Slayer - Reign In Blood

Number 19

Slayer - Reign In Blood
Metal classic or just noise?
To me this is all classic.... Slayer broke into the mainstream consciousness with this, their third album. Released in 1986 against a backdrop of Reagan's America.
The album was brutal, extreme, controversial and honest. Clocking in at as little of 29 minutes the pace is both breathtaking and relentless.
'Angel Of Death' opens proceedings, this track initially had the moral majority (PMRC) throwing all sorts of accusations at Slayer, ranging from Devil worshippers through to Nazi symphathizers. The lyrical matter was questionable, it tells of the experiments at Auschwitz concentration camp by Nazi physician Josef Mengele, but the music is top draw speed Metal!
The album barely draws breath with most songs under 3 minutes, a real blink and you miss it, the following are not to be missed:
The buzzsaw guitar sound on 'Necrophobic', Tom Araya's (Vocalist) demonic vocal and scream on 'Altar Of Sacrifice' and not forgetting the Dave Lombardo school of thrash metal drumming throughout the disc, especially on 'Jesus Saves'and 'Criminally Insane'.
The outstanding track on the album is saved to last 'Raining Blood'. The track starts with thunder and rain, then the tension builds further with Lombardo's tom toms.
Then possibly one of metal's most recognisable riffs rips through. It was writers Kerry King and Jeff Hannerman's (both guitar) intent to try and make this sound like being stuck in purgatory and waiting to take your revenge on Heaven. It indeed sounds that savage.
Slayer Raining Blood Video From Live Decade
The influenece of this disc has been far reaching throughout the Metal world, without it we would not have seen bands like Pantera and Sepultura breaking into the mainstream.
Others like Carcass and Fear Factory may have never been signed etc...
Also big kudos to producer Rick Rubin for seeing the potential in them and signing Slayer to his predominantly hip hop label 'Def Jam'.
As far as this genre of music goes, Reign In Blood is a masterpiece.

Why I ♥ This Album

A couple of years ago, my wife and I were having an evening meal with friends at Cafe Galatea in Glastonbury high street, The resturant was very busy and the management had put on some entertainment for the customers. The (ahem) singer was playing acoustic guitar and looked a lot like TV presenter Sister Wendy.

At these occasion after a few drinks myself and my friend Tim were discussing which songs we should request and amongst them were Metallica and our mainstay Slayer's Raining Blood.
However desite the amount drunk neither of us had the bottle to shout out any of these, especially after what seemed to be a random person from the resturant got up and sang backing vocals on a screeching version of 'California Dreamin'.
The best laugh of the evening was left to our table. As you may imagine Glastonbury is full of the weird and wonderful people and tonight was no different. However this resturant was shocked by what was said from our table.
Tim was discussing local art galleries with our American friend, Dancing Hands, and as the resturant was very noisy they were speaking quite loudly, during their conversation the resturant went very quiet and it was at this point that Tim exclaimed at the top of his voice 'Do I Know Lucifer?' well you could hear a pin drop... everyone's head turned to our table, necks were craned to see who this satanist was. How did we reacted to this.... We fell about in fits of laughter, my stomach hurt, tears were rolling down my face.
Here we were in the spirit capital of England and people are still shocked by the mention of the L word - which really means the 'dawn of Venus' ...

NB Lucifer does run a beautiful art gallery in Glastonbury 'Portal For The Immortal' in Benedict Street. Worth a visit if you're in town.

Michael Jackson - Thriller

Here we are at 18

Michael Jackson - Thriller
I have never been Michael Jackson's biggest fan, however you have to respect the phenomenal success of 'Thriller'as to sell that many records it would have to be a great album. After the success of his previous effort 'Off The Wall' he must have felt the pressure with the follow up, however with the guidance of Quincy Jones
he showed diversity and a great ear for classic pop and soul.
In the US 7 of the 9 tracks were released as singles and all hit the top 10, a feat that has never been matched from one album. Also the videos broke down MTV's reluctance to show black artists in heavy rotation during peak hours. These are just 2 of the many legacys left from Thriller.
What about the actual songs?
Let's look at the killer trio, firstly 'Billie Jean' a song that nearly didn't make the album (Jones didn't like it at all). From the stark drum beat and the hard R&B bass lines it just makes you want to dance and wiggle. The lyrical story about a stalker was just fascinating and a real sign of the times.
Billie Jean Including The Famous 'Moonwalk'
'Beat It' has a real 'West Side Story' feel to it, the bashing tubes at the start set the tone. It also probably contains the most recognisable guitar solo ever (courtesy of
Eddie Van Halen) and the song was neither disco or rock, just classic.
Last of the trio is the weakest of them but possibly the most famous now due to the 14 minute video - 'Thriller'. Said video is amongst my generation's 'JFK' moments
(Where were you when?), the first showing on UK TV became an event and I know of people that watched in their local village halls at midnight when it was first shown. The song starts
promising enough with the howls and creeking doors but then descends into just a tepid pop/R&B song. It finishes strongly, however, with a spoken outro from 'horror' actor Vincent Price.
Other good songs on the album are the Funkadelic inspired 'Wanna Be Startin' Something' complete with African chanting and the soulful aching 'Human Nature'.
The most dissapointing song on the disc is perhaps the Paul McCartney duet 'The Girl Is Mine'. After the success the duo had with 'Say Say Say' I expect a lot of people were looking forward to another big song. However what came out was a sugary and uninspiring ballad. A letdown.
As this was the lead single from the album many critics had their knives sharpened for the failure of 'Thriller' but now after over 65 million sales worldwide those knives must have been blunted.
Pop music was never bigger than this.

Why I ♥ Album

What would you say to your eleven year old son if he asked you for alochol to take to a party he had been invited to?
Unless you've been on The Jeremy Kyle Show I'd hope you would say no! Well, my mum did say no, but hey ho, I had to ask! I was invited to a party at popular boy Jamie Sheldon's house in Popley.
The rumour at school was that the invites were exclusive and if you were lucky enough to be invited you had to take some alcohol with you.
It was like winning a golden ticket when I was asked to go. So of course I had to (like others that were invited) ask if I could take some beer or any sort of Alcohol! Unlike some of my friends I really didn't have an older sibling that I could turn to and ask. I had two older step-sisters but they would have just taken my money and told my mum (nasty girls!!!).
So what to do?
Mark Farry had told everyone he had 2 bottles of cider and other stories started to be heard about how much drink other people were bringing. So after much pleading and wailing my parents agreed to meet me nearly half way with 'Shandy Bass'. It looked like beer, smelt like it but had as much alcohol in it as mouthwash...(probably less actually!)

Yum Shandy Bass

The day of the party arrived and all excited I clutched my 2 litre bottle of shandy and left for the party with neighbour and school friend Ian Russell. We arrived at Jamie's and knocked on the door. I think it was his mother who answered the door and showed us in. Michael Jackson's Thriller was on the turntable (this was the soundtrack for any party in 1983) and there was a lot of noise. It seemed the party was not as exclusive as I was led to believe, it was heaving. Anyway we were shown into the kitchen to put our drinks
on a table and the sight was unbelievable........ a table full of 2 litre bottles of 'Shandy Bass'!!

Free - Fire And Water

No 17

Free - Fire And Water
A seven track timeless British blues rock album, and one that I discovered only in the last couple of years after much resistance. I had always loved Paul Rodgers' (Free Vocalist in Free) work with a band called Bad Company, but had always been a little reluctant to listen to Free for some reason. Even though it had a taken me a while to listen to this album I was delighted to find that it contains so many strong songs and a bone-fide classic.
'Fire And Water' opens the album with the sort of riff that Pete Townsend would have killed for! Paul Kossoff (Guitar) had a wonderful belief and swagger about his playing, and
it shows on this song - IMMENSE!
Another rocker on this album is 'Mr. Big', an awesome stuttering riff by Kossoff with some great bass lines that almost seem like the Bassist was actually playing lead. The disc does have a number of slower and medium paced tracks the best of which is 'Remember'. Paul Rodgers' voice is drenched in the blues whilst the guitar solo is just sublime.
As for the rest of the songs 'Heavy Load' is a well crafted guitar and piano workout wrapped with a wonderful story led vocal. On 'Oh I Wept' Paul Rodgers certainly proves, without a doubt, he was one of the best vocalist of his generation.
The one song that most people will be familar with closes the album, 'All Right Now'. A song that I never really tire of hearing (despite it's over use for a gum commercial back in the late 1980s). I defy anyone not to play air guitar along with the huge riff to this track. This song did catapult Free to success, but also contributed to the beginning of their downfall.
Free On Top Of The Pops Performing All Right Now
It was during the tour for the follow up record 'Highway', that differences were beginning to show between the main songwriters (Rodgers and Bassist Andy Fraser),coupled with Kossoff's growing heroin dependency.
The band disbanded in 1973. If you do buy one Free album in your life, ensure it's this one!

Why I ♥ This Album

Early 1990s before the internet, if you wanted to know the lyrics to a song you had four options to find them;
1)have the sheet music
2)some lyrics were printed on the inner sleeve of a record cover
3)buy 'Smash Hits' magazine which listed lyrics to the Hit Parade
4)listen to the song over and over again to decipher the lyrics 



Me & Mike From The Bane

 It was whilst, in my brief tenure, as lead vocalist with Durin's Bane that Graham Lenton (Guitar Hero) asked me, one late Friday evening, to learn Free's classic 'All Right Now' in time for the next rehearsal on the Sunday.
No problem, I said. The following day it dawned on me that I didn't know the words and didn't actually own a Free record. As it had no long been re-released it was on the jukebox at my local watering hole 'The Lardicake'. However I was sure that the locals would have grown sick of me pumping the machine full of 50 pence pieces and playing the song over and over and over again. So I had to come up with Plan B.
I suddenly remembered that I had not long gone to London and bought a mystery pack of 7 inch records from Berwick Street. The pack came in a sealed carrier bag and only cost a couple of quid, what would be inside was fairly hit and miss but I recall that there was a version of 'All Right Now' in there.
So off home I went to dig the single out. It is lucky that I do like the song as this version was awful!! I must have listened to it at least 20-25 times, stopping and starting it to write down the lyrics. It seemed to take forever. The second verse was a little hard to follow - "Are you tryin' to put me in shame?, I said, slow, don't go so fast" are the actual words, I found out later.
I don't remember what I wrote down but it certainly wasn't that!
Sunday rolled around and I was all ready to rehearse. After a couple of run throughs, and me just simply destroying the song and ruining it for everyone (I am no Paul Rodgers)
it was decided that Graham would sing the song in the live set. I don't blame my own vocals I blame the version that I had learned it from.
So I blame Pepsi & Shirlie!!!

Pepsi & Shirlie - All Right Now