The Angels Return!

Glad to see Doc Neeson healthy and one of my fave bands, The Angels (Angel City in the States) back among the living! This is from the Angels documentary, "No Way! Get F*cked! F*ck Off!"













The Angels on MySpace

Okay, seriously Butch.

(Butch, right, with that dickhead from Fall Out Boy)

This from a recent Butch Walker MySpace bulletin:

Ho Ho Ho..

Merry "What the Hell?? I Have A Lot Of Shit Going...

well i hope your Thanksgiving was filled with lots of tryptophan delights and coma inducing, rival school football games. i came home from the holiday (pt. 1) to a pretty nutty week, so here's a rundown of what you can get in on/are already in on... tomorrow (Wed the 3rd) i will be the musical guest on Steve Jones' (Mr. Pistol, if you're nasty) radio show on Indie 103.1 out in sunny Los Angeles. if you haven't listened to this show, it's the best radio has to offer. no rules. no playlist. plus, he likes me, so.... Booya!!! you can listen to it from Noon-2pm or listen to it streaming on the web at http://www. indie1031. com/listen_live. php

Last Show of the Year Y'all

Thursday the 4th, i am playing a Sold Out show at the Largo Theatre (at the Coronet) in LA at 9:30 or so. if you got tickets, then yay for you. it's gonna be a special show for me. no fancy bells, lights, whistles or band. hell, i may even sit down and play my acoustic guitar and upright piano all night for you. throw in a couple of holiday songs as well (requests are accepted on a "do i even fucking know this song?" basis.

if you need directions or anything like that then click (or copy/paste) here: http://www. largo-la. com
(this is a seated, small theatre so make sure to grab a row with your friends early if you wanna sit together and hold hands..

New Video!

the video for the first "single" called "The Weight of Her" off of my new record is out also this week!!!! we put it out on a whole bunch of sites that i hope you will check out.
Amazon was kind enough to put it on their site, and we are having a ton of cool sites put it up as well.. of course, there's always Youtube...

Recorded a Christmas Song for you again this year...

i threw down a little version of "Christmas All Over Again" and asked my buddy, singer, and co-star of the "Weight of Her" video Taryn Manning, to sing it with me. it's gonna be avail online and other places here shortly. will let you know.
yay!

Sycamore Meadows is gonna be avail on VINYL for the holidays!!!!!!!!

yes, i'm doing the biggest and coolest vinyl package ever. it is gonna be a big gatefold edition packaging with all sorts of bonus stuff included (pictures, lyrics, credits, online codes to download the digital version of the album in high quality audio file form, digital booklets, etc.). you will want this for collecting, even if you don't have a record player. it's a bargain too because you will be getting the digital version of the record for your computer, free of charge (or guilt) along with the 180 gram heavy vinyl (which sounds waaaay better than cd on a good turntable), for the price of a record! yay! so you will be able to order it from my website, myspace page, and also buy it in cooler, more independant music stores that don't sell appliances and hair dryers. keep checking back here and i will let you know when ordering will commence.

that's pretty much it for the rest of the year. oh! a legendary bar down the street from my house called The Malibu Inn is closing it's doors (sad) due to new ownership. This Saturday the 6th is the final night that anyone will ever play there!! i have seen some legendary bands play this place and it has a massive history in Malibu for hosting some of the best shows of all time. i gotta go pay my respects to t. i think Taylor from the Foos is gonna go play with a cover band or something. i might stand at the side of the stage, foaming at the mouth to get up and play until they let me. or ask me to leave... either way, should be fun.
the website appears to be already down, but the address is:

2969 Pacific Coast Hwy.
, Malibu, CA 90265

and it's this Saturday night

well, have a holly jolly holiday for me, and i will see you at the beginning of the year with a spring tour booked, a new lease on life, and some more ramblings worthy of blogging... or something.


love you mean it bye.

butch.

"Yay"?! "Love you mean it bye"?! Why does Butch talk like a chick who's way too happy to be seen at the mall in her Girls Gone Wild t-shirt? Seriously, it's bad enough Butch is trying real hard to work on my last nerve, but hearing a 40-year-old dude whose music you used to respect talk like some 20-year-old idiot chick that no one respects is just irksome. Butch, my friend, cut that shit out.

Tony James on "Dancing With Myself"

I've always been a fan of Generation X (the band not the, er, generation). For those who've no idea what I'm talking about, Gen X was a short-lived UK punk band fronted by one William Broad - better known as Billy Idol. Idol, of course, went from being an avid Sex Pistols hanger-on to fronting his own punk band and, in doing so, was able to catch the tail-end of the UK punk craze, hitting the Top 40 with their debut single, "Your Generation".

The band caught a lot of flack for deviating from the tried-and-true punk rock template and were labeled sell-outs very early on by the punk community due to their willingness to not only embrace commercial entities such as Top Of The Pops, but to cover a John Lennon song. Glen Matlock had been kicked out of the Pistols for admitting he liked the Beatles, after all.

While their second album, Valley of The Dolls, featured a Top 20 single in "King Rocker", the album failed to meet expectations and the band began to fracture. By the time the band began work on their ill-fated third album, Kiss Me Deadly, the writing was already on the wall.

That arguably the best song of the group's career, "Dancing With Myself", would come during this time is just short of miraculous. Bassist Tony James describes the writing of the song and the band's last days in a new blog posted on his current band, Carbon/Silcone's website:

"We sat on the back fire escape steps, on the cold concrete, and Billy leaned against the iron railings and played me a driving E,A,B, A chord sequence on his Epiphone guitar, singing da da daaa da da da tune.... Idol always had such a teenage enthusiasm every time he presented something new, seemingly amazed at finding this tune somewhere out of the air..... and it always brought the mood to a frantic pitch of creativity that we both got caught up in.. he la la la’d the next couple of phrases and into the chorus ending with “with the records reflection and the mirrors reflection..and back into the hook.. from the Tokyo seed....."

READ THE REST

Generation X - Dancing With Myself

Gavin Rossdale Has A Solo Album Out? Who Knew?

If one were to ask me what I think of when the name Gavin Rossdale is mentioned, truth be told, none of it would be good. For starters, his first "claim-to-fame" was being a boy toy to Boy George's much-less-talented hanger-on, Marilyn. Years later, of course, he surfaced as singer of the British grunge band Bush, best known for ruling the charts and airwaves in the early 90's with their multi-platinum debut album, Sixteen Stone.

For a band as successful as Bush were, they were also quite loathed and regarded as musical carpetbaggers, accused of aping Nirvana's sound in an unabashed bid for commercial success. Thus, it was no surprise that the band's next two albums met with critical and commercial disdain. When the band broke up, the world-at-large could be heard breathing a collective sigh of "good riddance".

Since then, of course, Rossdale has been spending most of his time fathering children with No Doubt singer/fashionista Gwen Stefani while trying valiantly to not get lost in her shadow.

In 2005, Mr. Stefani, er, Rossdale emerged with a new band, Institute, and confirmed once-and-for-all that he should never, ever be put in charge of naming a band. To no one's surprise, the band sounded a lot like Bush and, also not surprisingly, failed to set the world on fire.

Fast forward to June 2008 and the release of Gavin Rossdale's debut solo album, WANDERlust.

That I didn't even known about the album's existence until, well, a couple days ago should tell you one thing: what that one thing is, I'm not quite sure.

On its own terms, WANDERlust is an album that tries very hard to be everything to everyone. Bob Rock's production is as amazingly free of any rough-edges, making his work on Nina Gordon's debut solo effort seem positively jagged by comparison. Aside from the obligatory radio ballad (the aforementioned "Love Remains"), there is the very-Bush-sounding "If You're Not With Us You're Against Us" and a couple songs about how tough it is being a dad and, at the same time, keeping up with the Hollywood jet set ("Another Night In The Hills" and "The Skin I'm In").

While one gets the feeling that Gavin will have an Interscope deal for as long as his wife continues to be a major source of profit for the label, I tried to hate this album, believe me, I did. Part of me does, in fact.

But the other part of me knows that there are a lot of people much less jaded than I who are just looking for something, ANYTHING, to embrace as an alternative to the likes of Daughtry, Nickelback, Puddle Of Mudd.

This, more than anything, is an album for them.

Open Letter To Chicago Mayor, Richard M. Daley

Dear "Don" Daley:

What's that? Your first name isn't Don? Yeah, I know. You'll notice that it's in quotations, which means to infer that it is a nickname that I've given you based on the FACT that you continually operate like some Mafia don who knows he has absolute impunity to do whatever the hell he wants.

Your seemingly endless reign as mayor of Chicago has proven beyond a shadow of a doubt that your direct connections to widespread corruption, mismanagement and hubris seem to only endear you further to the people of this great city.

This week, barely able to conceal the smile upon your otherwise lifeless face, you announced that the city of Chicago had privatized parking meters, resulting in an immediate increase in many areas from 25 cents an hour to $1 an hour, with a future increase to $2 an hour by the year 2013.

Most appalling, of course, was the revelation that downtown parking meters would go from $3 to $6.50 an hour within five years.

That, in and of itself, is highway robbery.

What's worse is that you sold a huge chunk of the city's financial future for a one-time up-front payment of $1.2 billion as an immediate cash injection to offset a slew of horrible budgetary decisions on your part. You and your cronies have long been playing fast-and-loose with the future of this city, operating with total disregard for anyone but yourselves and continually leaving us, the citizens of Chicago, to pick up the tab.

Is it not bad enough that we already pay the highest sales tax in the nation?

Is it not bad enough that you cut this deal, which results in the immediate fleecing of the citizens of this great city, DURING A RECESSION?!

All part of the price we pay to live in the greatest city in the world, right?

Wrong, Dick.

As it stands, the city makes approximately $20 million per year from parking meter revenue. If rates were to remain fixed for the next 75 years (not likely), that would equal $1.5 billion in revenue. If, on the other hand, the city maintained control of the meters and raised rates moderately based on current inflation and economic factors, the amount of revenue generated would easily be double that of the one-time payment of $1.2 billion you're going to receive (and blow foolishly over the next few years).

Oh, but you'd rather have the money now in order to stop some of the bleeding you've caused. Never mind the next generation, you say, it's in our best interests to cover up your mess so that you don't get voted out of office for driving the city into the ground.

Bravo, Dick.

Of course, you've tried valiantly to spin this so that we citizens of this great city feel like we've been given a check for $1.2 billion. We haven't, you have. We're the ones left paying ridiculous parking meter rates that will no doubt immediately adversely affect downtown business. You know, businesses that are more than likely already seeing a sharp decline in traffic and revenue. Not to hear you tell it, though.

You were quoted recently as saying, "We're lucky we've done these things in a very difficult and challenging market," Daley said. "All the economists are now looking at Chicago, finding out how they do this in a challenging economy - that we basically leased public assets for the public good."

Um, WHAT?!

When challenged on that claim, of course, you got all bent out of shape and sarcastically offered to lease the meters to aldermanic critics: "I'll sell it to you for $4 billion. You go out and get $4 billion."

Nice.

Oh, but you weren't done: "The people own the asset to be used today for this generation of people and not for 2050 .... Our responsibility is to help the generation right now."

Um, dude, you do realize that it is the people of 2050 who will still be paying for this deal, right?

What's next? Pay Port-o-Johns at the Taste of Chicago? Pay to get in, pay to get out? That's just crazy enough to work, you say? Oh crap.

Seriously, Dick, do us all a favor and don't do us any more favors. Capiche?

Your pal,
Darren

New Jay Bennett Album for FREE Download

Ex-Wilco guitarist Jay Bennett is releasing his new album, Whatever Happened I Apologize, for free via the Rock Proper website.

The album, as one might expect from the title, is somewhat somber collection of introspective self-portraits from the artist (who also created the album's cover art).

My favorite cut from the album:

I Don't Have The Time

Like Sands Through The Hourglass, So Are The Days of Trent And Axl

We all have our little obsessions, don't we? I mean, I still buy every Cheap Trick album that comes out, even though "Special One" wasn't very special at all and "Rockford" should have just stayed home. In the past week or so, though, I've been treated to some joyful noise from two of my favorite guilty pleasures: Axl Rose and Trent Reznor.

Axl, of course, finally had the (or, rather, a) final mix of the long overdue Chinese Democracy pried from his freckled hands and unleashed upon the world. The response has been incredibly mixed, of course, with a slew of Axl worshippers calling it the greatest thing since the mullet was invented and others rightfully christening it a steaming pile of Pro Tools-gone-horribly-wrong.

If Axl doesn't suffer from ADD, you'd be hard-pressed to prove it, as the album is a schizophrenic, meandering and virtually unlistenable train wreck from start to finish. The guy is so unsure of who he is and what he wants to say, that he tries his damndest to be everything - usually within the same song - shifting gears so often that he never really builds up any momentum. The shear dementia on display makes it almost listenable. Almost.

Truth be told, the album resembles a Nine Inch Nails album more than I ever thought possible. The paint-by-numbers industrial posturing, the elegiac piano breaks that are squeezed in to break the monotony, and the rantings of a singular star surrounded by hired guns all combine to create something that could have been great, but ultimately falls well short of the "legend".

Truth be told, Axl and Trent Reznor have almost melded into one person. They've worked with enough of the same people on past efforts that its either frightening or hilarious, I haven't figured out which.

And, of course, Trent must be feeling a little left out with Chinese Democracy grabbing so much of the attention here on the interweb (albeit not so much on the charts, as ChiDem sold a cringe-worthy 200k in its opening week - far short of expectations). Especially since, according to a message Reznor recemntly posted to his blog, financing and scheduling problems have led to the plug being pulled on his much-anticipated NIN 3-D concert film.

He also mentions that this tour will probably be the last large-scale NIN tour. In other words, Mr. "I'm So Happy To Be Free Of The Major Label System" (who, ironically, went begging to his former label for financing on the 3-D film - how indie is that?!) is already feeling the constraints of true independence.

My hunch is that he'll be inking a deal with Live Nation (or some other such entity) within the next few months in order to beef up his bank account so that he can continue to afford the necessary smoke and mirrors to cover up the fact that the songs just aren't there. I mean, seriously, if he'd spent more time creating great songs than dreaming up the latest high-tech live show, he wouldn't be in the position. Of course, there's no telling him (or the legions of crazily devoted NIN fans) that.

Of course, as long as they remain completely high on their own fumes and totally hell-bent on foisting one polished turd after the other upon the world, I will continue to take great enjoyment in the spectacle that is their, ahem, downward spiral.

Reality check? Couldn't happen to two nicer guys.

Axl Rose Concert Speech #1
Axl Rose Concert Speech #2
Axl Rose Concert Speech #3
Axl Rose Concert Speech #4

And, of course, my favorite Trent moment of all time: