Saturday
Mar022019
L.A. Guns Release 'Rage'
Saturday, March 2, 2019 at 08:41AM
First off, go listen to the Animal Drive cover of "Monkey Business" that I posted yesterday.
Now, today we have new music from L.A. Guns. They just dropped a stream of their song "Rage." It is from the forthcoming album The Devil You Know. That is coming out via Frontiers and I will be a first day buyer.
Reader Comments (13)
However, production on this track sounds like it was recorded in a tin can. As others have noted previously in Comments, this may be due to the fact this maybe still in raw pre-release form and hasn’t had that Frontiers signature sparkle and sheen applied to it as of yet.
Whether this is true or not, I’ll still take it over the crap the Gunless L.A. Guns was putting out over the years.
Yes, “Hollywood Forever” could be considered an exception, mainly on the track “Underneath The Sun” and Andy Johns’ production but I’ll still take this latest track and the one released earlier, both from “The Devil You Know”, over any output by them sans the incredible talents of Tracii Guns.
Question is: what does Steve "I am the original WASP drummer" Riley think? And what does Franklin "I am not the original drummer of Quiet Riot" Banali think about what Riley thinks? I better go over to Blabbermouth and find out.
Speaking of the Ramones, now there’s a band more legit than most of the bands we parse over combined and members of those bands will be the first to tell you that, even Tracii Guns.
Interesting to note that the Ramones had a series of excellent producers, for the most part, listed as follows:
Craig Leon - “Ramones” (1976) Leon also produced Blondie, Talking Heads and, ironically, Pavoratti. Himself, an accomplished musician, Leon writes and records Classical music.
Tony Bonjiovi - “Leave Home” (1977) Bonjiovi, cousin of Jon Bon Jovi and who gave Bon Jovi his start sweeping floors at his legendary Power Station recording studio in Manhattan, also produced Ozzy Osbourne’s “Bark at the Moon” in 1982, among several other albums for Aerosmith, Ace Frehley, Helix and, of course, Jon Bon Jovi, name a few.
Tony Bonjiovi - “Rocket to Russia” (1977)
Ed Stasium - “Road to Ruin” (1978) Stasium also produced Motörhead, Peter Wolf (former lead singer of J. Geils) and Talking Heads, among many others. He also produced subsequent albums by the Ramones, “Too Tough To Die” (1984) and “Mondo Bizarro” (1992)
Phil Spector - End of the Century (1980) In 1994, Johnny Ramone personally told me Spector held the band at gunpoint when they tried to leave the studio before the last track was competed to his satisfaction. Despite some songs being overproduced, the album can still be considered a recording masterpiece.
Of course, there are many more Ramones albums with many other producers but I figured I’d stop here, because, let’s face it, how do you top Spector, no matter how insane he went.
The list of producers the Ramones worked with is impressive but Johnny also lamented to me in that same conversation he felt like they never had any luck with producers. The comment came about when I asked him if they were working on a new album.
Then he mentioned Brian Wilson was being considered to produce and I said to him, “Johnny, you gotta get him!” That’s when he told me about Spector and being weary of producers. No wonder. Still, just think if Brian Wilson has produced their next album at the time.
I still believe to this day, that would have been the silver bullet Johnny was looking for to get the chart topping success they needed AND deserved.
The Ramones were inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2002.
Finally, can I just say once and for all, and I don't care if it's not cool or popular but, punk rock sucks so much swamp ass that I can't even formulate a sentence that would rip it like it deserves to be. Also, The Ramones suck even more. And no, I don't care that Nikki nor anyone else loves punk and used it as one of their major influences. Thanks for letting me vent & all just my opinions!
Here’s a few tunes from some Punk artists you might like ...
1) The Dickies’ covers of “Nights In White Satin” and “Paranoid”.
2) 999, “Titanic (My Over) Reaction” and “Homicide”. Check out their first two albums.
3) The Stranglers’ cover of “Walk On By” and their song, “Hangin’ Around”.
4) Elvis Costello, “Lipstick Vogue” and “No Action”. Actually, you may enjoy “This Year’s Model”, the album on which those songs appear.
5) Blondie’s multi-platinum album, “Parallel Lines”.
And for some reverse engineering, Motley Crüe’s cover of the Sex Pistols’ “Anarchy In The U.K.”, aptly retitled “Anarchy In The U.S.A.” from the “Moscow Peace Festival” show.
Enjoy, BK! And if not, well, like you said, “ ... all just my opinions!”
I agree with you on the first part, in part. Just because two great-ish originals are back together again doesn't mean the music is going to be good. And I bet you are right: just that idea is enough to make a lot of people say "yeah" when they would otherwise say "meh." By the way, that opening part is a rip off of what song? Someone here knows.
I disagree with you on the second part, in part. There is some good punk out there. Problem is, what do you define as punk? Just speaking of the early years, you put the Pistols next to the Clash next to Generation X next to The Ramones . . . you get a lot of different threads that are all tangentially connected (and I did the obvious three Brits and one American thing). As you move closer and closer to now, you get--to my mind--weaker and weaker versions of old templates, with some exceptions. I thought The Offspring brought something interesting and SoCal to the mix. I though Green Day wasn't punk but pop, and that Rancid lived up (or down) to its name. Propagandhi is good for a laugh. Bad Religion is good, full stop.
Good venting though. I'd like more of this fully formed venting on your part. It helps me understand your way of thinking. Good show!
HIM mentions another excellent band, Generation X, Billy Idol’s first band. Their first 2 albums — Their self-titled debut and “Valley of the Dolls” are far superior to any of Idol’s solo stuff.
Also, HIM, Green Day ARE Pop but they are ALSO Punk!
And OFFSPRING are indeed awesome. They ARE Punk but if you close your eyes while listening to them, a lot of their stuff sounds like Metal!