Day After Day #137: Godzilla

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Godzilla (1977)

One of my favorite things to do as a kid was watch monster movies on a lazy weekend afternoon. One of the Buffalo UHF stations we got on our cable system ran a regular monster movie double feature and I loved all of it. But without a doubt, the best monster was Godzilla, the prehistoric reptilian beast who is awakened by nuclear radiation and wreaks havoc on Tokyo. He was the coolest looking and the strongest monster; according to the Wiggitypedia, Godzilla has been in 38 movies over the last 70 years. 

So you can imagine how cool it was for young Kumar when I discovered there was a rock song about Godzilla by Blue Oyster Cult. The band got its start in 1967 as Soft White Underbelly at Stony Brook University in Long Island. After some lineup and band name changes, the group finally settled on Blue Oyster Cult in 1971, releasing their self-titled debut on Columbia Records in 1972. They were a hard rock/psych band with a literary bent toward occult and sci-fi topics, but at the same time, also had a sense of humor. 

BOC toured early and often in the '70s and built a faithful following behind songs like "Cities on Flame with Rock and Roll," "The Red and the Black," "Hot Rails to Hell" and "Career of Evil," but their first big hit was in 1976 with "(Don't Fear) The Reaper." The following year, the band released their fifth album Spectres, which featured a gargantuan lead single, "Godzilla."

The song featured lead vocals by guitarist Buck Dharma and singer Eric Bloom and opens with an appropriately monstrous and ominous riff.

"With a purposeful grimace and a terrible sound/He pulls the spitting high tension s down/Helpless people on a subway train/Scream bug-eyed as he looks in on them/He picks up a bus and he throws it back down/As he wades through the buildings toward the center of town/Oh no, they say he's got to go/Go go Godzilla, yeah/Oh no, there goes Tokyo/Go go Godzilla, yeah."

Dharma, a terrific guitarist, plays smoking hot leads throughout the song, which ends with a frightening and profound refrain.

"History shows again and again/How nature points out the folly of men/Godzilla!"

I mean, pretty goddamn accurate, no?

For some ungodly reason, the song didn't chart, but it got plenty of play on rock stations and remains a classic rock staple and one of BOC's best known songs. The song has been covered by many artists, including Fu Manchu and Smashing Pumpkins. Most recently, a cover of "Godzilla" was featured in the 2019 movie Godzilla: King of the Monsters with Serj Tankian of System of a Down on lead vocals.

As for BOC, they remained a strong touring act into the '80s and had a few more radio hits ("Burnin' for You," "Shooting Shark," "Take Me Away"), but they were on the decline when I saw them in my then-hometown of Kingston, NH, in June 1986 along with Foghat, Molly Hatchet, the Outlaws, Jon Butcher Axis and Blackfoot. They put on a great show and, of course, played "Godzilla." 

BOC has remained active in the 38 years since then, only releasing five albums but touring fairly regularly, with Dharma and Bloom as the only remaining original members. Godzilla also remains active, winning an Oscar earlier this year for 2023's Godzilla Minus One.

Day After Day #136: Pushin' Too Hard

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Pushin' Too Hard (1965)

I was born in the '60s, but late enough in the decade that I had no clue of what was going on until much later. It's been fun to go back and dig into the sheer volume of music that was being made in the mid-'60s by North American kids inspired by the British Invasion as well as the surf rock craze. The music was called garage rock because a lot of these bands were practicing in garages (duh), but it more speaks to the DIY nature of it all: it was mostly kids plugging electric guitars into amps and playing raw and basic three-chord rock songs in the hopes of becoming the next big thing. Eventually, the bands started to get more psychedelic.

A lot of these bands came and went, even if they were lucky enough to have hits. Some had regional hits, some were bigger than that. In 1972, a writer and record store clerk named Lenny Kaye convinced Elektra Records to release a garage rock singles compilation and Nuggets: Original Artyfacts from the First Psychedelic Era 1965-1968 was born. Kaye's liner notes include one of the first references to "punk rock." The comp was reissued in 1976 and then in the '80s, Rhino Records issued a series of Nuggets comps.

Nuggets proved extremely influential, not just on future punk bands but also on other compilations. It contains many well-known songs including "Dirty Water" by the Standells, "Psychotic Reaction" by the Count Five, "Night Time" by the Strangeloves, "The Witch" by the Sonics and "Louie Louie" by the Kingsmen. 

Another classic Nuggets track is "Pushin' Too Hard" by the Seeds, a band out of LA led by Sky Saxon on vocals. Saxon wrote the song while sitting in a car waiting for his girlfriend to finish shopping at a supermarket; it doubles as the protagonist speaking out against his girlfriend's controlling ways or in a wider sense, pushing back against society. 

"You're pushin' too hard, pushin' on me/You're pushin' too hard, what you want me to be/You're pushin' too hard about the things you say/You're pushin' too hard every night and day/You're pushin' too hard/Pushin' too hard on me/Well all I want is to just be free/Live my life the way I wanna be/All I want is to just have fun/Live my life like it's just begun/But you're pushin' too hard/Pushin' too hard on me."

The Seeds initially released the song as "You're Pushing Too Hard" in November 1965 and it didn't chart. But after the band's self-titled debut album came out in April 1966, a Los Angeles DJ started playing the song a lot. The band re-released it with the new title "Pushin' Too Hard" in July 1966 and it eventually made the Billboard Hot 100 chart in December, peaking at #36 in February.

The song was banned by some radio stations because they thought it was about a drug pusher. But it became the Seeds' signature song and they based their style around it, so much so that you can hear elements of "Pushin' Too Hard" in many of their later songs. 

"Pushin' Too Hard" is credited as a major influence on punk bands that followed and included on several best-of lists of garage rock songs. It was covered by Pere Ubu, the Bangles, the Rubinoos and the Makers, and parodied by Frank Zappa and the Residents. It's been featured in movies including Easy Rider. Saxon even re-recorded it for his 2008 album The King of Garage Rock.

As for the Seeds, they changed their name to Sky Saxon and the Seeds in 1968, with guitarist Jan Savage and drummer Rick Andridge leaving the band. They released a few more singles, "Mr. Farmer," "Can't Seem to Make You Mine" and "A Thousand Shadows." After splitting up the Seeds in 1972, Saxon joined the Source Family, a Hollywood Hills-based cult led by Father Yod (aka former health food restaurateur James Edward Baker); Father Yod fronted a psychedelic rock band called Ya Ho Wha 13, which released nine albums, but Saxon did not participate (although he later appeared on a few offshoot albums and put together a box set of the group's music). Saxon continued to make music under various band names over the years, and reformed the Seeds in 2003 and then several times after that. He also collaborated with Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins on some songs in 2008. Saxon died in 2009 on the same day as Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett.

Lenny Kaye ended up playing guitar in Patti Smith's band throughout the '70s and rejoined her in the '90s. More recently, he's been leading a tour celebrating Nuggets' 50th (plus a few years) anniversary. It came to The Cut in Gloucester last night for the last night of the tour (I think) and featured an all-star collection of musicians including Peter Buck, Ted Leo, Bill Janovitz, Jon Wurster, Hugo Burnham, Barrence Whitfield, Dave Minehan, Clint Conley, Willie "Loco" Alexander and more. They played "Pushin' Too Hard" and a bunch of other Nuggets tunes, as well as garage-adjacent classics like "I Wanna Be Your Dog," "Kick Out the Jams" and "Road Runner" (all of which have been featured in this space). It was a terrific night all around.

Stuck In Thee Garage #528: May 17, 2024

There are rock legends, and then there is Steve Albini. In addition to his work in bands like Big Black and Shellac, he worked as a producer and engineer on literally thousands of albums over the last 40 years. Albini died last week of a heart attack at the age of 61. This week, I've got songs produced by Albini in hour 2. They rock hard enough to get you into a fistfight in the parking lot.

This playlist's still got it:

Hour 1

Artist - Song/Album

Beeef - Bedhead Boy/Single

Ducks Ltd. - When You're Outside/Single

Les Savy Fav - Limo Scene/OUI, LSF

Lightheaded - Always Sideways/Combustible Gems

The Lemon Twigs - If You and I Are Not Wise/A Dream is All We Know

Savak - The Body, It Falls Apart/ Savak/Contractions Split EP

Contractions - Le Feu Au Bout Des Doigts/ Savak/Contractions Split EP

St. Vincent - Violent Times/All Born Screaming

Kim Gordon - It's Dark Inside/The Collective

E - Postperfect Conditional/Living Waters

Mdou Moctar - Tchinta/Funeral for Justice

Hallelujah the Hills - Confessions of an Ex-Ghost/Bootleg: Live 12/15/23 at the Sinclair

Cloud Nothings - Thank Me for Playing/Final Summer

Ted Leo and the Pharmacists - Walking to Do (demo)/Shake the Sheets: The Demos 2003-2004

Jerry Cantrell - Atone/Brighten

Sonny Vincent and Rocket from the Crypt - Pick Up the Slack/Vintage Piss

Masters of Reality - High Noon Amsterdam/Deep in the Hole

Hour 2: Albini

PJ Harvey - Man-Size/Rid of Me

Nirvana - Radio Friendly Unit Shifter/In Utero

Pixies - Vamos/Surfer Rosa

The Breeders - Hellbound/Pod

Mclusky - Lightsabre Cocksucking Blues/Mclusky Do Dallas

Helmet - Turned Out/Meantime

The Jesus Lizard - Seasick/Goat

METZ - Common Trash/Strange Peace

Cheap Trick - Downed/In Color - The Unreleased Steve Albini Sessions

Silkworm - Into the Woods/In the West

Fred Schneider - Lick/Just Fred

The Jon Spencer Blues Explosion - Bernie/Acme

Jarvis Cocker - Further Complications/Further Complications

Ty Segall - Break a Guitar/Ty Segall

Brainiac - This Little Piggy/Hissing Prigs in Static Couture

Mikey Erg - Sick as Your Secrets/Love at Leeds

Jawbreaker - The Boat Dreams From the Hill/24-Hour Revenge Therapy

Crank up the loud/quiet/loud playlist HERE, buckaroo!

Day After Day #135: Rock Lobster

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Rock Lobster (1978)

When it comes to weirdness, nobody made it work for them like the B-52s. Especially when they first came out, people didn't know what to make of them.

Formed in Athens, Georgia, in 1976, the band was comprised of Fred Schneider on vocals and percussion, Kate Pierson on vocals/keyboards/synth bass, Cindy Wilson on vocals/percussion, Ricky Wilson on guitar and Keith Strickland on drums/guitar/keyboards. The band combined dance and surf music with Schneider's over-the-top vocals and Pierson and Cindy Wilson's melodic girl group harmonies. Ricky Wilson was a terrific guitar player; not flashy, but his surf riffs were the backbone of the band. Meanwhile, Pierson and Cindy Wilson wore beehive hairdos in the early years that resembled the nose cone of the B-52 bomber, hence the name. The band embraced a retro thrift store aesthetic

"Rock Lobster" was the band's first single, recorded in 1978 on DB Records. It became an underground hit, selling 2,000 copies and getting the B-52s gigs at CBGB and Max's Kansas City. The band re-recorded the song and its B-side "52 Girls" for its self-titled debut album on Warner Bros. in 1979. 

Schneider got the idea for "Rock Lobster" at an Atlanta disco, where a slide show was played featuring lobsters on a grill. The song is about a beach party where someone loses an ear in a run-in with a rock lobster.

"We were at a party/His ear lobe fell in the deep/Someone reached in and grabbed it/It was a rock lobster/Rock lobster/Rock lobster/We were at the beach/Everybody had matching towels/Somebody went under a dock/And there they saw a rock/It wasn't a rock/It was a rock lobster."

Ricky Wilson's sick surf riffs power the song, but it's the vocals that make it so unique. Schneider spits out the lyrics like a carnival barker, while Pierson and Cindy Wilson provide animal noises to go with Schneider's descriptions.

"Boys in bikinis/Girls on surfboards/Everybody's fruggin'/Twistin' round the fire/Havin' fun/Baking potatoes/Baking in the sun/Put on your noseguard/Put on the lifeguard/Pass the tanning butter/Here comes a stingray/There goes a manta ray/In walked a jellyfish/There goes a dogfish/Chased by a catfish/In flew a sea robin/Watch out for that piranha/There's goes a narwhal/Here comes a bikini whale!"

The band performed the song on Saturday Night Live in January 1980. That spring, John Lennon heard the song and was inspired to record again after five years off; Pierson and Cindy Wilson's shrieking vocals were definitely inspired by Yoko Ono, who in turn became a fan of the B-52s along with Lennon. 

"Rock Lobster" hit #56 on the Billboard Hot 100, but it went to #1 in Canada on the RPM national chart. I distinctly remembering hearing it on the radio in 1980, after which the DJ said, "Is that the future of rock 'n roll? We're in trouble." 

The radio edit is 4 minutes, but the single was 4:52 and the album version was nearly 7 minutes. Meanwhile, the band's debut went platinum thanks to "Rock Lobster," "Planet Claire" and "Dance This Mess Around. The band's decidedly silly but eminently catchy sound was tailor made for the new wave frenzy going on at that time.

The B-52s released two more albums in the early '80s before Ricky Wilson passed away after a battle with AIDS in 1985. Strickland switched to guitar and they released Bouncing Off the Satellites in 1986, but didn't tour to promote the album because they were still dealing with Wilson's death. After a hiatus, the band reunited and recorded Cosmic Thing in 1989, which blew up after the success of "Love Shack." Cindy Wilson left the band in 1990 and they recorded the next album, 1992's Good Stuff, as a trio. The band continued to tour (Wilson returned in 1996) and make soundtrack songs over the ensuing decades, but only released one more album, 2008's Funplex. 

A farewell tour took place in 2022-23, but then the band started a series of residencies in Las Vegas, which stretched into this year. And just this week, the city of Athens announced their new minor league hockey team would be called the Rock Lobsters.

 

Day After Day #134: One Thing Leads to Another

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

One Thing Leads to Another (1983)

Say what you will about MTV and how much it sucks now, but in the early '80s, it helped make stars out of some worthy bands who otherwise may not have made much of a dent. Sure, there were plenty of one-hit wonders, but there were also bands that made the most of their opportunity and parlayed video airplay into a successful career.

Take the Fixx, for example. The London band may have succeeded on its own merits because it certainly had the material, but it didn't hurt to get that additional exposure. Singer Cy Curnin and drummer Adam Woods formed the band in 1979 in college, originally going by the name Portraits. They released a couple of singles before adding guitarist Jamie West-Oram in 1980 and changing their name to the Fix. After getting some radio exposure on the BBC, MCA Records offered the band a contract but wanted them to change their name because of the drug implications; eventually, they added another "x."

Right off the bat, the Fixx had some success, riding the popularity of new wave. Their 1982 debut album Shuttered Room included the hits "Stand or Fall" and "Red Skies," which both had videos on the then-new MTV and also got FM radio airplay in the U.S. The band had a sweeping, cinematic sound with Curnin's soaring vocals and West-Oram's chiming guitars leading the way, and the rail-thin Curnin cut a Bowie-esque figure in the group's videos with his angular dance moves.

Alfie Agius joined the band for the Shuttered Room tour, but he left during the recording of 1983's Reach the Beach; interestingly enough, he joined the metal band Fastway that same year. Reach the Beach was produced by Rupert Hine, whose star was on the rise at that time. His fingerprints are all over '80s music, having worked with the Waterboys, Tina Turner, Howard Jones, Chris DeBurgh, Thompson Twins, Stevie Nicks and Rush (!), to name a few. 

Reach the Beach became the Fixx's biggest album, with two big hits in "Saved By Zero" and "One Thing Leads to Another," which both went top 40 in the U.S. The latter was all over MTV and the radio in the fall of '83, with West-Oram's choppy guitar riff underlying Curnin's diatribe about crooked politicians.

"The deception with tact, just what are you trying to say?/You've got a blank face, which irritates/Communicate, pull out your party piece/You see dimensions in two/State your case with black or white/But when one little cross leads to shots, grit your teeth/You run for cover so discreet why don't they/Do what they say, say what you mean, and baby/One thing leads to another/You told me something wrong, I know I listen too long but then/One thing leads to another."

The song was an instant hit, going to #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and #1 in Canada, although interestingly enough, it didn't too much in the Fixx's native England, where it only got to #86 on the U.K. Singles chart. The Reach the Beach album went to #8 on the Billboard 200 chart and sold 2 million copies in the U.S.

"Then it's easy to believe/Somebody's been lying to me/But when the wrong word goes in the right ear/I know why you've been lying to me/It's getting rough, off the cuff, I've got to say enough's enough/Bigger the harder he falls/But when the wrong antidote is like a bulge in the throat/You run for cover in the heat why don't they/Do what they say, say what they mean/One thing leads to another."

I was in full-on metal mode at this time, but I liked the Fixx right from the first time I heard them the year before with "Stand or Fall." They got a lot of radio play in the Boston area, with another song, "The Sign of Fire" going top 40. Curnin and West-Oram also played two songs from Tina Turner's huge comeback album Private Dancer ("I Might Have Been Queen" and "Better Be Good to Me"). 

The band kept things rolling with 1984's Phantoms, which featured "Are We Ourselves?" (the video for which was the first to have a mobile phone in it), "Sunshine in the Shade" and "Deeper and Deeper." While the songs didn't chart as high as the previous album's singles, they were still radio-friendly and fairly ubiquitous. The Fixx's next three albums, 1986's Walkabout, 1989's Calm Animals and 1991's Ink, all had radio hits but sales dropped with each subsequent release. The band has remained together since then, but has only released five studio albums since 1998, the most recent being 2022's Every Five Seconds. They've continued to tour periodically, and Curnin has released several solo efforts.

Regardless of their current status, the Fixx's '80s output still holds up.

 

Day After Day #133: It's Too Late

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

It's Too Late (1980)

There are plenty of musicians who also write poetry: Dylan, Jim Morrison, Nick Cave, Tupac Shakur, John Lennon, Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell, Kate Bush, Gord Downie, Leonard Cohen, Lou Reed, Patti Smith and Marc Bolan are examples. Hell, even Billy Corgan published a poetry collection. 

There aren't as many who went from poetry into music. Jim Carroll was a well-known poet and author in 1978 when he decided to start a band, inspired by his former roommate Patti Smith. He was traveling with Smith and her band when one night in San Diego, the opening band didn't show up; Carroll ended up performing his poetry while backed by Smith's band.

Carroll then teamed up with a San Francisco new wave act called Amsterdam. After changing their name to the Jim Carroll Band, they were able to score a record deal with Atlantic Records with some help from Keith Richards. They recorded their debut album Catholic Boy in the summer of '79 and it was released in early January 1980. 

Carroll wasn't much of a singer, but since when has that mattered in rock and roll? He was a strong performer and was able to bring his words to life effectively while his band provided a lean, twin-guitar-driven garage sound that fit right in with the CBGB scene at the time. Echoes of Lou Reed, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, solo Iggy Pop as Carroll sang about drugs and death and NYC street life. 

"People Who Died" became an instant hit, written about people Carroll knew growing up who died tragically. It has since been covered by everybody from John Cale to Drive-By Truckers to Gwar. It's a great song, but a few years after the album came out, I would hear "It's Too Late" played every so often on Boston's WBCN and it just resonated. It's dark and nihilistic, has a killer riff and honestly, it's just a  perfect punk song.

"It's too late/To fall in love with Sharon Tate/But it's too soon/To ask me for the words I want carved on my tomb/I think it's time/That you all start to think about gettin' by/Without that need to go out and find somebody to love."

Growing up in NYC in the late '60s, Carroll was a high school basketball star who developed a heroin addiction. He ended paying for his drugs by becoming a prostitute, and later published The Basketball Diaries, an edited collection of his high school diaries. So he knows what he's singing about here.

"It's too late/There's no one left that I even wanna imitate/You see, you just don't know/I'm here to give you my heart, and you want some fashion show/But it ain't no contribution/To rely on the institution/To validate your chosen art/And to sanction your boredom and let you play out your part."

I remember hearing this song for the first time and being shocked it was even on the radio. The band (with a young, shirtless Robert Downey Jr. on drums) played "It's Too Late" in the movie Tuff Turf (see below).

"It's too late/You know, when they got nothin' to give/They only part their legs for what's negative/They're so decadent/Until their daddy's money from home's all spent/So I think it's time, 'cause it's too easy to rely/On worshipping devils and strangers in bed/Though they do get good drugs, and they do give good head."

Catholic Boy was well reviewed and ended up hitting #73 on the Billboard 200. "People Who Died" made it to #103 on the Bubbling Under Hot 100 chart and has been used in many movies and TV shows, including E.T., the 2004 remake of Dawn of the Dead and Mr. Robot. The Jim Carroll Band made two more albums in the early '80s; Carroll released a spoken word album in '91 and another album of music under his own name in 1998. The Basketball Diaries was made into a movie in 1995 starring Leo DiCaprio as Carroll; it got mixed reviews but the soundtrack featured Carroll backed by Pearl Jam performing the song "Catholic Boy." 

Carroll died of a heart attack in 2009 at the age of 60. He may have only been a part-time musician, but he left an indelible mark. You can definitely hear his influence on bands like The Hold Steady. 

I'm honestly surprised nobody else has covered "It's Too Late," but I suppose it actually isn't too late.

Day After Day #132: Headache

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Headache (1994)

What do you do when you have a massively influential band that you don't want to be in anymore? If you're Charles Thompson (aka Black Francis aka Frank Black) and you're done with the Pixies, you just keep going. 

After breaking up the band in 1992, Thompson started working on a solo album with Eric Drew Feldman, who had collaborated with the Pixies, Captain Beefheart and many others. That album, 1993's Frank Black, was named after his new stage moniker and was a fitting follow-up to the final O.G. Pixies albums, Bossanova and Trompe Le Monde, full of songs about UFOs and sci-fi weirdness. 

For his second solo album, Black worked with Feldman again, as well as his old Pixies bandmate Joey Santiago, Lyle Workman, Moris Tepper and drummer Nick Vincent. By the time Teenager of the Year came out in May 1994, Black's former bandmate Kim Deal was already riding high with the Breeders and their '93 release Last Splash. 

Rather than compete on a popularity level with Deal, Black released a 22-song collection of weird and awesome little songs, most of which were under 3 minutes long. Teenager of the Year wasn't really appreciated when it came out, although the song "Headache" got a little MTV and radio airplay, hitting #10 on Billboard's Modern Rock tracks.

"Headache" was the catchiest song on the album, so it made sense as a single. It was also a great ditty about dealing with life's stresses.

"This wrinkle in time, I can't give it no credit/I thought about my space and I really got me down/Got me so down, I got me a headache/My heart is crammed in my cranium and it still knows how to pound/I was counting the rings/And I fell me into sleep/I peeked to see if you were way back when/I was counting trees/Until a day when there was one/I'd hoped beneath, asleep is where that you had been."

It's about as joyous sounding a song about a headache as you're going to find, filled with glorious pop harmonies and maybe even some redemption.

"Well, I found you/Maybe you can help me/And I can help you."

The video is gloriously weird, as a multiple Frank Blacks sing the harmonies, fly and take a chainsaw to a giant pain pill.

Teenager of the Year hit #2 on the Billboard Heatseekers chart and #131 on the Billboard 200. It didn't get a lot of love until later, but I'll pat myself on the back and say I loved it from day 1. I got into the Pixies late in their first run and then was digging the solo stuff from Frank and Kim. But Teenager of the Year is still my favorite post-Pixies album. It reminded me a bit of a Guided By Voices album, both in the short song lengths and the wide range of subject matter; Black sings about old video games, outer space (duh), record store snobs, historical Los Angeles, the Three Stooges and long road truckers. The arrangements are fun and interesting and 30 years later, it still sounds amazing.

Black released another good solo album in '96 and then formed the Catholics, which was a much more straightahead rock band than the Pixies. He released several more albums before reuniting with the Pixies in 2004 for a tour. He continued to release solo material throughout the '00s while also playing Pixies shows. Deal left in 2013, but the Pixies forged on with new bassists and recorded four new albums and subsequent tours. Black hasn't released any solo material since 2011, but the Pixies (now on their third post-Deal bassist) are still touring.

Day After Day #131: Flying High Again

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Flying High Again (1981)

On this day 45 years ago (1979 if you don't feel like doing the math), Ozzy Osbourne wasn't doing much of anything productive. It was a little more than two weeks after he'd been kicked out of Black Sabbath, the band he'd helped start a decade earlier. Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi said it was because Ozzy's drug and alcohol use was out of control, while Ozzy felt he wasn't any better or worse than the other three Sabs. In any case, Sabbath eventually forged ahead with Ronnie James Dio and began working on what would be their best album in quite a while. 

Ozzy, on the other hand, was given a lump sum for his share of the band name and spent the ensuing three months on a coke and booze bender. He figured he was done singing and would just go on unemployment, but the British label Jet Records signed him to a deal in the hopes he would record new material. Label head Don Arden sent his daughter Sharon to LA to work with Ozzy and help him get his act together, literally and figuratively. 

Eventually, Ozzy put together a band called the Blizzard of Ozz. He actually had formed an initial incarnation of that band when he left Sabbath 1978, backed by three members of the band Necromandus, but he rejoined Sabbath for the recording of their final album with him, Never Say Die! This time around, the Blizzard of Ozz featured Randy Rhoads of Quiet Riot on guitar, Bob Daisley (of Rainbow) on bass, keyboardist Don Airey (of Rainbow) and drummer Lee Kerslake (of Uriah Heep). The label eventually decided to name the band's first album Blizzard of Ozz and credit Ozzy as a solo artist, something the rest of the band was not pleased about.

The second chance seemed to rejuvenate Ozzy, and with the help of Rhoads and Daisley, the album was tight and energized. "Crazy Train" was the first single and hit #49 on the U.K. Singles Chart and had moderate success in the U.S., getting plenty of airplay on rock stations and hitting #6 on the Billboard Bubbling Under the Hot 100 chart, but it's become his biggest solo song over the years, getting endlessly played on classic rock radio and in sports arenas. Rhoads got a lot of attention for his flashy, neoclassical lead guitar work, which combined big riffs with speedy solos that were very different from Iommi's playing. 

After a big tour that put Ozzy back on the metal map, the band returned to England in 1981 to record the follow-up album, Diary of a Madman. Once again, Daisley wrote most of the lyrics and some of the music with Rhoads, with Kerslake contributing to the two biggest songs off the album, "Flying High Again" and "Over the Mountain." This would become a point of contention later, because Daisley and Kerslake initially received no credit for their contributions. Right before the band was set to go on tour, Daisley and Kerslake were fired and replaced by Rudy Sarzo (of Quiet Riot) and Tommy Aldridge (ex-Black Oak Arkansas). 

"Flying High Again" was the first single off the album, released in October 1981. It's a triumphant victory lap for Ozzy, celebrating his return to prominence as a solo artist. Of course, it could also be about his voluminous booze and drug consumption, which he was still very much into. Either way, Ozzy was having fun with it.

"Got a crazy feeling I don't understand/Got to get away from here/Feeling like I should have kept my feet on the ground/Waiting for the sun to appear/Mama's going to worry/I've been a bad, bad boy/No use saying sorry/It's something that I enjoy/Because you can't see what my eyes see/And you can't be inside of me/Flying high again."

Rhoads punctuates it with an excellent solo. In their "Odd Couple" dynamic, he was the Felix Unger to Ozzy's Oscar Goldman: neat and precise and always on point while Ozzy slobbered around wasted and biting off the heads of various animals. 

"Daddy thinks I'm lazy he don't understand/Never saw inside my head/People think I'm crazy but I'm in demand/Never heard a thing I said/Mama's going to worry/I've been a bad, bad boy/No use saying sorry/It's something I enjoy/Flying high again."

Sadly, the fun hit a brutal snag a few months into the tour on March 19, 1982, when Rhoads died in a plane crash in Florida. Ozzy was devastated but the tour continued two weeks later with Bernie Torme filling Rhoads' spot for several shows before Brad Gillis of Night Ranger stepped in and finished the rest of the tour. He married Sharon, who by this point had become his manager.

Ozzy kept rolling throughout the '80s with the help of guitarists Jake E. Lee and later Zakk Wylde. Meanwhile, in 1986, Daisley and Kerslake sued Ozzy for unpaid royalties and they eventually won songwriting credits on both Blizzard of Ozz and Diary of a Madman. Strangely, Daisley returned to help write and play bass on 1988's No Rest for the Wicked; Geezer Butler of Black Sabbath joined Ozzy for that album's tour. Even after heavy metal saw a huge decline in the '90s, Ozzy managed to thrive. His albums sold well, but his biggest success in the '90s was the creation of Ozzfest, which Sharon Osbourne put together. Ozzy reunited with the original lineup of Black Sabbath on the 1997 Ozzfest tour (something he would do periodically for the next few decades).

In 2002, Ozzy reissued the first two solo albums, replacing Daisley and Kerslake's original bass and drum parts with new parts recorded by his then-drummer Mike Bordin (of Faith No More) and bassist Robert Trujillo (who later joined Metallica). The reissues also featured new backing vocals from singers Mark Lennon and John Shanks. Sharon claimed at the time it was Ozzy's idea to re-record the parts, but Ozzy later said Sharon did that on her own. Fans were outraged and eventually the original versions were included on the 30th anniversary reissues of the albums.

From 2002 to 2007, Ozzy and his family starred in an MTV reality show, The Osbournes, which was a big hit and transformed Ozzy's image from Prince of Darkness to a sort of celebrity grandpa. Meanwhile, Sharon became a celebrity herself, guesting on numerous talent shows and eventually becoming a co-host of The Talk. In recent years, Ozzy has struggled with health issues, including Parkinson's disease. He's said he won't tour again, but wants to play some farewell shows in the U.K. at some point.

 

Day After Day #130: Mama Kin

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Mama Kin (1973)

When you're one of the biggest American bands of all time, you're going to deal with a lot of ups and downs. With Aerosmith, they've had drug problems and lineup shuffles as well as sold-out tours and massive success. They had their biggest victories after they went to drug rehab in the mid-'80s and cleaned up, but my favorite phase of the band was the early version when they were lean and hungry (and yes, using copious amounts of illicit substances).

The band formed in Boston in 1970 when singer Steven Tyler, guitarist Ray Tabano and drummer Joey Kramer joined forces with guitarist Joe Perry and bassist Tom Hamilton. The next year, Tabano was replaced by Brad Whitford and Aerosmith's lineup was set. The band played a raw, bluesy mix inspired by British bands like the Stones, Beatles, Led Zeppelin and the Yardbirds. Clive Davis, the president of Columbia Records, signed the band to a deal after seeing them play Max's Kansas City in New York in 1972.

The band's self-titled debut came out in January 1973 and made a minor splash, with the power ballad "Dream On" getting some radio play and hitting #59 on the Billboard Hot 100 (although it was on radio stations in Boston). The album didn't chart until three years later after Aerosmith had better success with their follow-up albums Get Your Wings and Toys in the Attic. Columba re-released "Dream On" in January 1976 and it became a huge hit and led to folks rediscovering the band's debut.

The other song that became a classic rock staple from the first Aerosmith album was "Mama Kin," a raw ripper that Tyler wrote on a guitar that Kramer found in a trash can on the street. Tyler restrung the guitar and came up with the song's riff. The lyrics seem to be about keeping the faith while trying to find success as an unknown touring band.

"It ain't easy living like a gypsy/Tell you, honey, how I feel/I've been dreaming, floating down the stream and/Losing touch with all that's real/Whole earth lover keeping undercover/Never know where you've been/You've been fading, always out parading/Keep in touch with Mama Kin/Well, you've always got your tail on the wag/Shooting fire from your mouth just like a dragon/You act like a perpetual drag/You better check it out because someday soon/You'll have to climb back on the wagon."

The chorus talks about keeping it real, so to speak. In a 2001 interview, Tyler talked about what the song meant: "People always ask, 'What's Mama Kin?' It's the mother of everything. It's the desire to write music, the desire to get laid, to go through the relationship with a girl, or whatever it is. Keeping in touch with mama kin means keeping in touch with the old spirits that got you there to begin with."

"Keep in touch with Mama Kin/Tell her where you've gone and been/Living out your fantasy/Sleeping late and smoking tea."

Musically, "Mama Kin" is appealingly raw, chugging along thanks to the rhythm section's aggressiveness. David Woodford plays sax on the song, adding to the bluesy vibe. The song is a fan favorite all these years later; in '94 the band also opened a club called Mama Kin on Lansdowne Street in Boston but sold their interest in it five years later.

One notable thing about that first Aerosmith album is Tyler's voice, which sounds very different than on the band's other albums. Tyler has said he changed his voice to sound more like a blues singer, more out of nervousness than anything else.

Thanks to "Dream On," the album ended up peaking at #21 on the Billboard 200 in 1976 and eventually went double platinum. Aerosmith released three more albums in '70s and became one of the biggest touring attractions in rock, but the band was getting almost as well known for their excesses. 

Tyler and Perry became known as the Toxic Twins. Perry ended up leaving during the making the Night in the Ruts album in 1979; the album was completed with the help of guitarists Jimmy Crespo and Richie Supa. Whitford eventually left the band and was replaced by Rick Dufay (better known these days as the father of actress Minka Kelly). The band released Rock in a Hard Place in 1982 and had a hit with "Lightning Strikes," but Tyler's drug use was getting out of control; there were a few instances of him passing out on stage.

The original lineup reunited in 1984 and released Done With Mirrors in 1985, but the album didn't do well and the drug problems persisted. After the tour, the entire band went to rehab and got clean (fun fact: my father-in-law was in rehab with Joey Kramer). In 1986, Tyler and Perry appeared on Run-D.M.C.'s cover of Aerosmith's "Walk This Way," and the song was a monster hit, going to #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 and the video was all over MTV. 

Aerosmith was back in a big way, and capitalized the following year with Permanent Vacation, which had three big singles and a tour with opener Guns N' Roses. The difference was the band worked with outside writers for the first time, including Desmond Child, Jim Vallance and Holly Knight; the result was hit singles, but also a tendency to rely on schlocky ballads like "Angel." The band took full advantage of MTV, with videos for "Dude (Looks Like a Lady)," "Angel" and "Rag Doll" getting tons of airplay. The band saw similar success with the albums Pump and Get a Grip. Their albums in the late '90s/early '00s were less successful, but still had hits; the band also scored a #1 song with "I Don't Want to Miss a Thing" from the 1998 film Armageddon (written by Diane Warren) and then had a ride at Disney World named after them. 

The last 20 years have been less active for Aerosmith, with only two albums of new material released (and one of those an album of blues covers). The band announced a farewell tour in 2023 but it was delayed for a year after Tyler damaged his vocal cords; it's rescheduled to begin this fall.

I saw Aerosmith and the Black Crowes play in 1990 at Old Orchard Beach, Maine and it was a great show. But give me those old '70s albums any day over anything they've done in the last 35 years.

Day After Day #129: Youth Against Fascism

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Youth Against Fascism (1992)

I wouldn't necessarily consider Sonic Youth a political band, but when they do decide to write a political song, it's a doozy. 

It's funny to think back to the political scene in the early '90s. Liberals thought George H.W. Bush and the Gulf War, not to mention the Clarence Thomas/Anita Hill hearings, were signaling the end of democracy. Turns out that was barely scratching the surface. Nevertheless, things weren't great at the time and Sonic Youth was not happy about it.

SY started off in 1981 as an anti-commercial noise rock act, experimenting with feedback and unorthodox guitar tunings. Throughout the '80s, they released classic albums like Daydream Nation, Sister and Evol, but remained on the fringes of indie rock. A decade later, they had signed to DGC and while they were still unlikely to ever get played on commercial radio, Sonic Youth was writing shorter, more conventional songs. Their major label debut, 1990's Goo, was their best-selling album (#96 on the Billboard 200) and "Kool Thing" (featuring Chuck D) got some airplay on MTV. 

The band's next album was 1992's Dirty, which got a big push from DGC in the wake of Nirvana's success. I remember seeing SY playing "100%" on Late Night with David Letterman, which ended with guitarists Thurston Moore and Lee Ranaldo rolling around on the floor, much to Letterman's delight.

The second single was "Youth Against Fascism," which is kind of funny because there's no way in hell any radio station would play this song. Ian MacKaye provides additional guitar work on the song, which is powered by Kim Gordon's bass and Ranaldo's squalling guitar as Moore spits out the lyrics with extra vitriol.

"Another can of worms/Another stomach turns/Yeah, your ghetto burns/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate/You got a stupid man/You got a Ku Klux Klan./Your fucking battle plan/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate."

Moore holds nothing back as he eviscerates the Republican administration.

"A sieg heilin' squirt/You're an impotent jerk/Yeah, a fascist twerp/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate/Black robe and swill/I believe Anita Hill/Judge'll rot in hell/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate."

Geffen exec Mark Kates pushed to make the song the second single off the album, but it didn't sell well and got zero airplay because, well, you know. It was originally called "Hate Song" for a reason.

"Yeah, the president sucks/He's a war pig fuck/His shit is out of luck/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate/Another Nazi attack/A skinhead is cracked/My blood is black/It's the song I hate/It's the song I hate/We're banging pots and pans/To make you understand/We're gonna bury you, man."

Sadly, we didn't realize what real fascism was until 30 years later. So I guess Thurston and the gang were on to something, even if they didn't realize what it was. I mean, we all knew Clarence Thomas sucked in 1991, but man, he's surpassed all expectations.

As for Sonic Youth, they continued releasing excellent albums until 2009. The band broke up in 2011 after Moore and Gordon announced they were splitting up (and eventually divorcing). Moore, Gordon and Ranaldo have all gone on to release solo albums in the years since. I'm glad I got to see them a few times over the years.

Day After Day #128: Sailin' On

Day After Day is an ambitious attempt to write about a song every day in 2024 (starting on Jan. 4).

Sailin' On (1982)

One stereotype of early punk was that because anybody could do it, the bands couldn't play their instruments. While some certainly fit that bill, that definitely wasn't the case with Bad Brains. In addition to being killer musicians, the band also mastered a variety of genres, including hardcore punk.

The band started in 1976 in Washington, D.C., as a jazz fusion band called Mind Power, inspired by Return to Forever and Mahavishnu Orchestra. The lineup included Dr. Know (aka Gary Miller) on lead guitar, Darryl Jennifer on bass and brothers Paul Hudson (who later went by H.R.) on rhythm guitar and Earl Hudson on drums. Singer Sid McCray got the band into punk rock, after which they changed their sound and name to Bad Brains (after the Ramones song "Bad Brain"). McCray left soon afterward and H.R. switched over to lead vocals.

Their ferocious live shows helped Bad Brains grow their audience, although they were banned from many Washington, D.C. clubs because their fans tended to cause a lot of property damage (inspiring the song "Banned in D.C." on their first album. They moved to New York City in 1981 and helped grow the city's hardcore scene.

The band's self-titled debut came out in February 1982 on cassette only on Reachout International Records (ROIR), with its iconic cover art showing a bolt of lightning striking the Capitol building in D.C. The album itself showcased the band's chops, whether it was Dr. Know breaking out hard rock riffs and lightning-quick solos or the rhythm section's ability to shift between thrash to reggae and back in the same song. Bad Brains was all about dynamics, able to rock furiously, play love songs or howl against injustice. H.R. was a terrific frontman, able to dominate the stage with a collection of backflips, splits, spins and other moves; he could just as easily adapt his vocals to whatever style the band was playing. He's also credited with coming up with the term "moshing" about the punk dancing style that grew out of punk venues in D.C. in the early '80s, although he was saying "mashing" and was misunderstood because of the Jamaican accent he was using.

The debut album is full of amazing songs, including "Pay to Cum," "Attitude," "Banned in D.C.," "F.V.K. (Fearless Vampire Killers" and "Big Take Over." The leadoff track is "Sailin' On," in which H.R. sings about moving on after a relationship.

"You don't want me anymore/So I'll just walk right out the door/Played a game right from the start/I trust you, you used me, now my heart's torn apart/So I'm sailin', yeah, I'm sailin' on/I'm movin', yeah, I'm movin' on/Sail on, sail on, sail on, sail on/Yeah."

These aren't necessarily original sentiments, but they're delivered at breakneck speed by both H.R. and the band that you can't help but get fired up. Dr. Know then fires off a hot solo and the band thrashes any residual depression right out the window.

"Too many years with too many tears/Too many days with none to say/How will we know when there's nowhere to grow/And what's the facts of life to show?"

The song was re-recorded (along with several others from the first album) for the band's follow up, the Ric Ocasek-produced Rock for Light. It's a little cleaner and about 10 seconds shorter, but essentially the same song. I just gravitate to the original version because that's one I had first and it smokes.

The band signed with SST in 1986 and released I Against I, which is also excellent. H.R. sang the vocals for "Sacred Love" over the phone from jail, where he was serving time for a cannabis charge. The following year, the Hudson brothers quit to focus on reggae. Bad Brains continued on with Taj Singleton on vocals and Cro-Mags drummer Mackie Jayson; that lineup recorded the band's next album Quickness, but the Hudsons returned and H.R. redid the vocals. The lineup changes continued, with Chuck Mosley and Dexter Pinto taking over on vocals at different points. 

After Bad Brains-influenced acts like Living Colour and Fishbone had some success, Epic Records offered the band their first major label deal, with the album Rise coming out in 1993. The Hudsons once again returned in 1994 and the band opened for the Beastie Boys on the Ill Communication tour and released an album in 1995 on Maverick Records called God of Love. H.R. was starting to have some issues, both onstage and off and ended up in jail again. The band toured for a few years as Soul Brains because of some legal issues before taking their original name back. They released albums in 2007 (produced by Adam Yauch) and 2012, but have only performed sporadically since then. 

I never saw Bad Brains, but when I think of good uses for time machines, one would be to travel back to D.C. or NYC in the early '80s and see them in their heyday. The footage is just amazing.