Favorite Album Openers

To start off I have finally done away with that old generic and boring looking header. I used my extremely small knowledge of Photoshop to come up with that new one and I bet that my lack of Photoshop skills shows, anyway that is my new header, and until I can improve my Photoshop skills you will be looking at that.

Now, today I came across a fantastic post which can be seen on Welcome to the Pond, a great blog which really engages the reader with fun questions. Today the question was what are your favorite album openers, this immediately struck a chord with me because I feel the flow of an album is so extremely crucial to a listening experience. I am going to go on and list some of my favorites.

1) Pink Floyd - Shine On You Crazy Diamond (Wish You Were Here)

2) King Crimson - 21st Century Schizoid Man (In The Court of the Crimson King)

3) U2 - Where the Streets Have No Name (The Joshua Tree)

4) Nirvana - Smells Like Teen Spirit (Nevermind)

5) John Lennon - Imagine (Imagine)

6) Metallica - Enter Sandman (The Black Album)

7) The Doors - Break On Through (The Doors)

8) Smashing Pumpkins - Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness (Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness)

9) The Who - Baba O'Riley (Who's Next)

10) Black Sabbath - War Pigs (Paranoid)


I would love to give explanations for each song but I am waking up early tomorrow morning to catch low tide for surfing.

Trying to Spice Things Up

I feel my blog has a very generic looking appearance and I think it is about time to try to change things up. I'm not planning on changing the whole template but instead just customize the header of the page. I am pretty terrible with Photoshop but we'll see what I can do, so right now if I don't post tonight I am devoting my time to making a new header for my page. If anyone has any suggestions of how it should look I would be more than happy to hear suggestions.

If I Go Insane Please Don't Put Your Wires In My Brain

I feel like I’m beating an old drum with how often I say that certain albums are one of my favorites but once again I must say it again, “Atom Heart Mother” is a Pink Floyd classic. This album was released right before “Meddle” which was in the year 1970, like “Meddle”, “Atom Heart Mother” has a short track listing of only five songs but in Floydesque style, songs with length. A rather interesting note regarding this album is that Floyd themselves do not exactly prefer this album opposed to their others often putting it down, sometimes it boggles my mind how artists can completely write off some of their best work, a very good reminder of this is with Weezer who basically loathe their fan favorite album “Pinkerton.” Regardless, it is certainly understandable why people may not immediately gravitate towards this album due to its 23 minute opening self titled instrumental piece which may deter listeners from listening to the rest of the album. Despite the length it is quite a captivating piece with a wonderful French horn section which really creates some stunning drama. The three following tracks are short (When speaking of Floyd) but very personal songs each sung by a different member. The first of which is “If” sung by Waters, a very dreamy song with surreal lyrics and a soothing arpeggio on guitar which continues throughout the whole song. “Summer of 68’” is the next song sung by Wright who has a voice extremely similar to Gilmour’s. The song has a rather funky touch to it decorated with a wonderful brass section and great piano lines; this is a song which can certainly be tied in with Syd Barrett influences thanks to its catchy chorus and musical style. “Fat Old Sun” is the last of the shorter songs sung by David Gilmour, and this is the highlight of the album. This just may be the most beautiful sounding song Floyd has ever written, the lyrics use fantastic imagery and are backed by a slowly strummed acoustic guitar and Gilmour’s magnificent voice, the song peaks about three and a half minutes in where Gilmour shows off what is arguably his best solo ever, right there with “Comfortably Numb” personally I may like this solo a bit more, and I must say seeing this song live was definitely one of the best experiences of my life, one that I will take to the grave. The album ends on what can be seen as a rather comedic note with “Alan’s Psychedelic Breakfast”. The title basically explains everything, a psychedelic trip through breakfast time following someone through there morning routine of making coffee, lighting up a cigarette, pouring and eating cereal and etc. The band does play over Alan’s morning routine but nothing that would really qualify as spectacular or even “good” for that matter but once again the musical sections need to be put into context with the theme of the song. This is not a song that in any way should be listened to on its own but MUST be listened to along with the rest of the album (I honestly feel that ALL Floyd work should be listened to in its entirety but most songs can be enjoyed on their own terms.) This album holds up as one of Floyd’s best albums whether they like it or not, it is a grand eloquent album with bombastic themes and pieces, but not overly pretentious to the point where they are trying to create something which completely flies over the listeners head. Like “Meddle” this shows the band going on the right path towards the perfect balance of grand ideas and musical work, “Atom Heart Mother” is a phenomenal work of art that shows what a band can do when all putting forth equal creativity and ideas.

Overhead the Albatross Hangs Motionless Upon the Air

Two posts down titled “Wots…Uh The Deal?”stated my feelings about the lack of glorification of earlier Floyd work specifically anything before “Dark Side Of the Moon.” I claimed I would shine much positive light upon three early Floyd albums “Meddle”, “Atom Heart Mother” and “Obscured by Clouds” this post starts the “glorification” process. To start off "Meddle" which is a bit more well known than the other two contains probably the strongest Floyd piece ever "Echoes", a twenty three minute epic that has every conceivable emotion tied into it, along with incredibly soothing harmonies, moving guitar lines, and wonderful sonic textures. When listening to “Echoes” you are being taken on a journey which pulls and tugs at your mind taking you in all types of directions. At times you will be lulled and sedated by lush and beautiful sounds and at times you will be tense with a sense of urgency from the rough sounds and unbelievable guitar lines. When talking about a song which creates a sense of urgency no song is better than "One of these Days", the song is nothing more but urgency, the pulsating guitar riff, hammering drums and demonic sounds/voices come together to give the listener a feeling of tension and stress. To sum up “One of these Days” in just one word, it would have to be poignant. Aside from “Echoes” and “One of these Days” this album is a rather mellow one. “A Pillow of Winds” the second track on the album sounds just like its name, a very dreamy song which will lull you right in serenity. The third song on the album “Fearless” is quite like “A Pillow of Winds” in the manner of its soothing sound, David Gilmour’s voice on this song is just miraculous, it is so incredibly mellow and surreal no other voice fits better, along with the moving voice is some brilliant guitar work, nothing over the top but regardless it sounds spectacular. The only down point of the album is “San Tropez” a song which just does not fit in any way on this album, if anything it sounds like it belongs more on “Piper at the Gates of Dawn” than anything else. Although sounding out of place it is a rather catchy song on its own but when looking at the album as a whole this track can certainly be disregarded. In the end “Meddle” is nothing short of spectacular, the album clearly shows the potential Pink Floyd had if they were able to all hone their skills together to make one cohesive and fluid sounding album which was obviously soon to come if not already apparent. This is one album that no music lover should go without and especially no Floyd fan should be without.

Pop Is the New Metal!

As a huge music fan devoted to certain genres I often get quite offended when certain genres get completely abused. When certain bands get placed into genres that I hold near and dear to my heart my first instinct is to argue because nothing is quite worse than saying to people "Yeah I like Punk" and then they go on to say "Oh so you like bands like New Found Glory and My Chemical Romance." Three genres that I feel get completely destroyed by ignorant music listeners is Alternative, Punk and Metal. The only genre I am going to focus on out of the three is Alternative mainly because it is pretty late and I'm a bit tired.

Alternative is probably the genre which receives the worst of band placing. I once knew a person who claimed that what she listened to was Alternative music, but what I ended up finding out was that all of the bands she listened to in no way fit into the Alternative category. To me when someone says alternative a few bands that come to mind are Radiohead, The Flaming Lips and Beck. These three bands I feel very well describe Alternative which is basically a classification of a different sounding type of music, I like to describe it as the progressive music of the modern era. The classification of alternative is quite obscure but yet even with such a broad meaning bands which have no right being placed there are. To name a few bands which are placed under alternative music by many is Fall Out Boy which is clearly an Emo band (Emo being a classification of emotional music with the simplicity of punk but yet lyrics are whinny as well as the vocals being whinny) another is Lifehouse which is Pop Rock (basically simplified rock music with catchy lyrics and riffs.) To me these two bands should not be in any way synonymous with Alternative music, their simplicity screams the antithesis of Alternative. To add on top of the simplicity is the way these bands are following the standards of popular music, in no way are choosing an "alternative" style of music.

To just touch on the other two genres, Emo music is always labeled as a sub genre of Punk, to me this is incredibly wrong. Punk was a music which called for rebelling against society and the current music scene, the simple three chord songs along with extremely raw sound made punk what it was. Punk was not a genre which got touched up in the studios, when you pick up a true punk album you should be picking up something which sounds like the band is playing in your room examples of true punk bands are The Sex Pistols, The Dead Kennedy's and The Bad Brains. Emo music the so called sub genre of punk music prides itself on whinny and sappy vocals along with lyrics which do nothing to promote rebelling against society, the only promotion it does is the promotion of depression and worthlessness. The other genre Metal has been injured by one terrible sub genre and that genre being Glam. Bands like Poison, Motley Crue and Skid Row to me are the complete opposite of metal. Metal is heavy and hard, bands which are prettied up and care more about their hair than their music shows clear signs of anything but metal. I know real metal bands such as Metallica and Slayer are outraged by Glam rock bands and rightfully so.

I guess in the end the problem is not the bands which are being placed into certain genres but those who are placing those bands into them. Society is more or less to blame rather than these individual bands. Genres are there to give an explanation for the sound of a band, with the creation of genres people can easily describe what music they like, but when bands are being misplaced in genres the genre as a whole is being tarnished. To me genres are a good thing, and I know many would like to do without them but without genres how hard would it be to describe the music you like, I would much rather tell people I like classic rock rather than listing bands. If there are major errors in this please forgive me, but I felt it was something I should write about. I know many will disagree with my point of view and that comes as no surprise so I would love to hear more opinions.

Wots...Uh The Deal?

Pink Floyd is a band who is well known for their cult like following, fans worship their music and would sell body parts just to see them one more time but even Floyd with such a hardcore following gets overlooked. From 1973 (Release of "Dark Side of the Moon") to this current day they set the bar for what a quality progressive rock album should be. The issue regarding Floyd is the amount of quality work released before "Dark Side of the Moon" seems to be put on the backburner to future albums which pale in comparison to its predecessors. Albums like "The Wall" and "Animals" receive what I feel is much "undeserved" credit...Well let me rephrase that, much more credit than any album before "Dark Side of the Moon." If I were to list what I feel are the top 10 Floyd albums, "Animals" wouldn't appear until nine and "The Wall" wouldn't even appear on the list. Now I must say I do have some bias against anything which is heavily derived from Waters and little input from the rest of the band but with good reason. All albums from 1968-1975 ("A Saucerful of Secrets"-"Wish You Were Here") display the band working together, there was fantastic synergy and they were firing on all cylinders, input from each member can clearly be heard which accounted for masterpiece after masterpiece. Following "Wish You Were Here" marked the Waters domination era, each album after WYWH sounded more and more like a Waters solo album and to me that just is not Floyd. I am one who advocates the evolution of sounds within a band but when evolving it must be a group effort not the evolution of one member leaving the rest in the dust. As most of you all know this lead to the split of Waters from the band and I honestly feel that it was for the better, I would much rather hear Pink Floyd than Roger Waters. Now back to the topic the amount of albums that Floyd created which are undeniably classic and which probably very few have heard of let alone even heard the name of is unbelievable. To name a few of the albums which I believe are simply jawdropping and yet nearly unheard of are "Atom Heart Mother", "Meddle", and "Obscured by Clouds" Each album is a perfect display of the golden age of Pink Floyd, and in honor of these three unforgettable albums each day I will write a review stating why these albums are very deserving of legendary status juxtaposed to latter Floyd.

Back to New Jersey and the Blog

Well yesterday I returned home from Washington DC and I must say I love it there. It was my second time visiting the area on vacation and yet the second time was just as interesting as the first. Anyway, I do have something to write about, well actually it is more of a question. B&G foods has an offer where when you spend $10 on their food you will receive two free lawn tickets to a concert at a venue by me called PNC Bank Arts Center. I looked at the list of shows that they had to offer and was a bit upset by the lackluster list but there is one show that caught my eye and that is Ringo and his All Star Band. I figure I probably will take advantage of this offer and see them but has anybody else seen Ringo and His All Star Band? I took a look at the members and I must say I am pretty impressed with the lineup, especially with Billy Squire, Edgar Winter, and Rod Argent. From what I have heard about these shows is that they all play some of their own songs and I would love to hear songs like "Frankenstein" and "She's Not There." So once again, if anybody has seen Ringo and His All Star Band or heard anything about the quality of shows I would love to hear. It's nice to be back!

Off to D.C.

From Sat. - Mon. I will be in Washington D.C. so I will be unable to post anything because I don't believe I will have any "free" Internet access. Anyway, while I'm posting I might as well write about some musically related news which is pretty good news to say the least. On July 10th, we will be receiving a "Mini Opera" from The Who, this is a bit of a preview of their upcoming full length album. This mini album will be eleven minutes long and is slated to be one song cut into six parts, the name of the album is "Wire and Glass." For those who thought we would never see The Who again, here they are recording their first album in twenty-four years. We all know how well Pete Townshend writes rock operas a la "Tommy" and although we won't have Keith Moon or John Entwistle I am sure we will receive a quality album.

Pink Floyd Will Be Touring!!!!!

Well not really but I have wonderful news to report from the Pink Floyd camp. Nick Mason appeared in a recent interview with NME.com and went on to give some very shocking but yet incredible news. If you do not know Nick Mason is the drummer of Floyd and this year he has already played with David Gilmour and will soon be playing with Roger Waters. Mason said that Floyd would return in the FULL lineup as long as he can set aside differences between both Gilmour and Waters. A quote from the interview was "I'd love for it to happen again and I really do think Pink Floyd will play together again - but it would have to be for love, not money." He also claimed that he was "The Henry Kissinger of Pink Floyd."

No matter how exciting the news is I refuse to get my hopes up but in the back of my head I figure if Bob Geldoff can do it, why can't Nick Mason? Regardless, I honestly don't think that Pink Floyd will come together and I think the one who would be less willing to bring the group back together would be Gilmour. Surprisingly I feel that Waters would be more up for one more tour but Gilmour would be more reluctant. Gilmour has noted many times that he no longer wants a big tour and has no desire to bring Floyd back together. He seems to really be enjoying his solo efforts and tour and with the success of his solo album there really is no reason for him to get back together with Floyd. During the Live 8 show I was rather surprised to see the ear to ear smiles on Rogers face, which really gave me hope but with all the interviews with Gilmour denying that Floyd will EVER get back together I am fairly convinced that any chance of seeing Floyd again is gone. If Mason is able to get Floyd back together I hope that Kidney's are going for a high price because there is going to have to be somehow to afford those tickets which are surely going to be high, not to mention I want front row! So Nick if you are able to bring back Floyd for just one more tour you will now move from my second favorite member of Floyd to number one!

Horizon's End: Check Them Out!

OK, well my good friends just finished recording their first demo today. As I said in my last post I have been unable to think of anything to post so while my creative vision is dry why not give them a little more exposure by posting them on my blog. All I really have to say about them is they are a very talented group who has a lot of potential. They are very dedicated and do it because they love to play, not because they want to be big rich and famous. Here is the link to hear their stuff Horizon's End. I'm sure they would love to hear some constructive criticism if you have any or please just comment about what you thought about it. I would love to hear what you think about them and I'm sure they would love to hear what you think.

Confusion Will Be My Epitaph

I've been having a pretty difficult time figuring out what to write about. All musically related news seems to be rather insignificant at this time and no solid writing ideas are coming to mind. So I decided I would make a simple but fun post of asking everyone what is their favorite song and why? I realize quite often people don't have favorite songs, and this is understandable considering the plethora of songs out there and how ones listening varies on their mood. Although for me I can easily tell you my favorite song, this song has been my favorite for the past few years for the most part, well to be honest with you it was my second favorite for awhile behind "Echoes" by Pink Floyd, but once I heard a live version of this song my perspective completely changed. I'm sure you are all SO INCREDIBLY ANXIOUS to know what the song is, and it is "Epitaph" by King Crimson. As I said this song was dueling "Echoes" but when I came across what is now my favorite bootleg King Crimson Live at the Fillmore West in 1969 my mind was set on this song. Never have I heard such emotion put into a song, and when a vocalist has his heart and soul in a song one can clearly tell. Greg Lake put his all into this song, and some may say his vocals are "overblown" but nothing can be overblown when it is clear that their blood sweat and tears are in that piece. The song is haunting and incredibly powerful, and displays the height of King Crimson songwriting. A very pessimistic song drenched with pain and agony, and the instrumentation behind it serves as the perfect backdrop with Crimson even whipping out the mellotron. This is a perfect song on a perfect album, King Crimson is sadly not amongst bands that are still heavily recognized to this day like Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, and The Beatles but those who haven't heard their genius are missing out on some of the most intelligent and moving music ever created. How could one pass up an all star lineup of Robert Fripp, Greg Lake, and Ian McDonald? Well anyway, what is your favorite song and why?



The wall on which the prophets wrote
Is cracking at the seams.
Upon the instruments of death
The sunlight brightly gleams.
When every man is torn apart
With nightmares and with dreams,
Will no one lay the laurel wreath
As silence drowns the screams.

Between the iron gates of fate,
The seeds of time were sown,
And watered by the deeds of those
Who know and who are known;
Knowledge is a deadly friend
When no one sets the rules.
The fate of all mankind I see
Is in the hands of fools.

Confusion will be my epitaph.
As I crawl a cracked and broken path
If we make it we can all sit back
And laugh.
But I fear tomorrow Ill be crying,
Yes I fear tomorrow Ill be crying.
-King Crimson

If Video Killed the Radio Star Than What Killed the Video Star?

Not so much who killed the Video Star but who or what killed music on television. Music and television seemed to go hand in hand in the 80's and early 90's but towards the end of the 90's into the 2000's music and TV seemed to be polar opposites and this time opposites did not attract. Growing up in the music video era MTV used to be the hot spot to hear some good and new music now MTV is the perfect place to watch people embarrassing themselves on ridiculous dating shows. I'm not quite sure what Dating Mothers has to do with Music but maybe MTV (Music Television) knows something that I don't. The question is what happened to music and television? No longer do people even associate MTV with music and even when we thought VH1 was going to hold its ground and continue playing music they went into the celebrity reality business. For me I feel there are two things that led to the destruction of music and TV. The first thing that led to the downfall of music and TV appears to me to be the diversity of music at this point in time. I don't think that ever in the history of music has there been such a large diversity. From Pop, to Rock, to Emo, to Rap, to Metal, to the Singer Songwriters and beyond leads me to believe that this is one important factor to the death of this once thriving business. Of course music has always been diverse but never to this point, even in times of heavy music diversity one genre always seemed to take the cake as the most popular especially during the 80's and earlier 90's. As of now with the immense diversity of genres the allocation of fans seems to be rather equal. Along with the diversity the discontent between genres seems to be rather heightened, those who listen to metal usually hate emo, those who listen to rock seem to hate rap, those who listen to nearly anything besides pop usually hate pop. With all this hate and diversity television just cannot win when playing music. If MTV were to play every genre then people would just flip in and out every few minutes if they stuck to just a certain genre they are losing a huge base of viewers. Regardless of what they do it is very difficult for them to come out victorious. The 80's was dominated by rock and hair bands, the early 90's was dominated by grunge. Rap was obviously around during this time but didn't quite break out the way it did in the later 90's. These non diverse times led to the perfect break out for both VH1 and MTV. The second thing leading to the death I believe is the Internet. The power of the Internet was unleashed in the later 90's, no longer was music difficult to attain, with just an Internet connection music was just a click away. I don't honestly feel that the videos really drew people to watch MTV it was more or less the music. Of course the videos are nice to watch but it is the music that counts and why watch the TV waiting for a song you want to hear when you can just download it in a few seconds. If you want to make the argument that people do indeed want to watch the videos they are easier to attain than the music itself. Launch.com made an incredibly large database of music videos and once again why would one want to wait for a video they want to see when they can just hop on the internet and see what they want when they want. I once would badmouth MTV for no longer playing music but who can blame them. We are at a point in time where music and TV just don't go together. The Internet juxtaposed to TV for music is just a much more efficient option and along with the Internet this particular time in music history the diversity of genres also leads to nothing but pain for TV and music.

Favorite SNL Skit

Saturday Night Live has seriously been lacking quality skits the past few years. I realize this really has nothing to do with music but my favorite SNL skit is indeed a musical one. So back to the topic, the problem with SNL is the lackluster cast but every now and then they will come up with a classic skit. It seems like through SNL history it is a show based on a few incredible skits and the rest is just filler. Anyway, my favorite SNL skit of all time has to be the skit with Chris Parnell and Andy Samberg called "Lazy Sunday." It is a ridiculous rap about the two's journey to go see "The Chronicels of Narnia." The song is filled with classic and catchy lines. After this skit aired on SNL it flooded the internet as if it was going out of style. If you haven't seen it yet I URGE you to watch it and here is where you can watch it Lazy Sunday. One interesting note about the way it flooded the internet was the way NBC handled it. NBC made sure that no site could show it which I think is a poor move on their part. SNL has been in a serious drought for quite a long time and by making it difficult to find skits online is only hurting their odds of getting back that large viewing audience they once had. As I said earlier, please watch the skit if you haven't yet and also what is your favorite SNL skit? Runner Ups for me would be Matt Foley the Motivational Speaker and Christopher Walken playing Bruce Dickenson as a record producer trying to incorporate more Cow Bell into Blue Oyster Cult's "Don't Fear the Reaper."

Will Nirvana Carry Over Into Future Generations?

A very knowledgeable reader of this blog Perplexio posted an objective view on what I thought about Nirvana which can be read three posts down. He went on to say this about Nirvana:


History is generally a fair judge of political/social/cultural impact. And while I do believe Nirvana will be fondly remembered, I don't know that it will ever be in the same way or to the same extent as the Beatles (although we will find out within our lifettimes).


They WERE the poster-band for grunge, and they were THE definitive grunge band-- but grunge as a musical style was incredibly short-lived (perhaps only matching psychadelia in its brevity). It's impact may have been tremendous but it was also incredibly brief.


A very interesting question to ask ourselves at this point in time is will Nirvana carry over into future generations? Their life span was short to say the least, they only lasted basically three years in the spotlight and five years from the release of their very first album "Bleach." I thought about this question for a decent amount of time and I do indeed think that they will carry over into future generations for several reasons. One reason I think their music and their legendary status will carry on is because I already hear their music being played on classic rock stations, every classic rock station I've ever listened to has sometime or another played Nirvana if not play them quite often. My mom who I would never suspect liking Nirvana can be found singing along in the car when they're on the radio and once something is labeled as classic rock on a classic rock station it remains classic rock forever. A second reason I believe that Nirvana will carry over is because I can see very young people listening to Nirvana and wearing Nirvana shirts. My brother who was born a year before Kurt died happens to love Nirvana and his friends also listen to them. Another thing I think to look at is the amount of historic bands who have this grand mystique around them that lived very brief lives. I think the two best examples are Hendrix and The Doors. Hendrix had an extremely brief career lasting only from 1967-1970, then The Door only went from 1967-1971. Both of which created revolutionary music and their front men died rather unexpectedly. Nirvana was just like these two, their music was revolutionary and at the same time their life was very short lived. Another thing playing in Nirvana's advantage is the way they are hyped up by critics, magazines like Rolling Stone worship Kurt Cobain and praise him as if he were a God. I feel as long as critics continue to aknowledge Nirvana as one of the greatest bands and or most important bands of all time then I think they will carry over. One final thing that I feel works out well for Nirvana is the mystery of Kurts death. Books and movies continue to be released based on the growing suspicion of how Kurt really died, whether it be by suicide or him being killed the clues don't seem to be sufficient to have a clear and definitive answer. This suspicion will only help the legendary status of Nirvana just like how it helps The Doors. Now in conclusion I don't feel that Nirvana will be remembered in the same light as The Beatles but I do think they will hold legendary status and will be considered as "The Next Beatles."