Episode Transcript
[00:00:25] Speaker A: Well, hello there, and welcome to episode 60, the Rock podcast. Those about the pod, we salute you. In this episode, there's rock news. It's the letter M in the a to z of Rock. We got new rock on the block. And of course, everyone's favorite feature, hidden gem time. So without further ado, here he is, the man with the princess Diana picture. It's Brian Maney, everyone. Hello, Brian. How you doing?
[00:00:51] Speaker B: Hi. I'm doing well, Matthew. It's not Princess Diane, it's Kenny Dal Gleesh.
[00:00:57] Speaker A: Okay, I'll take your word for it.
[00:00:59] Speaker B: All right.
[00:01:00] Speaker A: So, Brian, how are you, my friend?
[00:01:02] Speaker B: I am doing very well, mate.
[00:01:04] Speaker A: Good.
[00:01:05] Speaker B: I'm a diamond geezer.
[00:01:07] Speaker A: Well, indeed. Well, thanks for asking, by the way. I'm fine. Yes, indeed. It is our 60th episode. It is indeed 60. Which means this is our diamond anniversary. You know what that means, don't you?
[00:01:21] Speaker B: Some link to your favorite band, Diamond Head.
[00:01:26] Speaker A: I'm sending you a present, actually, it's on its way to you. I'm going to hold it up to the screen. It hasn't arrived yet, clearly, but I'm going to hold it up to your screen. And that is what I'm sending you as my gift to you. I'm sending you something with a diamond in it.
[00:01:40] Speaker B: Fabulous.
[00:01:41] Speaker A: The best of diamond head CD. How about that?
[00:01:44] Speaker B: And here was me thinking you might send me a legs diamond CD from the playlist that we put on last episode, because they were really good. It's the first time I ever heard legs diamond. They were brilliant.
[00:01:56] Speaker A: I know. Absolutely. Same, yeah. Loved it. Well, that's the beauty of these playlists. We try to inspire people to listen to more of these artists. And of course, we'll do the same today.
[00:02:07] Speaker B: Yeah, we will.
[00:02:08] Speaker A: With the letter M for Maley, of course.
[00:02:12] Speaker B: Of course.
That's a section all in itself.
[00:02:16] Speaker A: Yes, indeed, indeed.
Okay, so what has caught your eyebrow, Matt?
[00:02:23] Speaker B: You know, the way you always talk about me.
Know a guitarist, not very good.
[00:02:30] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:02:31] Speaker B: So I've now cracked how to get rich quick.
I'm going to follow what Mark Knoffler has just done.
Mark Knoffler has just auctioned off 122 guitars from his collection for a staggering 8.8 million pounds.
[00:02:53] Speaker A: So they're amazing.
[00:02:55] Speaker B: I don't have 122 guitars, Matt. But if you do the math, if I sold about ten of my guitars and make the same amount of money as Mark Knoffler, I can retire.
[00:03:11] Speaker A: That is true.
Only there is one little sort of catch, really. You are not Mark Novler. You're not the guitarist and dicer.
We haven't talked about your audition for the smashing pumpkins, by the way.
Last time we'll come on to that.
So you might get sort of face value from those couple of banjos and ukulele's you've got there. I can see them. I can see them in the background next to the Princess Dinah picture gathering dust.
[00:03:40] Speaker B: I actually watched the audition. I actually watched the auction live.
[00:03:46] Speaker A: The auction, not the audition.
[00:03:48] Speaker B: Yes, I watched the auction live and it was brilliant.
I also bought the book. So I bought the Mark Knoffler book with all of the guitars that were going to be auctioned. And I sat and watched the auction and it was hilarious, Matt, where you had like, balalikas and little guitar.
It wasn't all Les Paul's and Fender stratocasters and sewer guitars that he's well known for using.
There were some interesting guitars and they had like, little guitars that were up for a value of the value of between 800 and 1200 pounds.
And then it went to. Right, we've got lot 22. We've had a lot of interest in these guitars. Let's start the bidding at five grand.
[00:04:50] Speaker A: Did you buy anything?
[00:04:51] Speaker B: No, I didn't. No.
But, yes, it was a whacking amount of money, 8.8 million pounds that Mark Knoffler raised. And we've talked a lot about guitars and things have been auctioned off. The biggest guitar in the collection was a 1959 Les Paul standard that sold for 693,000 pounds. But the one that actually was picked up on most of the news was a 1959 reissue that was made in 1983, actually went for nearly 600 grand. So Mark's donating sizable amount of the proceeds from the auction to the British Red Cross, to Tusk and to the brave hearts of the northeast. And he's also for one of the. He had a special gold Les Paul that was signed by lots and lots of his peers, which sold for 403,000 pounds. And he's giving all of that to the teenage cancer trust. So that's it, Matt. I auction my guitars off in Christie's and make three pound 50.
[00:06:11] Speaker A: Well, that said, you met Eric Bell recently. You got this guitar, haven't you, that you get signed by various members of Thin Lizzy. I believe you like thin Lizzy. I could be wrong. But you met Eric Bell recently. So that Eric Bell, was he the original guitar player?
[00:06:27] Speaker B: He was the original guitar player.
[00:06:29] Speaker A: Just for those people who don't know who Eric Bell is, of course.
What was he like? Was he a nice guy?
[00:06:35] Speaker B: Sonny, your guitar absolutely gentleman. He was fabulous.
He was playing in a great little venue in Kinross, just outside Perth. And it was a Monday night and it's like a blues trio and Eric was playing great and it's like a blues trio. He played a couple of thin Lizzy tracks. He obviously played whiskey in the jar and he played the rocker and he played for nearly 2 hours. And at the end of the.
[00:07:10] Speaker A: No.
[00:07:11] Speaker B: No, he had a pint of Guinness in his hand and he was just about to walk off the show, off the stage and I just said, hello there, eric. I put on my Northern Ireland accent a bit because Eric's from Belfast, so I laid it on a bit thick and then, how's it going there, Eric? How you doing?
And then he answers, grand. And then we're Northern Ireland territory.
So I said, would you mind signing my Les Paul? And he said, no bother. No bother at all. And then he had to look at it and he spotted Brian Downey's signature on it as well too. And I said, yeah. So, yes, lovely man and yeah, legend.
[00:07:54] Speaker A: Yes indeed. Speaking of lovely, hasn't been the singer of Meridian for a long time. Solo performer Derek Dick is his real name, of course, is finally calling it a day after, I think, was it four decades, maybe more in the music business from the early days of merillion in the early 80s.
It's decided that 20, 24, 25 will be his last tour.
It's going to be an emotional one because he's quite an iconic character, fish.
And he's retiring from the music business. I think he's going to go and live in the Isle of Orkney or something like that.
[00:08:39] Speaker B: He's actually going to live in a craft on the Outer Hebrides.
[00:08:44] Speaker A: Oh, the Outer Hebrides. That's it, yeah. Amazing. Talk about reclusive.
Yeah, good on him. I think he's retiring. I would say at the top. Let's say at the top, we'll always be synonymous with that. Early 80s merillian. Well, early to mid 80s. Late. He left in the late eighty s. And that was there. I mean, that was a purple patch from merillium, wasn't it? In the kind of misplaced childhood Fagazi script for a gestatir era. I met fish, actually.
I was at a planet rock thing in Marrakesh in Morocco back in 2015. And he was one of the. There were three gigs, temperance movement, fish and black star riders. And you got to meet all of them. And he was quite jovial and quite amicable. Nice guy, very tall, smoked a lot like chain smoking, which is not a good idea. Kids, by the way. Are you hiding from the kids, by the way? Right, just going sideways.
[00:09:52] Speaker B: The mock exams, is it? Yeah, doing the mocks.
[00:09:58] Speaker A: How comes you know this but I don't?
They don't keep in touch with me.
[00:10:02] Speaker B: Well.
[00:10:08] Speaker A: Okay, fair enough. Anyway, he did a nice gig, but, yeah, I've got a photo somewhere of me and fish. I'll dig it out and stick it on the Facebook page or something. Anyway, fish, you're a fan of Meridian, you love a bit merillion, don't you?
[00:10:23] Speaker B: Of course I do. I love Merillion. But I'm a bigger fan of the latter day with the new guy. You know, the new guy who's been in it for 35 years.
[00:10:36] Speaker A: Yeah, that's right.
Steve Hogarth, of course, yes.
Some people call Brian Johnson the new guy in AC DC. He's been there since 1980, but it's still the new guy. New bloke still, right, yeah, it'll be.
[00:10:51] Speaker B: Good, I think the 2024 part of the farewell tour, which he's calling the roads to the Isles. The roads to the Isles tour. So he's doing Europe first in 2024, but next year in 2025, he's going to kick off the tour in Haddington Corn exchange. So I'm going to try and get tickets to go and see him in Haddington.
[00:11:18] Speaker A: Wow. Never heard of it. Where's Haddington?
[00:11:20] Speaker B: Haddington is a little East Lothian village. I lived in it for about a year when I moved up to Scotland. And fish is well known for playing locally because he lives in Harrington at the moment and has done since 1988. So he's got his recording studio there and he also has his garden because, remember during lockdown he was doing fish on a Friday and then he had the sideline of the gardening show that he used to try. I'm going to try and get tickets to go and see him on the opening night at Harrington, the corn exchange, next year, feeling that it'll be the last night of his last ever show in Glasgow.
[00:12:02] Speaker A: Yeah, that'd be an emotional affair, I imagine.
[00:12:05] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:12:06] Speaker A: So we wish you well, fish, on your farewell tour. So this next story, bride, made me smile in a way, I guess. So, status quo, which essentially is Francis Rossi these days and Andy Bowen from the kind of the classic era, let's say.
They recently recorded for M s, Marks and Spencer, the UK sort of department store giant. Spent a lot of time there, actually. I quite like M s, but anyway, that's another story. My daughter works there hi, Georgia. If you're listening, which you hopefully are. If not, then why not?
Anyway, so they recently recorded a version of rocking all over the world, which indeed itself is a cover of the John Foggarty song, promoting M s.
And they retitled it saving all over the store, which, as someone put on Facebook, I think probably Rick Parfitt and Alan Lancaster are turning in their graves, and possibly they are, because it's not Quo's finest hour, I don't think. Have a listen, boys and girls. It was filmed not far from where I live, actually, up in towards. I'm pointing north, bry, as you can tell.
[00:13:28] Speaker B: Excellent. Up to north.
[00:13:31] Speaker A: Well, that's not that far. I'm pointing up towards Croydon, which is where it was formed.
And they've even changed the lyrics. Oh, my God. It's just amazing. Oh, here we are at MNS, and here we. That. I think we should stop there.
It's a good store, mns, and it's quite fun, I guess you could say, the whole sort of idea behind it. But as I say, I'm sure Alan Lancaster and Rick Parfitt, if they're looking down, they're probably having a good old chuckle at Francis and Andy's expense. Let's say.
[00:14:10] Speaker B: Here's the benchmark for me, Matt.
Is it better than burning bridges?
[00:14:18] Speaker A: Oh, that's a tough call, actually.
Oh, my goodness.
[00:14:25] Speaker B: Why do we put it on the playlist and let our listeners decide whether burning bridges or the re recording of rocking all over the world for M-S-I.
[00:14:34] Speaker A: Tell you, we'll put all of them on there. We'll put the John Foggarty version. We'll put the original quote, but then the lot, we'll put them all on.
[00:14:39] Speaker B: Exactly.
[00:14:42] Speaker A: What else you got for.
[00:14:46] Speaker B: One of the most polarizing men in the world these days is the multi billionaire Tesla CEO Elon Musk. And you're probably wondering, Matt, why am I talking about Elon Musk on our little podcast?
[00:15:05] Speaker A: Well.
[00:15:09] Speaker B: Do you know the way in which AI is going these days? Man, I wouldn't be surprised.
Here it is. Elon Musk. Elon Musk is no fronting Black Sabbath.
[00:15:20] Speaker A: Musk Sabbath.
[00:15:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
So anyway, Elon Musk Musk will not be listening to a band called dawn of Correction. And the reason why that is the drummer of the thrash brand dawn of correction is a gentleman called Richard Tornetta. Now, Richard Tornetta is a shareholder of the Tesla company, and I think it was in 2020, Elon Musk's boards said, you're a good lad. We're going to give you lots and lots of money because you've made the company lots and lots of money. And as a shareholder, Richard went, no, I don't agree with that. And he had nine shares worth $200, Matt. And he took Elon Musk to court, and the court in Delaware sided with Richard Tonetta. And Elon Musk has just missed out. And these figures are correct. He's just been stripped of 56 billion pounds worth of compensation from.
Because of Richard, the drummer from Dawn Correction, who spearheaded the lawsuit against Elon Musk. There you go.
Finance and music.
[00:16:51] Speaker A: Yeah, they're not often good bedfellows, are they?
Dawn of correction. I can't actually find anything by dawn of correction on.
[00:17:02] Speaker B: Sadly, they've split up. They were not part of the big four.
[00:17:08] Speaker A: No, clearly. Dawn of correction.
What do you do with $56 billion, anyway? I mean, we've had this conversation before when the Neil Youngs of this world started to sell their publishing rights, but what do you do with.
[00:17:24] Speaker B: What do you do?
You sit on Christie's auctions in your dire straits t shirt going, yeah, I'm just going to bid all this up. I'm going to bid. There's we banjo for 50 quid. I'm going to bid it up to 27,000 pounds. West of meeting materials in the morning, drinking my coffee.
[00:17:46] Speaker A: Yes. With your daughter. Correction.
Right. What else you got for us, Brian? Anything else?
[00:17:52] Speaker B: Well, Matt, the exciting news for those of us who are big fans of supergrips and Glenn Hughes and Joe Bonamassa, in particular, the black country communion, who announced last year that they were getting back into the studio, have recorded their new album, which will be out in May of this.
Super, super excited with that. The band are in rehearsals at the moment. I think they're doing.
Is it like cruise to the. They're doing a cruise. I think that Joe Bonamassa does. So black country are going to play back. Country community are going to play some shows there.
The tantalizing teasing. Joe Bonamassa has also said, oh, and we will be doing shows, plural. So hopefully there's a slim chance that maybe they may come across to Europe, which would be fantastic. So I did get all excited when Spotify put a track out over the last few days, which was a track called with you I go. And I thought it was a brand new track off the new album, but sadly, it was an unreleased track from BCC four, but it still sounded good. And it's a nice little teaser for black country communion hitting new album coming out May of this year, which I'm very excited about.
[00:19:26] Speaker A: Well, I could imagine. And we'll have to review that, of course, in new rock on the block.
[00:19:30] Speaker B: We will indeed.
[00:19:31] Speaker A: Which brings us to new rock on the block.
So Saxon have got a new album out, their 24th album. Amazing. It's called Hell fire and damnation. It struck me, Brian, when we were listening to it, that in the course of this relatively short podcast history, since early mid 2020, we've reviewed. This is our third Saxon album that we've reviewed. Yes, hellfire and damnation.
Well, I'm just going to sort of say, well, what do you think of it? Right.
[00:20:11] Speaker B: I was very surprised with it, Matthew. As you know, I've seen Saxon many, many times, and I wouldn't say that I enjoy the classic period of know, wheels of Steel, Eagle has landed, all that early stuff, and I haven't really been much of a follower of their latter career. This album, the highlights for me is, I think the Biff and Andy Snape's production is amazing.
I think the songwriting is so strong.
The opening track with the prophecy, with Gordon's alive, it's such a well crafted piece of hard, heavy metal.
The tracks on it, the lead off track itself and the Prophecy. I love Madame Guillotine, fire and Steel, which is obviously, they're a northern band and pirates of the airways, where they're giving a shout out to lots of the radio stations like Radio Caroline and Radio Luxembourg from the late 60s.
So songwriting was great. I thought the band played well. The two things I want to call out about this album, and I'd say, people, if you haven't listened to Saxon for many years, go and listen to this album. It's great. But the two things that just stand out for me on the album is Biff's vocal is getting better.
There was parts of the songs that they were singing, matt, particularly around in the choruses, where it sounded as if Biff's singing with Bruce Dickinson singing harmony vocals to it, there was just a high harmony, which was fantastic. And I thought Biff was knocking out of the chart. The highlight of the album for me musically is Nigel Gluckler. The man is 71 years of age, and when you listen to the intensity of the drumming, it reminds me of latter day Judas Priest, the double bass drums.
And obviously there's a connection with Andy Sneep, who produces Judas Priest as well as Saxon album. But Nigel's drumming is youthful.
It's given Saxon that real hardcore drive. So I was really shocked at how good this album was. Matt, that's my meanderings of what has been a great, great album to start off. 2024 for us. Fabulous album.
Okay.
[00:23:16] Speaker A: Yeah. Interesting.
I was probably slightly less enthusiastic about it, really.
I thought, as you said, the title track is great.
But then the one thing that struck me is, if you're doing kids. We talked about the kids earlier. Kids, even adults, if you're doing a history degree or o levels, a levels, whatever gcses they call them now, I think, listen to Saxon, because every album is a history list. They've dealt with the assassination of JFK, the moon landing. On this album. They cover, as you say, the french revolution in Madame Guillotine. Fire and Steel is about Sheffield as a bit more of a kind of industrial, kind of socioeconomical statement, as it were, something in Roswell, which is my favorite song of the album.
The alleged UFO landing in the 50s in the US.
I think you could throw any subject to Biff. Biff Byford, the singer of Saxon. And he could write about it. He does it very well, I might add. The other thing, I thought, by the way, Brian Tatler from Diamond Head is on this album. In fact, Biff said to him, have you got any ideas? And he came up with Hellfire and damnation, which is tinged with some diamond head isms. When you've listed Diamond Head as long as I have 40 plus years, you know, the diamond Head isms or the Brian tatterisms. So there's a few listed throughout. And you can tell Brian's solos. I think Paul Quinn's on it as well.
I thought it was okay on the whole, Brian. It's one of those albums that the more I listened, the less I liked it. But if you want to just. Yeah, I know. It's a strange thing to say, isn't it? Normally goes the other way, but I probably listened to it too much. Because we do listen to these albums a lot for this sort of section.
But it's well worth a listen. The 24th album by Saxon, Hellfire and damnation.
I'm not sure it's called that, but I'm going to call it that anyway.
[00:25:18] Speaker B: Which brings us just before you come to the next album. Yes, there is something.
Whenever I was listening to the album and then I was listening to some Judas priest. There are some trademark words that Biff uses and trademark words that Rob uses. So to me, Biff uses the word night a lot. So night. And then, of course, Rob Halford is.
[00:25:54] Speaker A: Well, you know, they work in their own way. Whatever works for you, then go for it in the same vein. Green Day got a new album out called Saviors, which is their 14th album.
[00:26:14] Speaker B: What did you think of that one?
[00:26:16] Speaker A: Well, thanks for asking. And I shall tell you, I haven't listened to a Green Day album since, if I'm honest, since bullet in the Bible, the live album from about 2005, six, which my niece Zoe is on. We talked about albums and videos. You're on last time, and she's on that album. It's recorded at Milton Keynes bowl, which will maybe come on to later. And apparently she was in row 65. She has quite long hair and her hair was in row 73. She's quite something.
Anyway, the Green Day album, I thought was great. They've got this ability. Green Day, Billy Joe Armstrong, Trey Cool and Mike Durn's great names. They've got this ability to combine kind of punkiness and I mean that in a kind of stylistic way. The sort of classic kind of up downstrokes of the guitar with melody.
They seem to just kind of create this whole Green Day bubble for themselves, where you just know it's them, you know, it's Billy Joe Armstrong's vocal, you know, it's the. The guitar style and so on. In a way, it's a natural progression from american idiot, which was 20 years ago, for God's sake.
[00:27:36] Speaker B: Absolutely, yeah.
[00:27:41] Speaker A: They're out, I think, on tour, certainly this country in the UK doing, I think, dookie, which I think was probably ten years before that, and so on.
It's not for the faint hearted. It's very political in places. The opening song is the american dream is killing me.
It's got some interesting songs. I haven't really delved into the kind of subtext of these songs from Coma city. I'm not sure what that's about. I imagine that's a statement on whatever city they care to mention.
Strange days are here to stay. That probably says it, or the title and so on. It weighs in an impressive 46 minutes, which is the kind of classic, kind of current, put it on vinyl length. I think the Saxon album is about 42 minutes, so that's fine, because you don't necessarily want an hour and 20 minutes worth of album because you get to track 75 and you're a bit bored. But this has got a nice, punchy 15 songs in 46 minutes. So I think it's great. I really enjoyed it. I know we're only in February, but so far it's one of my albums of the year. Wow. I absolutely loved it. You briar. I fear that you don't have quite the same enthusiasm for this album.
[00:28:55] Speaker B: Listening to the album, I would have changed the running order for the album. That's just me, because the first couple of tracks off the album, obviously the american dream is killing me. Look, man, O'Brien's and Bobby socks, those are the first three tracks on the album. And when I listened to it, it felt like polished punk. So it wasn't as raw and vibrant as you say, as maybe a dookie or american idiot, because american idiot, it just sounds like they're in a rehearsal room and they're just thrashing out the songs. But then, cheekily, do you see from track five, which is a track called dilemma, all the way through to track nine, corvette, summer dilemma, 1981, good night, adeline. And to me, the banging track of the album, which is Coma City, which is nearly an AC DC terror.
It is. It's very much in that. And it got more angrier. And yeah, you're right about some of the commentary that Billy Joel puts in his lyrics. But that middle section of the album, I just went, oh, I like this now. And it really took me through, all the way through the.
Yeah, the first couple of tracks were just a little bit too polished for me. And then they just really took off from dilemma. And I was going, yeah, they're still angry and they're guys probably in their 50s, mid 50s, maybe late 40s, but there was an urgency about the material and they had something to say. And the middle part of the album was just fantastic.
Whether they're doing that on purpose and we'll do a few easy melodic songs and then we'll just get into it. But, yeah, very impressed with that as an album. Yeah, I thought it was really good.
[00:31:11] Speaker A: So check it out. Boys and girls, saviors by Green Day, as well as help our damnation by Saxon. Well worth the listen, of course.
[00:31:19] Speaker B: Absolutely right, Matt. So we have come to the middle of the Alphabet, kind of nearly, but it's the most important letter in the Alphabet. It's M. M for Matt and M for Maely.
[00:31:38] Speaker A: I like that. Yeah, I hadn't thought of that, actually.
[00:31:41] Speaker B: So we need to crack on because we've got so many bands. We've got so many things to get through. So let's kick off with some easy peasy bands that would make it into our pantheon of the a to z rock. I'm going to start us off with the wonderful. And we mentioned the former lead singer earlier on, Merillion.
[00:32:05] Speaker A: Oh, okay. All right, merillion.
[00:32:07] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:32:08] Speaker A: Still going strong. Yes. Formed in 1979.
[00:32:13] Speaker B: Really? Wow.
[00:32:16] Speaker A: I remember it well.
And as we said, fish was he. I think it was. Was he original singer? I don't remember merillian history. They kind of appeared. I remember they just appeared with script for a jester's tear in about 1982, which was one of those kind of highly lauded albums, and then folded up with Fugazi. And then I think their main sort of, I suppose, kind of standout album is clutching at straws from 1988. Is that right, Brian?
[00:32:46] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:32:46] Speaker A: And you got my merian discography correct.
[00:32:49] Speaker B: You're not too bad. You're doing for something off the cuff.
You've got misplaced childhood, which was the album, which had keely on it. That's right, yeah. And heart of Lothian and Lavender.
[00:33:06] Speaker A: And.
[00:33:06] Speaker B: Then clutching at straws, which was the last album with Fish. And then the fish era ends and then we go into the post Fish Hogarth era, which is amazing, which has got albums like Brave, a much more ambient, progressive, experimental, and as we've talked about Merlin in the show a number of times, the whole crowdfunding, the whole pay to get your name and the credits of albums and stuff, they took the whole self financing and kind of moving away from major label support and became an independent band and have been, I suppose, instrumental in, been able to keep out of the mainstream for so long and still be critically acclaimed with albums like fear, which came out a couple of. Couple of years ago, which featured very highly in the classic rock. So, yeah, brilliant. Hopefully a reasonable start to the letter m. But let's get back onto more firmer territory with a band from 1975, formed in 1975, Matthew, a band who I never saw, but a band formed with. By Mr. Lemmy Kilmeister, Mr. Larry Wallace and Lucas Fox, known as Motorhead.
[00:34:42] Speaker A: A couple of people said to me, why under the letter l, did you not feature Lemmy? Well, I said, simply because we're going to talk about motorhead, and to a lot of people, Motorhead is Lemmy. I mean, he was there from day one. Formed a motorhead after being fired by Hawkwind.
Motorhead was indeed, was a Hawkwind song originally. And if you listen to both, we'll put both on the playlist and you can kind of see the comparison. I've said many times, motel were probably my. When I was. What was I? 1516, maybe? Yeah, that era. They were one of my favorite bands. Lemmy. I mean, iconic character. And in a way, I kind of modeled my look on him in those days. Leather jacket, long hair, bullet belt, walk.
I mean, hugely influential.
And there's a couple of other M's, the Metallica and Megadeth and many others that they've influenced. I recommend, if you haven't seen it, the Lemme movie. Is it called the Lemme movie? Do you remember that? Yeah. Amazing insight into the world of Lemmy, but what a character.
Sadly no longer with us. Died in 2015, but his legacy lives on and he sent out his ashes in bullets to various members of the rock fraternity, I think. Fraternity. I think Dave Grohl might have got one and many others.
[00:36:13] Speaker B: Doff McKagan got one.
[00:36:15] Speaker A: That's right.
God bless him. But yeah, chain smoking, Jack Daniels drinking, fruit machine playing.
Wow, what a guy. We'll put tons of motet stuff on the playlist. Of course, we mentioned Metallica just then, of course, who, as I say, were influenced by mothead, but mainly influenced by Diamond Head, of course. That's very well documented over the years. Lazul Rick, Brian's sitting back while I give a little lecture on the origin of Metallica. And I linked with Diamond Head. It's been many times documented how Lazul Rick came to Britain in, I think about 1981, saw Diamond Head at the, I think it was a Lewis Shamodian or the Woolwich Odion somewhere in London and kind of hang out with the band for a few weeks and went back and formed Metallica, as you do, and the rest is history. But I mean, what a band. A massive band and resurgence last year with the Stranger Things soundtrack and master of puppets and so on. But yeah, we got to mention Metallica, surely, and then it's Rem. Right?
[00:37:23] Speaker B: We have to. We have to mention Metallica. And then obviously their original lead guitarist is Dave Mustine, who, having been kicked out of Metallica, went and formed Megadeth, who for many, many years you had this Megadeth, Metallica, and obviously some kind of monster movie when the band were going through their therapy sessions and Dave Mustaine was part of the documentary, you could see how much it hurt Dave, and they've reconnected. And then obviously the big four went out on know, Slayer, Anthrax, Megadeth and Metallica, and they're all big pals now, which is.
[00:38:21] Speaker A: We did Dave Mustaine's book, another m. Of course, Dave Mustaine and Megadeth. We looked at his book in book Club of Rock.
Well worth a read, Dave Mustaine's autobiography. And as you say, he's buried the hatchet with the guys in Metallica after all these years.
[00:38:38] Speaker B: And I love connections as well, too, because when you think of bands like Motorhead and Metallica. One thing that connects both of them in the early days is martial amplification.
In fact, martial amplification is just whenever you and I started to go to gigs, you're standing there and you're saying, how many bands had Marshall Stacks?
And it's over the years now, Matt, whenever we watch the documentaries and you'll see somebody like the motorheads of this world, Lemme had maybe six, four x twelve cabinets on stage. And he actually had them all swiped stone, whereas.
[00:39:35] Speaker A: Is that right?
[00:39:35] Speaker B: Yeah.
If you stood in front of, in the Lemmy movie that you mentioned earlier, you had people who came up on stage, modern musicians, and they stood in front of Lemmy's. Stood in front of Lemmy's bass cabinets and you just can't hear.
So nowadays a lot of it's for show. So we saw airborne at Steelhouse, remember a couple of, couple of years ago? And of course they have all of their Marshall stacks, et cetera. You just want to go, have you got them all switched on or have you just got one or two switched on and the rest are there for show?
[00:40:17] Speaker A: Yeah, well, famously there's. That clip isn't know, it kind of goes behind the wall of marshalls in a lot of shells. And Judas Priest, admittedly, we've got one where Rob Halford rides his motorbike through. So you're right, but it's synonymous with rock and metal. Isn't the Marshall Stack.
And Jim Marshall, who was the founder of Marshall, sadly no longer with us.
I think basically he ran a music shop, I think on Tim Panelli in London, Denmark street in London. And I think Pete Townsend, I think this is an apocryphal story, but it's probably true.
He came in and said, I need something louder. And meteor. And Jim Marshall came up essentially with the Marshall, probably the 50 watt or the 100 watt or whatever, you know, a little bit about guitars and stuff like that, amps and everything.
But essentially we got Jim Marshall to thank and probably Pete Townsend to thank for the whole Marshall stack, as it's sort of commonly referred to. Of course.
[00:41:26] Speaker B: Somebody who continues to use Marshall Stacks and well, maybe stick something on the socials.
If you go and see him in concert, is the wonderful. And let's not forget the J Ingvy J. Malmstein.
And he plays marshalls and lots of them.
[00:41:48] Speaker A: That's true.
I went to a gig in 2012 which was the 50 years of Marshall amplification gig. And Ingwe Malmstein was there and we were sort of side of the stage, almost. He was throwing his guitar over. I think he changed the guitar, like, midway through the songs. And he was lobbing his guitar over the top of his stack to his roadie. He was standing there like a baseball catcher or a wicketkeeper ready for this guitar that would land any second. Yeah. The great Ingwe J. Malmstein. Of course we're talking about guitarists. Of course, there are numerous guitarists in the letter M. The great Brian May. Not Brian May Lee. Brian May of queen.
[00:42:36] Speaker B: I can only hope.
[00:42:37] Speaker A: Sir Brian. Sir Brian May.
Remember him. Head of him.
[00:42:42] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely. Still, queen are still going strong. Still turing. Brian May with his sideboard guitar. And he plays.
His plectrum was a sixpence piece. Yeah, that's right.
[00:42:57] Speaker A: Yeah.
Amazing. When you think about it, other M's in the guitarist world. I mean, there's loads. There are really loads. I mean, at one point, whitesnake had three. Moody Marsden and Neil Murray, of course, on the bass guitar. Malcolm Mendoza has played bass for Whitesnake. Of course, there is Steve Morse, who was deep Purple's guitarist.
Dave Murray from Iron Maiden.
A little fella called John Mayer I think you've heard of.
[00:43:30] Speaker B: I have indeed.
[00:43:30] Speaker A: One of your favorites.
[00:43:31] Speaker B: Yeah, absolutely.
[00:43:33] Speaker A: And drummer wise, we've got Nico McBrain. We can't quite put together an M sort of supergroup as we did with the Lees last time around, but we're not far off with the various moors. Gary Moore.
[00:43:51] Speaker B: I'm glad you said, because if you try to me, I go, so you take this one, then.
[00:44:02] Speaker A: Well, I mean, there's loads. Isn't Gary Moore we talked about? I mean, he's one of your countrymen, of course. The great Gary Moore.
[00:44:09] Speaker B: Absolutely.
My favorite guitar player.
[00:44:13] Speaker A: That's right. Is he, though?
[00:44:15] Speaker B: Yeah, Gary's my goat.
He's my goat.
[00:44:22] Speaker A: I'm not so sure about that expression. Goat. Greatest of all time.
There are a few. Vinny Moore from UFO, of course.
Others.
[00:44:34] Speaker B: Well, actually, we're not doing too bad. Yeah, you're right. And then you've got a singer. You've got Nikki Moore, who sang with Samson. That's right. Keyboards. You would have Kevin Moore, who was the keyboard player. Dream theater.
[00:44:49] Speaker A: I know that. I know that.
You've got Thurston Moore, another guitar player.
[00:44:56] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:56] Speaker A: Sonic Youth, I think.
[00:44:58] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:44:59] Speaker A: Scotty Moore, who was. I think it was Elvis's guitarist.
[00:45:03] Speaker B: He was indeed very influential guitar player.
[00:45:06] Speaker A: Yeah, we're just about there. I think we're missing a bass player, aren't we?
[00:45:09] Speaker B: We need a drummer.
[00:45:11] Speaker A: That's true. I'm sure we'll get one somewhere. Please tell us any moors that play the drums, we'll stick them in.
[00:45:19] Speaker B: Gil Gilmore. Gilmore from triumph.
[00:45:24] Speaker A: Jeez, that's a good shout.
[00:45:26] Speaker B: It's a good job we do our preparation for this show, isn't it, Matt, as we're just throwing out Morse.
[00:45:33] Speaker A: Yeah, that's great.
Amazing. Yes, indeed. He was the drummer and co vocalist. Not quite in the Neil Pierce category, but still good from canadian drummer perspective. There we are. We've done another nearly family super group. Exactly. What else we got?
[00:45:51] Speaker B: Notable mentions, Brian, notable mentions. For me. Oh, my goodness.
For me, albums wise, I would be calling out three albums come off top of my head, moving pictures, mechanical resonance. And a band that has got two great albums, one studio and one live is Deep Purple's machine head and made in Japan.
[00:46:22] Speaker A: Amazing. That's a great shout. Yeah. In the same vein, I'm going to mention mechanics by UFO and of course featuring the great Phil Mogg on vocals.
[00:46:33] Speaker B: Absolutely great.
[00:46:35] Speaker A: Phil Mogg, singer on the greatest live album there's ever been, of course, as previously mentioned, marauder by Blackfoot. Do you remember old Kelvin, our former social media guy sent the one in, bless him.
[00:46:47] Speaker B: Yes.
[00:46:49] Speaker A: Machine head deeper. You mentioned that, I think.
And many more. I think we also need to mention Eric Martin from Mr. Big. Yes, they're pretty good.
[00:46:59] Speaker B: Good shape.
[00:47:01] Speaker A: We also need to mention Mick Mars from Motley Crue.
One of the kind of, I suppose, in a way, classic rock band. We talked about them last time and the fact we saw them last year.
And finally, I think, two absolute superstars of the genre. I'm going to go with Steve Marriott now. Steve Marriott, I think is one of those vocalists from humble Pie. And of course, the small faces.
Again, sadly no longer with us, but a hugely. I think he's probably just about one of the greatest vocalists has ever been in the rock world. And also, of course, we mentioned John Lennon last time. We can't mention John Lennon without, of course, the great Paul McCartney.
[00:47:49] Speaker B: He made it into.
Was he your bass player when we were putting together? Super.
[00:47:57] Speaker A: Don't. I don't think so.
[00:48:00] Speaker B: He might be mine then.
[00:48:02] Speaker A: I do remember that story with my friend was at a station, a railway station in Kent somewhere, and Paul McCartney was standing behind him in the queue to get a coffee and they started talking about football, soccer, Liverpool and Everton, which is quite surreal when you think about it, chatting to a Beatle about Everton and Liverpool. But there you go. I think that's it. I would also like to mention, by the way, we mentioned Milton Keynes bowl earlier, one of my favorite venues. Been there many times. And of course, monsters of rock. And I think boys and girls, you should go back to. I think it was episode seven or eight. And of course, subscribe on YouTube to the podcast, but listen to episode seven, the famous Bryfest and Matt Stock Festival episode, which still is one of my favorites of the 60 episode who. Dubbry, of course.
[00:48:52] Speaker B: Absolutely.
[00:48:52] Speaker A: Over to you, my friend.
[00:48:54] Speaker B: So this was a band or this was a piece of music that I remember from a midday on a Sunday. And it was the theme tune to weekend world in the UK with. Was it Brian Walden?
And the theme tune had this Hammond organ keyboard. And for years we didn't have the.
So you don't know what it is. And it was a track by a band called Mountain. And Mountain are obviously. It's. Leslie west was the guitar player.
Guitar player. And, you know, if you talk to Eddie Van Halen, loads of know Ronnie Montrose, who we didn't mention, sammy Hagar, you're in know, Leslie west is revered as one of the greatest guitar players. So Mountain played the theme tune for weekend world and it was. What a cracking name for a song. Nantucket sleigh ride.
[00:50:04] Speaker A: That's right.
[00:50:05] Speaker B: I have no idea where Nantucket is, but it's on the map because of mountain. So shout out to mountain. And then the other.
Moving away from music, Matt, we often think about denim and leather and things that are synonymous with. With rock. And it got me thinking about mascots.
So. Mascots. So when you think of the great mascots and suppose trademarks to a lot of bands.
I'll have a little bit of a quiz with you here.
[00:50:43] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:50:43] Speaker B: Iron Maiden. Who's Iron Maiden's mascot?
[00:50:48] Speaker A: Eddie. There you go.
[00:50:49] Speaker B: Excellent.
Now, we talked about motorheads.
[00:50:53] Speaker A: Yes.
[00:50:54] Speaker B: What is.
[00:50:55] Speaker A: That's the famous snaggle two.
[00:50:58] Speaker B: Well, two for two.
[00:50:59] Speaker A: The sort of skull with the horns and everything. Yeah.
[00:51:02] Speaker B: Okay. The third one again, another m band, which is Megadeth. And obviously, when you think of Megadeth's, the album covers with their mascot, who was Megadeth's mascot called.
[00:51:19] Speaker A: Well, having read Dave Mustaine's autobiography. I know it's Vic Rattlehead.
Which is it, Vic or Mick?
[00:51:29] Speaker B: Vic. It's Vic.
[00:51:31] Speaker A: Vic. I thought so.
[00:51:32] Speaker B: Right.
[00:51:33] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:51:33] Speaker B: And your final one of the ones that I think are the iconic heavy metal mascots is Dio.
[00:51:44] Speaker A: That's got to be Denzel the dragon, surely.
[00:51:51] Speaker B: Now, when you think of the holy diver album and you've got the diabolical character. Yes, the diabolical character. And you've got the chains around the priest and the water and all this kind of stuff.
This is what the Internet is telling me. That devilish character is called Murray.
[00:52:11] Speaker A: Is that right? Okay.
I think I prefer Denzel, to be honest.
Mascots.
[00:52:17] Speaker B: So there you go. There's the mascots of rock, and I'm sure there's many others we can remember.
[00:52:24] Speaker A: Yeah, very good. I like that. So that was the letter M. Next time it's n. Now it's going to get more and more difficult, I think, as we go forward.
[00:52:32] Speaker B: But I've already got it. I think it's going to be no, it'll be an episode for you to talk about Noabam, so we can do the whole history of Nwoabham and we can talk even more about Diamond Head.
[00:52:49] Speaker A: That's true. There you go. Happy days.
Okay, so that brings us to everyone's favorite part of the old podcast, Brian, hidden Ginger.
Thank you, Lola, sounding great, as always. Hope you're doing well. So, Brian, what you got for us?
[00:53:11] Speaker B: Once again? I have streaming services to thank me, Matt, for giving me this artist or reminding me of this next artist. This is an album called don't say no that was produced in 1981.
And actually the artist in question had asked Brian May to produce the album. And Brian said, I'm not available. Why don't you get our long standing engineer, Mac, to produce it? And this is the album don't say no by Billy Squire. Oh, yeah, no, Billy Squire.
It's interesting because the big single off this album, which was called a stroke, it obviously did very well in America at the time, 1981, but the track. And please put this on the playlist. Matt is lonely is the night. Oh, yeah, it's an absolute.
[00:54:22] Speaker A: Is it a banger? Is it a Brian banger?
[00:54:25] Speaker B: It's Brian's banger for this episode.
For somebody who has got the voice of Robert Plant and the guitar chops of Gary, he had it all. And by 1993, he'd finished his record contract with Capital Records. They weren't promoting any of his music, and he'd walked away from the music industry in total by 2021, which was the 20th anniversary of this album. Don't say no. He did a tour and then the last, and he sporadically turns up now and again. He was a member of Ringo Stars all star band, Matt, and I've just been listening to him for the last little while. I've been listening to this album and Billy Squire. What a singer, what a guitar player, what a songwriter. And for me, my hidden gem for this episode is Billy Squire's don't say no. It's a great.
[00:55:24] Speaker A: Very good, very good. I actually saw Billy Squire.
[00:55:27] Speaker B: Did you really?
[00:55:28] Speaker A: Yeah. He was one of the first people I ever saw live, actually.
It was the opening act, believe it or not, for whitesnake on the white snake on the come and get it tour. And in those. Know when your first gigs, you're too young to drink, so you go in and there'd be an empty auditorium. In this case, it was in the circle and waiting for whatever band to come on at 738 o'clock. And. Yeah, Billy Squire.
[00:55:55] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:55:55] Speaker A: So I saw Billy Squire in 81, actually, probably in that very album.
I'm going to come slightly more up to date with my brunt. It's another album.
It's from an american band called Red Sun Rising. Now, I came across this band through a song which is an absolute.
One of the greatest songs I've ever heard. Song called the other side. It's from this album, the album being polyester Zeal, which is the debut album from Red Sun Rising from 2015.
They're on a permanent hiatus now, Red Sun Rising. But check out. It's a really great album. I mean, it's one of those, kind of.
One of those emo kind of indie rock, classic rock albums. Check it out. But, yeah, my hidden gem for this episode is polyester Zeal by Red Sun Rising, featuring the brilliant the other side and the almost as brilliant emotion lists, which were singles from the album that did pretty well on the Billboard charts and the rock Billboard charts in the US, weighing in at only 42 minutes, the classic current, back to the 80s, back to the future with the current album, the album length of 40 od minutes. But yeah, check it out. Polyester Zillow by Red Sun Rising, my hidden gem for episode 60, briar.
[00:57:20] Speaker B: Fabulous.
[00:57:21] Speaker A: That was it.
[00:57:22] Speaker B: All done.
[00:57:23] Speaker A: All done. Right, bye, everyone. See you.
We have to say thanks for listening. Of course. As always, please subscribe on YouTube. Tell all your friends, neighbors, complete strangers about us. We'd love to hear from you on Facebook or on email, whatever our email address is. I can't remember what it is now. Thanks to Scotland rocks radio for having us on every third Tuesday.
Check us out there. What else, Bry? Anyone else want to mention? Talk about your mum. We haven't met your mum since last episode. She doing all right?
[00:57:56] Speaker B: She's doing okay, yeah.
[00:57:57] Speaker A: Good. Pleased to hear it. She excited about your smashing pumpkins audition?
[00:58:02] Speaker B: I haven't told her yet.
I haven't told her whenever I'm settled in LA.
I'm trying to keep it under wraps.
[00:58:16] Speaker A: I won't mention.
[00:58:17] Speaker B: Yeah, bully's just a bit.
[00:58:19] Speaker A: He's a bit quiet, but he sort.
[00:58:20] Speaker B: Of secret his management. My management.
The songs. I've been writing with them as well, too. It's just I've got to keep it all under wraps. But it'll come out in time. And I might be named a different person as well, too. Oh, really?
[00:58:38] Speaker A: That'd be great.
Like Brian M or something like that. That'd be hilarious. I'd love that.
[00:58:44] Speaker B: Yes. You've heard it here first, people. I am not the new guitarist.
[00:58:51] Speaker A: No.
What a shame on that bombshell. Thanks for listening, everyone. We'll see you for episode 61. Oh, my goodness. Can't believe it. Take care of yourselves. Be good, be nice to each other and keep the faith. Keep on rocking.
[00:59:06] Speaker B: See you later. Bye now.
[00:59:08] Speaker A: Bye.
[00:59:09] Speaker B: You.
[00:59:12] Speaker A: Those bad pod. We salute you is a mania. Rogers production.
