Rendclaw

Every time I hear Head Over Heels I cannot help but sing along. I love "Everybody" just as much as the next person, but Head Over Heels I maintain was their best song. Sorry Earl, Seeds was overdone in a lot of aspects. They tried to do too much *and* stay the same. You can do one, not both.

I remember when I bought Presto, I was hoping that the guitar was a more prominent instrument... when that riff kicks it off, I was like YES! Rush is BACK, baby! I think the chorus would hold up if Alex's guitar didn't vanish after every "Show me, don't tell me." You know, like when they do it live, and Alex's distorted guitar just rings through while Geddy sings the chorus. This song is a personal theme of mine, and it reminds me to never take something someone says to me on face value. Back up your words with the appropriate actions, and you're cool with me.

The 8 year old boy in me will say The Eagles, because I thought that Hotel California was one of the coolest songs to listen to. I still do, just from a guitar-oriented standpoint. But being near 43 now, I have to say Rumors by a nose. Rumors is a better album overall, but it is very very close, my crush on Stevie Nicks aside (yes, even now). And considering these albums have been around for close to 35 years respectively, how are they overplayed? I might agree back in the 70s and 80s when these albums were two of the most popular and best selling albums of that time, but not now. Easy listening/light rock stations in the 80s and 90s had both of the greatest hits of both albums in heavy rotation sure, but even then that doesn't rate overplay. As for the Eagles hate its justifiable, considering what pricks Henley and Frey are in firing Felder and all but neutering Joe Walsh, but this isn't about that. If you don;t like the music, that's cool, but at least try to be objective.

Cornell has one of those voices that doesn;t translate live. Hell, he blew out his vocal chords trying sound like the record. And yes, grunge music from the early 90s is now considered classic, even though all of the people who considered themselves alternative back then (or still do) cannot STAND it. Welcome to the real world, flannel jockeys. EVERYONE gets old. Every twenty years, the genre gets larger. I cannot wait until what passes for heavy metal these days gets the same treatment. It makes me laugh, every time.

QUOTE (danielmclark @ Sep 22 2011, 09:16 PM) QUOTE (EmotionDetector @ Sep 22 2011, 02:29 PM) QUOTE (metaldad @ Sep 22 2011, 02:00 PM) QUOTE (Rendclaw @ Sep 20 2011, 04:41 AM) As for the complaints about them playing the old songs as compared to bringing in Sammy's well known *two* songs... really? That's a weak argument No it's not. I have seen Every tour with Sammy more than once. They did almost no old V.H. 5150 Tour - I won't count You Really Got Me because it's a cover song. They did.....Panama and Ain't Talkin Bout Love 0U812 - Panama , Ain't Talkin Bout Love and Runnin With The Devil F.U.C.K - Panama , Ain't Talkin Bout Love and Jump Balance - Panama and Ain't Talkin Bout Love That is a bad joke. Sammy joined V.H. and did not want to sing old V.H. songs . You can like the albums, but the setlists were a joke. Over the years i saw them do way to many cover songs and not do old V.H. songs. That was my big problem with seeing with Sam . Shame on Ed and Al for letting Sammy write the setlist for those tours and screwing the old school fan. They almost completely ignored 6 albums worth of songs . Yeah, that is really ridiculous to think that they left out basically everything from such an amazing catelog. But to be fair...I'll bet if Sammy was singing more D.L.R. stuff, he'd be taking flack for not doing it right or as good as Dave. THIS. Sammy walked into a situation where he knew that if he did a lot of the old stuff, he'd get murdered for it - and you Roth die-hards know that to be true, don't even pretend . He was in a lose/not-lose-as-much situation, and made the best of it. That said, I do think that in later tours, after he'd been in for a while (Carnal Knowledge, Balance) they could have expanded into the older stuff more. I couldn;t agree with that more. That's why I stopped bristling when the diehards refer to the Sammy days as Van Hagar, because I realized it HAD to be that way. Even though VH went on to more success, Sammy knew that he was in a no win situation in regard to the old material. Oh, and by the way, Eddie didn't want to play a lot of the old songs either, if I remember an interview he did back in the late 80s correctly, as there was still a hell of a lot of animosity between him and Dave that didn;t get partially resolved (kinda sorta) until the the mid 90s, during that aborted attempt to bring the egotistical prick back into the fold. But I also know that the diehards live and die on every breath Eddie takes and he can do little wrong in their eyes, even though what he did to Mike was an inexcusable travesty. Laying the blame for the lack of the old songs squarely at the feet of Sammy is just wrong, and I am no Sammy apologist by any means. I wish that DLR had never left the band in the first place, but the following years were no failure by any definition of the word.

QUOTE (LeaveMyThingAlone @ Sep 20 2011, 05:38 PM) QUOTE (Rendclaw @ Sep 20 2011, 04:41 AM) Ed's behavior is another point for a theory I have about people who get cancer and survive it. but enough said about that. Interesting....I know 2 people that this applies to, my mother included, and they both turned very bitter afterwards and weren't really the same person. They don't treat people with the same respect they used to... Is your theory along those lines? Almost exactly right. In a way its not their fault, but the changes the disease itself and the treatment of it inflicts... yeesh. Speaking of recovering addicts, my stepfather was the first person like that. He had a severe problem and he needed to go to rehab for it, but the clinic he went to didn't help him overcome his addiction as much as they refocused it from drugs and alcohol to something else, which altered his personality greatly. My own mother was the exception to the theory that Leave and myself share. If anything my mother's inner strength increased while staying the same person for the most part when her cancer came back after being 10 or 11 years in remission. I wish I had been there at the end, and that remains one of my biggest regrets in the 43 years I have been alive.

I still have not forgiven SyFy for ditching Farscape. All's well that ends well, because I am going to get the box set, which is only $40 or so on Amazon. I think with all sci-fi series, the first season is hardly ever any good, but it especially holds true with all of the Star Trek series, with the possible exception of the Original Series, and even then the first few episodes were relatively bad up until my favorite episode, "Balance of Terror". After that, everything improved markedly. TNG's first *two* seasons were terrible, they didn't start really picking up until near the end of Season 2, when they started humanizing Picard and the stories got better. DS9, the same thing, though I do agree on the series getting exponentially better once the Gamma Quadrant exploration started in earnest and the Dominion storyline began. Voyager, same thing. My point is that if you;re going to watch a sci-fi series you have to commit at least a season and a half to it before you pull the ripcord. That is, unless its parent network doesn't cut its nuts off in the name of ratings.

From the bootlegs I have heard, the guys just didn't have it together for the first leg of the tour. There was something always undercutting them, from trainwrecks of their own making, to Alex's guitar issues to just plain rust. If I have said it once in the few years I have been here, I have said it a thousand times: Rush fans are amazing, and I mean that in both a positive and negative way. The undying support for and the incessant complaining about the band is wonderful and saddening, and I will leave it at that. The camera work was straight up wonderful. Perfect shots for the right amount of time. I think the number of shots they could have done better with I could count on one hand. The shots of the fans are great, because we are ALL like those people when its our turn to be in the crowd. At a Rush concert I yell, I scream, I sing at the top of my voice and I air guitar my black ass off. Why? Because I an ENJOYING myself, and I don't care who watches. The occasional shot of the fans being uninhibited in their enjoyment of the moment is great to see. As to VH1 Classic's handling of the showings, that was more than a little drawback, even though there were plenty of repeats. I DVR'ed the second showing of it, and it went off without a hitch for me. But there have been issues with VH1 programming and the local cable companies before, so I am not surprised there were issues. I honestly believe the band had precious little to do with that, and blaming them is rather asinine. In fact I give them points for putting it out *before* the DVD release date. Truth is, not many bands would authorize such a move. Enough of it was edited out so that DVD sales won;t be too negatively affected, if at all. I know for a fact that I would have been buying it, Rush Hashanah or not. I think most people would have as well. Instead of the main course, we got an appetizer with a promise of the main course on its way. That showing was more than enough to tide me over.

La Villa is over 9 minutes long and TCE is what, 12? I would love to have seen La Villa myself, but I understand why they didn't put it in. Why buy the DVD when you can see it as much as you like if you have the channel on cable and a DVR, like myself? Reportedly, the DVD comes out in a little over a month, have patience. I stopped after Vital Signs, and will resume before I go to work tomorrow. Watching them mess with each other while putting out some of the most excellent music always make me laugh, and after tonight at work, I needed some serious enjoyment of something. I want a Gefliter T-Shirt now. And is it me, or did Neil put a little extra zip into Faithless, BU2B and Freewill.

I liked B5 until things got way too complicated. DS9 was better with better characters, but I did like the relationship between Sheridan and Delenn. Mira Furlan is an excellent actress.

DVR is SET. I'm looking very forward to this, since I couldn't actually be there at a Time Machine show.

Eddie Van Halen is one of the best guitarists of all time, but the bullshit that was pulled on Mike Anthony killed all my respect for him and his brother Alex. They're the ones who pull the strings, and Ed's behavior is another point for a theory I have about people who get cancer and survive it. but enough said about that. I love both eras of Van Halen, and despite people wanting to revise history, bringing in Sammy Hagar saved that band, because he had the singing chops to match Eddie's guitar work. As for the complaints about them playing the old songs as compared to bringing in Sammy's well known *two* songs... really? That's a weak argument, because One Way to Rock was almost a new song with Eddie playing lead, and twin guitar harmonies. Watch Live Without A Net or listen to Right Here, Right Now and you will know what I mean. And by the way, they play a few of the old songs on RHRN. If you want to ignore Hagar's contributions, thats fine, even though you are doing a disservice to both yourself and Van Halen from 1986-1996, and then 2003-2005. Just like 99.7% of the other VH fans, I thought getting Cherone was a HORRIBLE idea.

Believe it or not, Circumstances is a very easy song, its just a freight train that if you mess up on, its very obvious. The hardest part about it is playing the melody before the chorus. When you get it right and are on time with it, its a good feeling but you have no time to celebrate it because the chorus comes barreling in and you need to get that right. Subdivisions is not that hard either.

Technically it was Moving Pictures although I bought that, Signals, 2112, Exit Stage Left, and Permanent Waves all on cassette from Crazy Eddie at the same time. I still have them too, though I am sure they are much the worse for wear. I was going to include All The World's A Stage in that list, but I had borrowed that from a friend and he never asked for it back.

Yeah, since he got him to play on his solo album, and that wasn't a bad idea.