Posts Tagged ‘Tommy Shaw’

  
Monday, August 24th, 2009

The Steel Horse Archives: Damn Yankees, “Where You Goin’ Now?” (1992)

by Jeff Vrabel

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631b828fd7a08c190e430110.L[1]Damn Yankees
Title: “Where You Goin’ Now?”
Album: Don’t Tread
Release Date: 1992

Why You Remember Them: For a guy who expends so much effort trying to sustain an image as such a carnivorous, twitchy Amurcan, Ted Nugent is responsible for an unusually high amount of sissypants cotton-candy girl songs, many of which delivered by a band inexplicably named after a vivacious Broadway musical. To call Damn Yankees a “supergroup” would imply a world where that word could include someone from Night Ranger, yet here we are: Aside from Nugent, the group included Styx’s Tommy Shaw, looking like the Eurythmics dude that wasn’t Annie Lennox (what? too soon?), Night Ranger’s Jack Blades and Michael Cartellone, one of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s 400 drummers but a guy who had the sense to forge a second career in painting. “Where You Goin’ Now” isn’t even the Damn Yankees song most often played as the soundtrack to trembling hands fumbling their way around bra straps in the early ’90s — that would be the execrable “High Enough” — but thinking that the last two songs anyone gave a damn about were these would probably turn me into a goofball hunter/reality-show cartoon too.

Album Sales To Date: The band’s self-titled debut went double-platinum in 1990; Don’t Tread went platinum? Really? Jesus wept. (more…)

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Monday, June 15th, 2009

Jesus of Cool: We Wuz Robbed! Great #2 Hits of the ’80s

by Jon Cummings

It’s amazing, the things a guy can learn even at my advanced age. The real treat for me, in slapping together this (too)-long-running series – which already has examined hits from the ’50s, ’60s and ’70s that ran out of gas just one block short of the Texaco – has been the opportunity to put into context some of the music-geek trivia that’s been crowding out more important information in my head for the last 30 years.

I’m embarrassed to say I was able to sit down at my laptop and reel off the names of about three dozen #2 hits from the grand and glorious ’80s without even cracking open my ever-present Joel Whitburn or Fred Bronson singles bibles. (The fact that I could do that, but can’t tie a Windsor knot, may explain why my career on Wall Street never took off. It also made narrowing down to 10 songs for this list a painful experience.) But it’s one thing to keep song titles and chart placements in your memory; it’s another to marvel at the tricks of fate, poor taste, or record-biz manipulation that launch one single over another on the way to Top 40 glory. Take this first juxtaposition, for example:

11. “Hazy Shade of Winter,” the Bangles. Here’s the hit that slaps some sense into those who mistake the Bangles for a novelty act, or stubbornly cling to the notion that Susanna, Vicki, Debbi and Michael didn’t really rock. They took a 20-year-old, twee-as-all-get-out Simon & Garfunkel tune and turned it into a fuzz-guitar anthem of ’80s excess, the perfect theme for what should have been a much better movie based on Bret Easton Ellis’ Hollywood-druggies novel Less than Zero. (Funny how the movie biz managed to mangle both Ellis’ book and Jay McInerney’s New York equivalent, Bright Lights, Big City. Of course, casting pretty boys Andrew McCarthy and Michael J. Fox as jaded protagonists didn’t help.) Anyway, how were the Bangles rewarded for their maturity and brilliance in transforming “Hazy Shade of Winter”? They were left in the dust by the god-awful ballad “Could’ve Been,” which might have been less terrible had it not been butchered by that caterwauling, flavor-of-the-month, shopping-mall princess Tiffany. A slightly interesting fact about “Could’ve Been”: Its composer, Lois Blaisch, was “discovered” while singing for her supper at a recently-shuttered restaurant a few miles from my house, called the Hungry Hunter. I knew there had to be a reason why I never considered going into that place … besides, of course, the goofiness of its name, particularly considering that it sat in the middle of a SoCal strip mall… (more…)

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Tuesday, June 2nd, 2009

Mix Six: “Supergroup … or Superdud?”

by Ted Asregadoo

DOWNLOAD THE FULL MIX HERE

On paper, it sounds like a moneymaking formula: take individual members from successful bands, put them together in a supergroup to make music, record the magic, and watch album sales go through the roof.  Yes, the Supergroup can, at times, be seen as a crass money grab, and at times it is.  However, there are other times when the result of these ventures bears some tasty fruit. Now, people’s taste being what they are, it’s going to be an argument without end as to which of the groups represented here are Supergroups or Superduds.  I certainly have my opinions, but don’t let that dissuade you from defending or slamming the six in this mix.

“Sole Survivor,” Asia (download)

Back when Asia made their debut in the early ‘80s, they were touted as the next big thing that would define rock music for the decade.  Think about it: you take a little bit of Yes, Emerson Lake and Palmer, and King Crimson, put them in a blender of sorts, serve up the contents  and … what do you think you’re going to get? Go ahead and insert a 40-Year-Old Virgin joke here. (more…)

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Friday, March 13th, 2009

CHART ATTACK!: 3/16/91

by Jason Hare

Happy Friday and welcome to another edition of CHART ATTACK! So last time we met here to dissect a Billboard chart, it was a Top 10 from 1971, and I got my ass handed to me by readers who (rightfully) corrected me on a million small errors I made (okay, okay, it was a Tony Orlando impersonator, not Tony Orlando! I’m sorry!). So this week, to try and save face, I thought I’d fast-forward ahead 20 years to a chart you probably don’t care about. That being said, if I botched something here, keep it to yourself let me know. Sit back and try to enjoy our journey back to March 16, 1991!

10. Hold You Tight — Tara Kemp Amazon iTunes
9. Where Does My Heart Beat Now — Celine Dion Amazon iTunes
8. Get Here — Oleta Adams Amazon iTunes
7. All the Man That I Need — Whitney Houston Amazon iTunes
6. This House — Tracie Spencer Amazon iTunes
5. All This Time — Sting Amazon iTunes
4. Coming Out of the Dark — Gloria Estefan Amazon iTunes
3. Show Me the Way — Styx Amazon iTunes
2. One More Try — Timmy T Amazon iTunes
1. Someday — Mariah Carey Amazon iTunes

10. Hold You Tight — Tara Kemp

Anybody remember Tara Kemp? She had two singles in the Top 10, this one (which peaked at #3) and “Piece of My Heart,” which reached #7. This song vaguely rang a bell, but I’m not sure why: it really doesn’t have anything original going for it. It never changes chords and the drum beat seems as it was ripped off of Soul II Soul. Even worse, the song has quite a few irritating qualities. Let’s start with the “oh, whoa” that is clearly supposed to be the clever hook of the song.

Then let’s build on that with a synth riff that my dog could have written.

Then, let’s take the part where Tara breaks it down with some funky singing.

What the hell is that yelp at the beginning? On its own, it’s actually quite creepy. Imagine being married to Tara Kemp and hearing this whenever you forgot to take out the garbage.

And yet…at 2 A.M. last night, I couldn’t get “Hold You Tight” out of my head.

9. Where Does My Heart Beat Now — Celine Dion

I’m not gonna lie to you: I owned this album. I bought it after I heard her knock her vocal in “Voices That Care” out of the park. And although I only listened to it once and I don’t remember any of other songs, I’ll step up and defend this one. I think it’s a strong ballad and was a great choice to introduce Celine to the American audience: the single went to #4 and became the first of her ten Top 10 singles. And here’s a surprise for you (and me): this single was not produced by David Foster!

You were all expecting me to rip Celine apart, right? I can’t do it. I know it’s the popular thing to do, but I can’t really find any reason to dislike her. She has a fantastic voice, and she gives your mom a reason to still buy music. That should be enough right there, but if it’s not, you should watch this video (if you haven’t already). It’s obviously trying to be snarky, but I think it kind of fails in that regard.

8. Get Here — Oleta Adams (download)

Here’s what I’ve learned about Oleta Adams and “Get Here”:

(more…)

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Tuesday, February 24th, 2009

Death by Power Ballad: Tommy Shaw, “Lonely School”

by Rob Smith

Maybe eight or ten years ago, if you’d wanted to make some pretty decent money on a minimal investment, all you had to do was find a CD copy of Styx guitarist Tommy Shaw’s 1984 solo debut, Girls with Guns, at a yard sale or in the used bins at your local strip mall record store (you remember them, don’t you?), then turn around and put the copy on eBay.  I once saw a one go for upwards of $200, and it made me longingly recall the time I saw a $10 used GwG at the Keystone Music Exchange and didn’t pull the trigger on the purchase.  And my fists shake with rage at the memory once again.

“Lonely School” was the second single off the record, a follow-up to the album’s more raucous title track, and it’s notable for containing just about every element that Shaw hated in Dennis DeYoung’s music, the primary reason he left Styx.  It’s a keyboard-heavy tune, for one thing; the guitars (Shaw’s stock in trade) mainly provide bits of color here and there, until the solo break after the second chorus.  There are key changes aplenty — into and out of every chorus, to be exact — which serve to adhere the verses to the chorus with a kind of musical Elmer’s or Scotch tape.  The background vocals —”ooh’s” and “ah’s,” mostly, give the overall track a kind of Mr. Mister-ish feel (a full year or two before any of us had heard of Mr. Mister.  Then again, I’ve never seen Tommy Shaw and Richard Page in the same room.  Hmmm …).

(Oh, and ignore the tom-tom percussion that opens the song; no one in rock should be allowed to use the things, with the exception of Neil Peart, who makes them sound like a hailstorm, a headhunter block party, and the march of an advancing army, because he’s Neil-fucking-Peart.)

In truth, “Lonely School” lacks any obvious full-on rawk bombast, the kind Shaw was exposed to daily in Styx and would absolutely master with Damn Yankees (”High Enough,” anyone?  Huh?  No takers?  Bummer).  Indeed, one might be tempted to wonder what’s so powerful about this particular ballad.

In one word: potential.

(more…)

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