VAN HALEN
(Eddie VH e David Lee Roth)
Il 30 novembre i VAN HALEN dovrebbero apparire alle nomination per i GRAMMY e nell’occasione fare un annuncio. Immaginiamo relativo all’uscita dell’album (Febbraio 2012) e al susseguente tour. Il condizionale è d’obbligo, con quel matto di Edward Van Halen non si puo’ mai sapere. Speriamo.
SIMON KIRKE (Bad Company)
(Simon Kirke battersita di Free e della Bad Company- photo of Lucy Piller)
Uno stralcio da una intervista rilasciata da Simon un paio di settimane fa:
From the beginning, Bad Company produced their own albums, which seems a bit bold for a new band, even though all of you had made a name for yourselves individually. During the classic period with Paul Rodgers, was there ever any pressure to adhere to the traditional system and bring in a producer?
No. Honestly, there wasn’t. We were with Peter Grant and Led Zeppelin on their label, Swan Song. Of course, Zeppelin marched to their own drum – they had engineers, very good ones – Ron Nevison and Chris Kimsey, they were good guys and they worked with us. I know Ron Nevison would have liked to have been thought of as a producer, but quite honestly, they couldn’t have added that much to the tracks.
We were so hellbent on being a success. The songs were written by us, mainly Mick Ralphs and Paul Rodgers. We had it all down when we went into the studio. And to really have someone come in and meddle just wasn’t going to happen. There’s two ways of looking at it – either the guy is a meddler, or he contributes and it’s a lonely job, being a producer.
I never felt that Bad Company needed a producer, until we lost the original lineup. I thought Terry Thomas, who produced ‘Holy Water’ and a couple of others, I thought he did a great job. But all of the sudden, it became less personal and a little bit more business like. A good producer is a catalyst.
He will suggest, try this, try that – that’s the operative role of a producer – try. I’ve helped a few people along the way and I’ve always tried to maintain that, you know, just try that – if it doesn’t work, it doesn’t work, but let’s see how it goes. A good producer is worth his weight in gold, but a bad one will just screw things up.
You have some interesting perspective on John Bonham as a drummer, having shared the stage with him. Drummer to drummer, what’s your take on Bonham?
He’s a wonderful drummer. I mean, he had great feel, apart from his attack and he was a wonderful friend. You’ve only got to listen to his drum solo on ‘Coda,’ there’s some really almost jazzy stuff. I think hands down, he’s certainly one of the all-time great hard rock drummers. And he could do stuff with his right foot that some guys can’t do with two feet. He kept great time, his fills were amazing.
I happened to watch ‘Song Remains the Same,’ the live double DVD and I forgot what a great band they were together. They played so well together and they all shared the stage. They weren’t on these huge stages like the Stones or the Floyd, they played in a little tight group. Bonham and Page were so rockin’ together. He was a wonderful player and I miss him to this day.
(Simon Kirke – photo Carl Dunn)
One of your early songwriting credits was a big one, with the song ‘Bad Company.’ What do you remember about recording that song and recording that album, which ended up to be a landmark debut album for you guys?
Yeah, it did, didn’t it? We’d just joined Swan Song Records and we’d been playing these dozen songs as our little showcase for months and months and we were ready to go into the studio, but nothing was available. But then we got a call from Peter Grant, who said that John Paul Jones had the flu.
They and Zeppelin had booked this country house in Suffolk called Headley Grange and since John was ill, it was ready to go, but nobody was playing. Did we want to take that week, and we said yeah. We all went down to Headley Grange and the mobile unit, the studio, was out on the lawn, a sixteen track [recorder].
I think we did all of the backing tracks in about five days. We started off with ‘Can’t Get Enough’ and we finished with ‘Bad Company,’ with Paul doing the vocals live on the lawn outside, full moon and all. It was just a great time. We had a ball making it. We’d rehearsed the songs so many times that it just poured out of us and became a great album.
ROBERT PLANT & PATTY GRIFFIN:
(La Band Of Joy: RP e Patty al centro)
Giunge voce che Robert Plant avrebbe sposato Patty Griffin, musicista del suo gruppo Band Of Joy. Robert vive as Austin (texas) attualnente. Sembra che i due siano innamoratissimi. Nulla di ufficiale, per ora.
ROBERT PLANT & ALFIE BOE
Ecco, quando succedono queste cose capisci che il mondo non ha futuro: Robert Plant che canta su SONG TO THE SIREN di Tim Buckley nella merdosissima versione di Alfie Boe, un Andrea Bocelli qualunque inglese. Plant canticchia qualcosa subito dopo il 50esimo secondo. RP aveva registrato la sua personale (e niente male) versione sull’album DREAMLAND. La Decca (etichetta di Boe) dice che i due collaboreranno nel prossimo futuro (si parla anche di possibili date insieme).
Dio del rock, front man hard rock per eccellenza, quarta parte della più grande rock band di tutti i tempi, ugola d’oro del rock che dava ogni centimetro del suo amore alle ragazzine, autore insieme a Jimmy Poige di capolavori assoluti (e questa non è la solita frase fatta)…beh, questo qui, dopo aver passato gli ultimi anni alle prese con del bluegrass cagacazzo adesso si mette gorgheggiare arie operistiche. Non c’è proprio più speranza. Che qualcuno inventi una macchina del tempo in fretta e mi riporti nel 1973, il 3 giugno, davanti al LA Forum…cazzo!
Los Angeles Forum 3 giugno 1973
timtirelli 
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