that revisiting Cream, JJ Cale and Stevie Winwood did rejuvenate EC on this album. Of course we get the usual Sheryl Crow grandstanding appearance (ain't there nothing she won't do?) and some guest stars but overall, as EC gets a year closer to the golden years, he sounds as laid back and comfortable in his surroundings. It may not get you to go to B & N for the bonus track but Best Buy does have it on sale for 10 bucks (till 10/2/10).
http://guitarinternational.com/wpmu/2010/09/14/ritchie-blackmore-the-rainbow-interview/
Blackmore did comment about the Cal Jam episode in this old interview. Take a look.
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