Who do you influence?

We all know that our favorite bands have been inspired by certain artists in their lives. Sometimes they flat out tell us in an interview, other times you can simply hear it in their music. If you are lucky you see it reflected on stage at a live show, the way they hold the mic, or possibly the way they slouch when they play the guitar.

I want to talk about a different kind of influence. The influence that the music we listen to has an effect on the people around us. I am thinking about this because something quite funny happened tonight.

My mother is in town from Florida, and being that my days of going out on the town and tearing it up with her is past me, we decided to head to a local restaurant for some BBQ. Not the scene I am sure that she is used to; heck I am even too old to be in that place now that I look back; however she wanted ribs so I obliged.

The check arrives; we pay, and as I am looking up I see my mother nodding her head back and forth to none other than Motley Crue's, Dr. Feelgood. She didn't know the words but you can tell that years of me pumping that particular album some how resonated in her head.

I am not sure why this makes me so happy. Possibly it stems from the fact that she could take some form of enjoyment from it; or possibly because as a kid growing up one of the fondest memories I have of my mother is her singing in the car. It made me realize that as much as an influence she had on me, that I have had some on her.

It makes me stop and think on where my love for certain bands came from? I know that some of my childhood friends who had older brother that listened to metal is part of it. But the majority of the bands I love today I am not quite sure. I just know that I love music and what it can do, and how something so simple can bring people together.

How dedicated are you to your band?

Sitting here thinking about all the concerts that I have been to in my life; there has been quite a few. My first concert was Paul McCartney and it was an invite from a friends family; and honestly it wasn't until I got into HS that I went to another concert. Something happened to me in college though. I realized how much I loved going to see shows. It was all consuming. I have been fortunate enough to see shows when they come to my town; although in college we would drive all over the country to follow bands. It dawns on me that I have seen certain bands more than a dozen times. Now for all my hippie friends out there this is not a big feat; Phans and Heads have seen Phish and the Dead 100's of times; and in the "jam band" communities this is the norm. However in the hard rock scene it is not.

Don't get me wrong we are die hard fans for our Metal and Rock, but you just don't hear much of people going to see TOOL 100 times; I'm sure that they are out there; I just have not run into them. When I tell people that I have seen Papa Roach, or Buckcherry a dozen to half a dozen times people sometimes stare at me. I love both of those bands and frankly if I still had the free time I would go to other states to see them. I am dedicated to my bands. This does not just include purchasing concert tickets but it includes buying every one of their albums a listening to it until my ears bleed.

If I could have it my way I would be seeing a concert every night. It's funny cause I have been in a funk all day because I just found out that one of my favorite bands is coming to town and I will not be around to see them due to a prior commitment. I just might have to jump on a plane and go see them somewhere else.

Bring back the 8-track

I am sure that this is not the first time that you will hear the statement that digital downloads have killed the album. Long gone are the days when we were forced to listen to 11 of the 12 songs on an album to get to our favorite song. Hell with the implementation of the cassette we started getting that itch to just press fast forward; and with cd's it became even easier. And now, in the wonderful digital age that we are in, we have the option to once again just buy that one song from that one artist and neglect the rest of it, if we so choose.

Notice I say once again. This is not the first time where single song purchases were available. Remember cassingles? And the 45 was even there before that wonderful invention. However both of these attempts did not have as much success in killing full album sales as the digital single. Is this possibly because even with cassingles and 45's we were given a "B-side"? Or is it because we simply did not want to acquire more junk in our little disco boxes and figured that it might just save us some space in our cassette holders if we just went out and bought the whole tape. Who knows.

I am a fan of the musicians that I listen to first and foremost. As an artist and poet myself I would feel cheated if someone only read one line of my work; or only looked at one piece of the work. Embrace it all. You have to read / see / hear the whole thing to truly grasp what that artist is saying.

Lastly; single song purchases of artists will always occur; there is nothing that we can do to stop it. There will always be individuals out there that want to have the top 40 on their iPod for their own discretionary play. Which to me makes no sense. If you wanted to hear all the hits all the time then just buy a damn radio, and skip the $200-$400 dollars on an iPod.

So buy the album people; the whole album. Think of all the gems that you could find!

Nirvana set back

So here goes; my fist post where I will probably get some backlash. (good thing that I don't have any readers yet)

Nirvana set guitar talent back 10 years! Notice I did not say music, but specifically aspiring guitarists. Don't get me wrong when Bleach came out I was enthralled with the simplistic guitar riffs, it was a far departure of my love of such bands and guitarists as Motley Crue and Steve Vai. As grunge slowly killed the "HAIR METAL" scene; new bands began to surface and this is where I feel the problem started. Three chords that was all it took to take aspiring musicians from wanting to wail out as many notes in a second; to being complacent enough to just learn three little power chords. Music to me for that time period became so boring. There were no 5 minute mind bending solo; just three strumming chords over and over again.

This is probably the reason why I just can't stand Nirvana as a band. Granted there were bands before them that focused only on three chords; some may argue that The Ramones were guilty of such a crime; heck some might even say The Clash were as well. But those were not my musical years; and from what I know; those bands were not blared on the radio quite like Nirvana was.

Kurt Cobain was a talented and trouble soul. I am by no means bashing him as an individual nor am I playing down his personal demons. It just bothers me at the end of the day that there are so many people that put some much stock in the fact that he was an icon. We as music fans most pose the question, "If Kurt never died would have Nirvana survived and evolved?"

My answer is no. They would have never changed or grown as a band. And to think that Dave Grohl sat on that drum kit and probably would have never been able to express his full potential.

This is just my opinion. So feel free to tell me to shut up if need be.

Play some Skynyrd man!

It is not often that one can scream out, "play some Skynyrd man", at a concert and the band will actually accommodate. However this is not true with Shinedown; whom are known to play an excellent rendition of "Simple Man". Unfortunately they did not play such cover at the 1-23-10 show at Nokia Theater. They did however play an excellent cover of Otis Redding's, "sitting on the dock". Which brings me to my point. The importance of covering songs well after you have "made it".

Too often bands do not pay tribute to whom their musical influences are after they become big. They seem to shun the fact that most likely they started off as a cover band and have moved on to bigger and better things such as writing their own self loathing lyrics. I like the cover song; it brings me a better understanding of what drove the guys on the stage to do what they do; it brings me closer. Puddle of Mudd even graced us with an awesome cover of AC/DC's "TNT".

So as an open request to all those artists whom I have seen; who I will see: BRING ON THE COVER SONG.

Skillet

Last night we headed to Nokia to see Puddle of Muddd and Shinedown. To my surprise a band named Skillet opened the show. Now I have heard of them; they actually have a popular song called "Monster" (http://itunes.apple.com/us/album/monster/id325821860?i=325821862) on hard rock radio; if you ask me it sounds very similar to "Riot" by Three Days Grace; but we wont get into that. The point was that they were surprisingly good and had a great stage presence. I guess where I am going with this is that often times we go to shows expecting to see our favorite acts and not really give much to attention to to opening acts. Skillet is worth checking out; for a brief moment I was even sure that their lead guitarist was a slimmer Ben Moody (Evanescence). I give these guys a two thumbs up; in fact bought their album this am; THIER WHOLE ALBUM!