Myles Kennedy and Kip Winger Guest on This Weeks Focus on Metal

Episode 446 - Walk The Sky

Yep it's a day earlier than promised. Think of it as an early gift.
This is our last show for 2019 and also the last one before we take our annual winter break. However we have some great discussion and also two great guests. Kip Winger returns to the show for a quick backstage chat and after that we talk with Myles Kennedy about the latest Alter Bridge release “Walk The Sky”. 

Enjoy and see ya in 2020.

By the way since we have your attention...
Biff Byford is set to release his first solo album in February 2020. Preorder at BiffByford.com
Here's the first single

Get the this episode from the Focus on Metal Site, The Focus on Metal RSS feed, or subscribe on iTunes.

You can hear us every Tuesday night on Pure Rock Radio
and each Wednesday afternoon on Metal World Radio

Visit http://focusonmetal.net/ for information on all the past episodes and to find the links to all our other social media sites.

And as always
Focus On Metal…Everything Else is Insignificant.

Holy Smoke: Iron Maiden In The 90's- Martin Popoff (Power Chord Press)

   I have both Maiden books Martin self-published this year, the first featured their classic period but it's this one I have read first for a number of reasons. The successes we know about but how a band deals with adversity is a more compelling story and every traditional metal band suffered in the 90s. Steve Harris didn't change with the times even as Adrian and then Bruce walked. His stubborn streak is what makes the band great but not always. The band were recording in a barn as Dream Theater were releasing the superior sounding Images And Words and I'm personally not a huge fan of the Blaze Bayley albums bar a couple of songs, love him in Wolfsbane but didn't feel his voice suited Maiden. His vocal style was too big a change in a decade of uncertainty, they needed a Bruce type vocalist and it took them two studio albums to figure it out and fire Blaze. Bruce sounds better singing the Blaze stuff. They were done if they kept him and even Steve knew it in the end. 

   Then there's Bruce Dickinson's solo career that is vastly underrated, some of it stands up to the best Iron Maiden ever recorded especially The Chemical Wedding. Steve was looking backwards as Bruce embraced grunge with Skunkworks and added a heavier metal sound on Accident Of Birth, take a bow Roy Z. In some ways the book title is misleading as half of it deals with Bruce outside the band and it's the in depth look at the solo albums that puts this over the top for me especially if you are a fan. The interviews with Bruce are fascinating highlighting his mindset on each release, he truly embraced change until it didn't become financially viable to continue on that path and you never get a sense that any of it was contrived. He's way overdue another solo album and I'm fascinated to hear it if he ever gets around to it.

   The book ends with Maiden playing clubs, Bruce making great music for small time labels void of tour support leading to the inevitable reunion with Bruce and the more surprising return of Adrian for the Ed Hunter Tour and there's interview coverage of all of that. Another great book from Martin, I don't know how many of these he has left as he only prints a certain amount so hit him up at the link below and get both books before they are gone. Hopefully the next one is out soon.

Richie.

http://www.martinpopoff.com/html/bookslist.html

A deep Dive into Queensryche's Q2K Release on This Weeks Focus on Metal

Episode 445 - Q2K Breakdown

On September 14, 1999 Queensryche released their seventh studio effort Q2K. This was the first album by the band without Chris DeGarmo and the only one to feature guitarist/producer Kelly Gray. This week, Richie and Brian Heaton take a deep dive into the inner working of the band at this time and also do a track by track rundown of the album.

Want more Queensryche insight? Head to Brian's excellent Queensryche site AnybodyListening.net You’ll be glad you did.

Get the this episode from the Focus on Metal Site, The Focus on Metal RSS feed, or subscribe on iTunes.

You can hear us every Tuesday night on Pure Rock Radio
and each Wednesday afternoon on Metal World Radio

Visit http://focusonmetal.net/ for information on all the past episodes and to find the links to all our other social media sites.

And as always
Focus On Metal…Everything Else is Insignificant.

Take It Off Kiss Truly Unmasked- Greg Prato (Jawbone Press)

  

   The non-make up era was when I first discovered Kiss and my first album of new music was Crazy Nights. Over time I've bought all their albums but it's this era I love the most and the band for the majority of their live sets choose to ignore it after putting the make up back on. The format is similar to his Kings X book earlier this year and there's a chapter on all the studio, live, compilation and tribute albums. Of course there's no input from Gene or Paul but plenty from Bruce Kulick including a rundown of the guitars used, the tracks demoed that didn't make albums and a frank discussion of the videos some of which haven't aged well.

   There's interviews with the expected like Eddie Trunk, Mitch Lafon, Ace Frehley, Ron Nevison and Toby Wright but what makes this book stand out is the unexpected. Greg includes a chapter on Creatures Of The Night because the re-release in 1985 featured Eric and Bruce on the cover, the inclusion didn't bother me as it's my favorite Kiss album. There's a section with Katherine Turman on misogyny in metal dealing with lyrics containing logs in fireplaces and such. KK Downing discusses bands softening their sound to fit radio and MTV like they did with Turbo, Curt Gooch the co-author of Kiss Alive Forever: The Complete Touring History brilliantly breaks down all the tours warts and all, Ron Keel tells us why Gene is a great producer, Eric Carr is remembered and if you are so inclined you can check out all Gene's acting appearances because they are listed to.

   So other then direct involvement with Gene and Paul what's missing. Well Eric Singer would have been nice as would Bob Ezrin, Michael James Jackson would have fleshed out Lick It Up more and I'm sure all were asked. The contributors are from what I can tell all located in North America and I think the book would have more balance if the likes of Mick Wall, Dave Reynolds or Howard Johnson from Kerrang shared their thoughts especially as Crazy Nights was a smash over in the UK. I have to say overall this is a super read and it made me go back and listen to some of those albums again.

Richie.

https://www.amazon.com/Take-Off-KISS-Truly-Unmasked/dp/1911036572

Author John Tucker on This Weeks Focus on Metal

Episode 44 - From Rocka Rolla to Painkiller

Author John Tucker joins us this week to discuss his latest book “Judas Priest, Every Album Every Song, from Rocka Rolla to Painkiller”. 

f you’re interested in John’s history and to see some more of his books or photography head over to JohnTuckerOnline.co.uk

Classic Priest

Get the this episode from the Focus on Metal Site, The Focus on Metal RSS feed, or subscribe on iTunes.

You can hear us every Tuesday night on Pure Rock Radio
and each Wednesday afternoon on Metal World Radio

Visit http://focusonmetal.net/ for information on all the past episodes and to find the links to all our other social media sites.

And as always
Focus On Metal…Everything Else is Insignificant.

Silverthorne's Brian Tichy Guests on This weeks Focus on Metal

Episode 443 - Silverthorne

Lots of discussion this week as well as a chat with Brian Tichy about his new band Silverthorne. While we were at it we couldn’t resist digging back into some of the other bands he’s been involved with as well.

Here's the first single off the upcoming EP

Get the this episode from the Focus on Metal Site, The Focus on Metal RSS feed, or subscribe on iTunes.

You can hear us every Tuesday night on Pure Rock Radio
and each Wednesday afternoon on Metal World Radio

Visit http://focusonmetal.net/ for information on all the past episodes and to find the links to all our other social media sites.

And as always
Focus On Metal…Everything Else is Insignificant.

Come On Feel The Noize- The Story Of How Rock Became Metal (Cleopatra Records)

 
   Tackling the story of heavy metal is nothing new, there have been countless books and documentaries on the subject. Most I've seen have needed multiple episodes from the likes of Bob Nalbandian and Sam Dunn and even they have to edit out a lot of stuff to fit the story and because of time constraints. So Thore Vollert and Jorg Soontag are attempting to tell the tale in 90 minutes, the results are mixed because of it.

   There are 3 ways to effectively represent the story: interviews with artists, old tv and concert clips and narration to flesh out the story and move it along. The big names are here from Hetfield to Page to Ozzy, the tv clips are impressive especially from German show Beat Club that I've never seen before. The coverage of the late 60s and early 70s is handled well but then it starts to lose me a little. Sometimes it loses me a lot. There is much on the influence of punk and glam yet nothing on prog rock giants Rush, Genesis and Yes. Having an interview with Blondie and a segment on Roxy Music and not mentioning Thin Lizzy had me scratching my head. There's next to nothing on Van Halen and the development of guitar gods like Yngwie, George Lynch and Randy Rhoads, the MTV era and its influence is not even mentioned. Quiet Riot had the first heavy metal album to go to number one in the US and it's not brought up yet they cover Slade. Power metal is brought up but it's the newer acts like Powerwolf and Sabaton featured at the expense of Helloween and Manowar and do we really need to hear Michael Schenker again taking all the credit for UFO and Scorpions? Nope.

   Moving on to the 90s there's nothing on Pantera when they kept the genre alive and is there a heavier album to ever go to number one? I don't think so. Nothing on Sepultura. There's a lot on Alice Cooper yet little on Kiss, how many metal musicians have you heard picked up a guitar because of Ace Frehley or saw Kiss, the answer is many. If you can't get an interview or the rights to footage it's vital the narration fills in the blanks. It doesn't. There's interviews with Steel Panther, too much on Ghost and David Draiman from Disturbed is very good. Then there's the inclusion of Life Of Agony and next to nothing on grunge, which do you think had the bigger impact on metal? A few minutes with Sixx AM, that's a no from me. Nikki Sixx on the impact of Motley Crue would have been better.

   By far the biggest exclusion is Ronnie James Dio who I believe is mentioned once in an interview with Doro. You ask any metal head to name the iconic singers in the genre and Ronnie is right up there. His influence is MASSIVE vocally, musically and visually. Don't include more footage of Running Wild and Blind Guardian at the expense of Ronnie. Would have been nice to include interviews with some magazine writers who were there at the time as well as some record industry folk to share their views. It needed more on the twin lead guitar sound of Judas Priest and Iron Maiden. Overall a decent and at times frustrating watch. If someone asked me to grade it out of 10 I would give it a 5.

Richie.

http://cleorecs.com/home/