I’ve spoken about “the sophomore slump” before on the pages of B&V. In that particular post I was thinking about all the bands who managed to overcome the dreaded sophomore jinx by putting out an even better second album than their debut. I recently posted about one such second album in the Cult’s Love. As I…
“I feel bad for people who don’t drink. When they wake up in the morning, that’s as good as they’re going to feel all day.” – Frank Sinatra With the exception of Fall – which is my favorite of the seasons because, well, football… and if I’m being honest I’ve always liked good jacket weather…
I posted my annual 40 year lookback playlist in March and this year it was all about 1985. I don’t think 1985 will ever rival say, 1971 or 1984, in terms of the vast amount of quality music that was released in that calendar year, but there were certainly some fantastic albums that hailed from…
Jack White, who just returned from touring Japan in support of his latest LP – the sensational No Name – came to Kansas City last night and played the venerable Uptown theater. He had played St. Louis the night before where he played my favorite Raconteurs song, “Carolina Drama,” I missed it by one night! Jack…
I saw a few months back that venerable, hard rock/prog rock, Canadian power-trio (which is just a fun word) Rush was releasing a box set to celebrate their 50th anniversary, creatively titled Rush 50. The box has a number of different configurations including a 7 LP vinyl version and a 4 CD version. I was…
*Image of the concert poster for Live Aid, July 13, 1985 likely copyrighted… A few years back, inspired by doing a playlist centered on the landmark year in music that was 1971 (a 50-year lookback at the time), I started putting together playlists centered on specific years in the 70s and then later we also…
*Photo taken from the internet and likely copyrighted There’s this common trope amongst music fans and especially music critics that when Grunge, in the form of Kurt Cobain (guitar/vocals/songwriter/legend) with his band Nirvana (Dave Grohl on drums; Krist Novoselic on bass) came along they destroyed all the music forms that came before it. Even I…
“I’m still dancing, but now I’m not alone…I’m still dancing but now I’m in control” – Billy Idol, “Still Dancing” I saw Billy Idol with his longtime, superb (and I believe underrated) guitarist Steve Stevens in Las Vegas in the fall of 2023 and he said, from the stage, he was working on a new…
*Image taken from the internet and likely copyrighted I’ve been grousing about this time of year recently (Playlist: Winter Blues) and wondering what to do with my free time now that football season is over, when the annual Rock N Roll Hall of Fame list of Nominees came out. I’ve often said out loud that…
“No more games. No more bombs. No more walking. No more fun. No more swimming. 67. That is 17 years past 50. 17 more than I needed or wanted. Boring. I am always bitchy. No fun- for anybody. 67. You are getting Greedy. Act your old age. This won’t hurt.” – Hunter S. Thompson, ‘Football…