Life on the road isn’t all glamour and rock’n’roll excess and Motörhead’s punishing tour schedule in 1981 took them all over the globe as they rode high on the success of Ace Of Spades. One integral part of the daily grind on the road is the sound check, although very little of it is ever seen or documented in the public domain.
Fortunately during the Short Sharp Pain In The Neck tour of March 1981, Motörhead had a mobile recording studio in tow as they recorded their thunderous, number 1 live album, No Sleep ‘Til Hammersmith now celebrating its 40th year. This rare recording of them performing ‘Stay Clean’ as they warmed up for the night at Newcastle on 30th March is accompanied by a video containing behind the scenes montages of the backbone of the Motörhead live show; the legendary road crew!
Ryan Hamilton shoots to thrill at the halfway point in his 1221 Project
How can it be June already?
Back in January 2021, Texan singer/songwriter announced his 1221 project, his intent to release a new song a month for the duration of the year. This month’s track, ‘Shots Fired’ sees us reaching the halfway point with a floor-stomping rocker.
What was the inspiration behind this latest track?
This song is about getting used. I’ve had some TOXIC relationships in my life… as lots of people have. So I got a feeling this song is gonna resonate with lots of folks. When you stay in a poisonous relationship, simply because there’s a singular good thing… whether it’s sex, or not feeling alone… whatever it may be. We ignore the abundance of reasons we should GET OUT, and stick around anyway. Why do we do that? This song is about that.
With half of 1221 already done, are you able to share anything about the remaining six months of releases yet to come?
From here on in, everything is rock n roll. I can’t wait to share the rest.
On the cover image for ‘Shots Fired’, you appear to be the victim of said shots – what’s happening there?
I wanted an image that portrayed a man being used. I’ll let you decide just HOW he might have been used 😉
Hamilton was recently heralded by Spin magazine as one of the ‘Best Lesser-Known Artists of the Last 35 Years’.
RYAN HAMILTON RELEASES “Shots Fired” 12 JUNE 2021, VIA WICKED COOL
See Bumblefoot, Earl Slick and others in “Band of Thieves,” new video by The Compulsions
Only a fool would underestimate Compulsions founder and frontman, Rob Carlyle. Armed with merely a shoestring budget and a crazy dream, the underground New York rocker remains an undeniable force to be reckoned with.
Even with somewhat limited activity, The Compulsions’ creative output never fails to hit like a nuclear bomb. For most artists in today’s frivolous and forgettable music world, this would be laughable hyperbole. However, there’s simply no denying the mountain of critical acclaim that’s been heaped upon Rob Carlyle & The Compulsions since Day One.
The Compulsions’ newest release, Ferocious, adds to a 17-year long rap sheet of wildly positive press. For example, “What Rock Was Like When It Was Considered Real” (Underground Press), “Think Early ‘70s Rolling Stones Transported To Present Day” (Fear & Loathing), “The Rock & Roll Record We Were Expecting And Craving” (RPM Online), and even “I Prefer Compulsions Versions Of Guns N’ Roses, Rolling Stones Songs” (Get Ready To Rock). Combined with ratings such as “10 Out Of 10” (Powerplay Magazine) and “9 Out Of 10” (Vive Le Rock), and it’s hard to describe Ferocious as anything less than a rock ’n’ roll masterpiece.
Ferocious was released on November 13, 2020 via Compulsions Records and now, seven months later, an accompanying video has suddenly been unleashed on the unsuspecting public. Here’s what Rob had to say about the vid for “Band Of Thieves,” which features many of the heavies who performed on Ferocious, including ex-Gunner, Ron “Bumblefoot” Thal, and David Bowie guitarist, Earl Slick.
“The studio footage you’re about to see has been on my phone for the last four or five years. Good thing I didn’t drop it in the toilet, because now the video that’s been playing in my head can finally become a reality – and thanks to my editor friend, Anthony Marinelli, it’s even better than I imagined.”
The track, “Band Of Thieves,” and the video were both influenced by the Road Warrior films, as Rob explained to Australia’s The Rockpit in his track-by-track breakdown of Ferocious:
“For ‘Band Of Thieves,’ I deliberately kept the lyrics kinda vague, so you can’t tell if I’m singing about a marauding motorcycle gang or a rock ‘n’ roll band. ‘Band Of Thieves’ is inspired by the soundtrack to Mad Max: Fury Road by Junkie XL. It’s funny because there’s the monster double-neck guitar player in Fury Road and this song features Bumblefoot on monster double-neck guitar!”
Also appearing in the video are local luminaries and frequent Compulsions collaborators: drummer Brian Delaney (ex-New York Dolls), bassist Alec Morton (ex-Raging Slab), guitarist Hugh Pool (New York Blues Hall Of Fame), keyboardist Andrew Sherman (Butter Music + Sound), and producer Ken Rich (Grand Street Recording).
“I remember when Ken played me the first mix of ‘Band Thieves.’ It felt like my teeth had been kicked in,” recalls Carlyle. “Which is exactly what we were going for. I hope that everyone who plays the song and the video experiences the same kind of musical beatdown.”
For regular updates on Rob Carlyle & The Compulsions, follow the band on Instagram and YouTube, and keep your eyes on thecompulsionsnyc.com. Ferocious is available at Apple Music, Pandora, Spotify and more. If you don’t check it out right now, you’re a fool.
Manic Street Preachers have moved their previously announced shows in July at the Cardiff Motorpoint Arena to Sunday 19th and Monday 20th September 2021. This is due to the recently announced capacity restrictions and continued uncertainty over if the shows can be played in full in July.The first night is a free show for NHS staff, the second had tickets available to the public with all profits going to NHS Wales charities.
All tickets remain valid for the rescheduled dates. For anybody who is unable to make the free show for NHS staff should contact Ticketmaster so they can be offered to another member of NHS staff. For anybody who is unable to make the rescheduled date for the fundraising NHS charities show, refunds will be available at point of purchase.
Tickets for Free Concert for NHS staff originally scheduled for Friday 16th July 2021 will only be valid for NEW date of Sunday 19th September 2021.
Tickets for fundraising show for NHS charities originally scheduled for Saturday 17th July 2021 will only be valid for NEW date of Monday 20th September 2021.
Here we have ‘seven year itch’ a perfectly titled follow up to the 2014 debut by this goth tinged supergroup 69 Cats. Ghoul’d up to max, showing more tricks and treats than Elvira on October 31st.
Like a lot of our readers I have a great love of all things rockabilly, psychobilly and goth. And this ensemble certainly tick all of the boxes on paper, but I cannot shake the feeling that this record is ambling across well trodden ground to an obvious degree. Don’t get me wrong, the group’s core sound is quite unique, but like Eddie Spaghetti once said “you say cliché, I say classic”. I definitely do not speak for everyone.
The record starts off really promising with an interesting vibe, but four songs in without deviation from this formula….. It can get very grating to say the least. Opening track ‘she’s hot’ kicks off with a promising pace and has some killer guitar licks, but particularly vocal wise, never hits the next gear. The following track ‘Hollywood’s bleeding’ continues this stop-start approach, giving the listener some hooks but never really developing them further making the songs come across as a bit pedestrian as well as the fact that this second track and third track ‘you’re the kind of girl I need’ are pretty interchangeable to an almost boring degree.
As I say, I normally am a fan of the genres touched on this record, and possibly the band knows what is best for their bread and butter audience. But for this listener, everything, even down to the song titles seems a little too obvious eg: ‘graveyard blues’, ‘vampire shuffle’. Don’t get me wrong, having song themes like this is not a problem, it’s what the fundamentals of rock ‘n’ roll are all about. It’s just you have to have the excitement and the drive to back it up and this record is severely lacking.
Overall to a lot 69 Cats’ audience, this will be meat and potatoes rock ‘n’ roll, but to those casual visitors to this genre, this record may, unfortunately, be a one listen affair.
When we all found out on the weekend via social media of the sad passing of Lord Zion I’ve thought about his passing and how we could pay tribute to a beautiful soul that touched several of us at RPM Online back in the early days of Uber Rock so I approached Gaz to put his feelings into words and pay a fitting tribute to Lord Zion. I hope these words bring even a small amount of comfort to his partner Vikki and show how well respected he was and how his positive attitude had an effect on us all. Rest in peace Zion.
“When news broke over the weekend that Lord Zion had passed away I, like every one of you I suspect, recoiled in both shock and horror. Then the sadness kicked in. Known to most as the frontman of SPiT LiKE THiS, and to many as one half of gloriously offensive T-shirt company, Smell Your Mum, Zion was once a member of a gang that we called the Uber Rock Massive; a group of clued-in music outsiders trying to change the business one chord, one paragraph at a time. Whether it was via an autobiographical article or a typically OTT video rounding up the latest rock news alongside his partner-in-crime, Vikki, Zion totally captured the spirit of what we were trying to achieve with the Uber Rock website and its spin-offs. Uber Rock still exists in another form in another corner of the Internet, but that original, aforementioned UR spirit is now strong in RPM via its editor and scribes, hence the need for acknowledgment of Zion’s passing here: he is a part of the fabric as much as any other person who made the jump to this site.
The first time I met Zion he greeted and spoke to me as if I were an old friend and, as he dipped regularly into a Tupperware container full of cold meats, I smiled a smile that never left any time that I was fortunate to be in his company. His quirks were brilliant – “I never carry cash… or a phone” – and his stories even more so. Our paths had similar trajectories – Star Wars toys and Region One DVDs. Zion sold both on the then-fledgling Internet and, after setting up a Star Wars toy website that cheekily featured the name of the first prequel, The Phantom Menace, but with a strategically-placed hyphen, he actually received a cease and desist letter from Lucasfilm. How did he react to this threat from an entertainment giant? He replied telling them that their movies had taught him that the little guy should always stand up to the big bully… and that was that. He heard nothing in return. Typical confidence from one of life’s genuinely great people.
I saw Zion and Vikki at many a ComicCon around the country as they sold their T-shirts and hilariously blunt greeting cards on their Smell Your Mum stall, and they were always available for a much-needed and very entertaining catch-up even when the shirts (typical design: “I’m only fat because every time I fucked your mum she gave me a biscuit”) were flying out thick and fast. Vikki would produce the first four Uber Rock shirt designs, all of which sold out quickly. It was the band, though, that was my introduction to one of the coolest couples I ever had the pleasure to meet.
I saw SPiT LiKE THiS play small clubs, and I saw them play massive stages. They treated every performance exactly the same; as if they were on the cusp of being the biggest band on the planet and everyone else needed to do a lot of catching up… fast! I took photos of the band when they played the main stage at Hard Rock Hell (still, in my eyes, the biggest and best I’d ever seen them) and was thrilled when one of my pics appeared in the CD booklet of their second album, 2012’s Chris Tsangarides-produced ‘Normalityville Horror’. Even then, with proper stardom appearing closer than ever to their collective grasp, Zion wore his Uber Rock colours front and centre in a number of the band’s music videos. He was, and always will be, one of us.
Zion and Vikki sold the T-shirt company, dissolved the band, and moved from one end of the country to the other to start a new life together. I’m sure you’re all with me on this, but isn’t it weird when something ends yet due to social media we can frequently be involved in the lives of people that we may never see again? Well now, due to tragic circumstances, we will never see Zion again. And that stings the eyes. It breaks the heart. The World was a brighter place having Lord Zion in it and even though right now it feels like a light has gone out, there is a shadow over all of us who ever fell under the spell of this massive personality… and that shadow is the shape of a statuesque rock star who took on the Galactic Empire… and won.
Listen to SPiT LiKE THiS, watch the YouTube videos, read his book, and Zion will never really leave us. It might not feel like it now, but he left a mark on us all that won’t fade easily. Rest easy, Z-man.”
So, what exactly did you do during lockdown? Did you use all that time to get yourself fit, or maybe you finally took up that hobby you’ve never previously had the time to dedicate to it? Whatever it was you did, I bet you didn’t start writing letters to punk rock musicians pointing out the lyrical inaccuracies and ambiguities they’ve made over the years, and then look to compile the acerbic replies into one jumbo sized 160-page book? Well, not unless your name is Derek or Dave Philpott.
For those of you who are maybe unaware of Derek Philpott and his son Dave’s services to the rock community, they are simply two regular folk who have been on something a crusade to set the record straight regarding song lyrics that simply don’t ring true (well maybe not in their minds anyway), and as such have been writing letters to pop stars since around 2008 asking them to explain just what the hell they were thinking when writing said song/songs. With the likes of Suzi Quatro, Saxon, Noddy Holder, Rick Wakeman and Toyah featuring in their two hilarious books to date, namely ‘Dear Mr. Kershaw: A Pensioner Writes’ and ‘Dear Mr Pop Star’. These earlier books only contained subtle nods towards the U. K’s hugely influential punk/new wave scene via the likes of Stiff Little Fingers and Squeeze. Here, with ‘Grammar Free in the U.K’ though, the Philpott’s are about to set that record straight with a book so steeped in punk rock history, that flipping the cover over I half expect to see the normally quite sombre looking duo sneering back at me flicking me the Vs. Thankfully, for all our sakes, they’re not!
What you do get though is page after page of punk rock craziness via sixty six of the most surreal letters you are ever going to read, all of course complete with the hilarious replies from the Philpott’s targets. From Sham 69 to Pete Bentham and the Dinner Ladies via Duncan Reid and The Big Heads and Mr Bruce off of Chumbawamba, the 160 pages play out in my head like some virtual version of the UK’s annual Rebellion Festival, albeit one viewed through the eyes of festival magician and unofficial mascot, Ratboy. Alas, with said mighty event once again postponed for another twelve months I can think of nothing better than donning the ole knotted Union Jack hankie rolling up my camouflage shorts and cracking open a few Dark Fruits in the summer rain and getting stuck into some ‘Grammar Free’ nonsense.
To actually preview any of the letters here would simply be wrong, but if I tell you that the opening mirth missile, which is directed towards Darryl from Cock Sparrer, features a mix up with a certain breed of dog, before ploughing headlong into a certain bequiffed singer from Manchester, that’ll hopefully give you an idea of the madness that lies herein. Whilst ‘Grammar Free in the U.K’ is perhaps best summed up by Rebellion’s resident mad man and bingo caller Max Splodge, who refers to the tome as “a magnificent pot pourri of questions you always wanted to ask but were too sensible to ask.” All this from a man I once witnessed offer his hotel room trouser press (which he had actually brought with him) as a bingo prize to one lucky festival attendee, and it had only just gone midday…on the Friday.
Released on June 13th 2021 there are just 1,000 of these bad boys being printed, with around 800 having already sold on presale to Derek and Dave’s hardcore following, so hit the link below and let everyone know that…you wanna be ‘Grammar Free’.
With a new album ‘Mountain of Piss’ about to be unleashed Cosmic Psychos drop a new video for ‘Sin Bin’
‘Call The Shots’, the debut solo release for the former CIVET member and TURBULENT HEARTS frontwoman Suzi Moon. The video, which Moon self-directed and edited, is dedicated to her friend Amie who was tragically murdered by an abusive ex-boyfriend. ‘I’m Not A Man’ is here for your visual delights.
Madysin Hatter – Treasure (single) I recently reviewed Madysin Hatter’s single Wild and Strange for RPM online and I was impressed by Madysin’s style and song writing ability. With her latest track Treasure, Madysin has gone down the power ballad route very effectively. After only playing the song through twice, I couldn’t get it out of my head. Fantastic production and quality backing from the supergroup Mule Kick featuring Frank Ferrer, (Guns N’ Roses, The Psychedelic Furs), Rob Bailey (David Johansen, PSSR), Brett Bass (Gregg Allman), and Rob Clores (The Black Crowes, Jesse Malin) help to elevate the track. Madysin’s voice is very distinctive and sounds great here combining softer tones with her more gravelly ‘rock’ voice.
The video for the song is interesting with Madysin in an array of different outfits set in a house that looks like it could have belonged to Zsa Zsa Gabor at some point! The song would sound great on the radio, let’s hope it gets some well-deserved air play.
Ken Mary’s long standing music career has placed him center stage in a wide spectrum of genres that have required an equally wide ranging and demanding set of skills. He is not only a drummer, but also an engineer, writer, vocalist, and an award winning producer. Combined, his body of work has sold over 5 million albums worldwide, and includes an extremely diverse, eclectic, and influential group of artists. His drumming can be heard on recordings from Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee Alice Cooper, Jordan Rudess, Northern Light Orchestra, Kip Winger, House of Lords, Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductees The Beach Boys, Impelliterri, Don Dokken, Fifth Angel, Bonfire, F5, and Soul Shock Remedy just to name a few.
Hit the link sit back and relax as Kenny gets on with some chatter that matters with the other Kenny
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