He Got Wild, Wild, Wild: R.I.P. Kevin DuBrow of Quiet Riot

The Aqua Net factory flag flies at half-mast this week as hair metal lost one if its true pioneers. Kevin DuBrow (second from left), lead singer of Quiet Riot, was found dead in Las Vegas at age 52. The cause of death is still under investigation.

If you are around 40, you have fond memories of driving around in your friend’s Vista Cruiser or Plymouth Valiant, chugging Busch beer, sucking down Parliaments and cranking the Riot’s irresitably buffoonish 1983 hit “Cum On Feel The Noize.” You don’t? Well, I do.

Their cover of Slade's post-glam hit from the 70s was the “Smells Like Teen Spirit” of 80s metal, unleashing a gaggle of guitar-wielding drag queens, including Twisted Sister, Poison, Motley Crue, Warrant, Ratt, Dokken, Whitesnake, Winger (my personal favorite), Cinderella, Skid Row, Night Ranger and Bon Jovi. The album from whence it sprung, Metal Health, sold a whopping four million copies in the US. (DuBrow is the man in the iron mask.)

Kev lived the rock & roll good life but never let the lifestyle get the better of him. According to a New York Times obituary, “he eschewed alcohol, liked doing housework and exercised regularly.”

Dearly departed DuBrow didn’t hang out at CBGB with Patti Smith, find inspiration from the Anthology of American Folk Music, campaign for Ralph Nader or any of the other things legitimate rock musicians are supposed to do. But for a few cold months in 1983-84, he rocked suburbia out of its preppy doldrums, and for that we are most grateful.

So dig out your jean jacket, throw on a rugby shirt and some Pumas, call your buds, get a suitcase of Busch, a carton of Cowboy Killers and crank it up. We’re gonna get wild, wild, wild! RIP & TCB.

YouTube: Quiet Riot, “Cum On Feel the Noize”

(Thanks to Rock Turtleneck hair-metal scholar/monster ballad lover Jeff Bazyk for the suggestion.)

Radiohead Free Europe

There’s nothing like returning from a gravylicious Thanksgiving break at the in-laws and finding yet another reason to give thanks. In this case, a November 9 webcast Radiohead did in their studio to launch their site radiohead.tv, brought to my attention via the fine music site That Truncheon Thing.

The show was called the "Thumbs Down" Webcast. A delicious use of irony given that it’s one of the coolest gifts the band has ever given its fans.

We see the band in a Fab-Fourish, freewheeling, fun-loving mode, spinning records, and playing live-in-the-studio verisions of "Bodysnatchers" and other tracks from their new album In Rainbows.

Radiohead, "Reckoner" (Thumbs Down Webcast)


As befit the band's genial mood, they also played some sweet covers: the early New Order single "Ceremony" and most brilliantly, The Smiths’s “The Headmaster Ritual,” which Thom Yorke says “is about when we were younger, but we didn’t write it.” (The lads met in an Essex boarding school, presumably run by belligerent fools.)

Radiohead, "The Headmaster Ritual" (Smiths cover) (Thumbs Down Webcast)

After a few tunes in their studio, Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood dash outside at dusk for an English countryside run-through of “Faust Arp” The song, which was Beatlesque to begin with, becomes even more so against a backdrop very reminiscent of the Fabs’ video for “Strawberry Fields Forever.”

Radiohead, "Faust Arp" (Thumbs Down Webcast)


Like U2 in their Achtung Baby period, Radiohead seem hell-bent on taking town the walls of mystique they spent so many years building, intentionally or not. Announcing In Rainbows only days in advance of its release and making payment optional was a good start. And this fly-on-the-wall gift to their fans is even better.

Good Times Never Seemed So Good: Neil Diamond's True "Sweet Caroline" Revealed

After the fury and majesty of Neil Young Week, Rock Turtleneck was starting to wind down for a well-deserved Thanksgiving break. But then a whole new reason to give thanks came in through the RT transom, courtesy of a headline on Yahoo! about another Neil:

"SWEET CAROLINE" WAS CAROLINE KENNEDY

According to the Pulitzer-worthy story, Neil Diamond held his Deep Throat-like secret until last week, when he performed the song via satellite at Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg's 50th birthday party.

‘Twas a photo of young Caroline and her pony Macaroni in the heady days of Camelot that caught the eye of Diamond, then a struggling songwriter.

"It was such an innocent, wonderful picture, I immediately felt there was a song in there," recalled the Bard of Flatbush.

But it wasn’t until years later while in a hotel in Memphis (where else?) that his signature anthem would pour out of him like a Junior's egg cream in under an hour.

"It was a #1 record and probably is the biggest, most important song of my career, and I have to thank her for the inspiration," he said. "I'm happy to have gotten it off my chest and to have expressed it to Caroline. I thought she might be embarrassed, but she seemed to be struck by it and really, really happy."

"Sweet Caroline" should be played non-stop atop the Golden Gate Bridge and Empire State Building, for it is almost impossible to feel blue when it is playing. Personally, I took the song (and the man) for granted until the late 1980s, when it emerged as a can’t-miss drunken college party anthem. The collective level of the room’s intoxication could be perfectly gauged by the loudness of the “buh buh buuuhs” in the chorus.

Yes, like a fine cheese, "Sweet Caroline" has aquired new meanings and complexities over time. So let us pause and give thanks for Neil and his brilliant, joyous, all-purpose ode to an American princess and her lil’ equine.

MP3: Neil Diamond, “Sweet Caroline,” Hot August Night, 1971

YouTube: Neil Diamond, “Sweet Caroline,” The Shirley Bassey Show, 1974

The Ditch Is Back: Neil Young's Ditch Trilogy

Neil Young Week Part IV"This song put me in the middle of the road. Traveling there soon became a bore so I headed for the ditch. A rougher ride but I met more interesting people there."
- Neil Young on "Heart of Gold," from the liner notes of Decade, 1977

Following the massive commercial success of his 1972 album Harvest and his only #1 single, "Heart of Gold," our hero Neil Young could have very easily settled into a very lucrative Eagle-esque career hacking out laid-back, E-Z listening country-pop.

But Neil doesn't roll like that. Rocked to the core by the death of Crazy Horse rhythm guitarist Danny Whitten (who OD'd the night he was fired from the band) and roadie Bruce Berry (he used to load that Econoline van), Neil's muse forced him to come to musical terms with the death of the L.A. hippie dream.
Thus he followed up Harvest with the legendary "Ditch Trilogy": three dark, eccentric, introspective and absolutely brilliant LPs: Time Fades Away, Tonight's the Night and On the Beach. Together, they are the benchmark by which the phrase "artistically uncompromising" is measured.

While many in the 60s were dying to live the West Coast dream — start a band, make a movie, become a big star, make a ton of dough, move to Laurel Canyon — a lot of people were now, in the 70s, dying from it. The Ditch Trilogy caputres this dread and disillusion perfectly - Neil often sounds wasted, angry and/or out of tune. Songs drag along one minute and rock furiously the next. Allusions to Watergate, Patty Hearst, Charles Manson and the energy crisis make their way into the lyrics. Even the most beautiful tracks, like On the Beach's "Ambulance Blues," are laden with despair.

Tonight's the Night has been available on LP and CD since its release in 1975. After years of rumors and waiting, On the Beach was finally released on CD a couple years ago. The live Time Fades Away, however, is completely out of print (though you can find it online if you look around.). It's rumored to be Neil's least favorite Neil Young album. Nevertheless, all three are must-haves.

Herewith, several selections from the Ditch Trilogy, along with an illuminating lyrical couplet, plus a YouTube bonus clip. Don't be denied.

MP3: "Don't Be Denied" from Time Fades Away
(Well, all that glitters isn't gold
I know you've heard that story told.
And I'm a pauper in a naked disguise
A millionaire through a business man's eyes.)

MP3: "Borrowed Tune" from Tonight's the Night
(I'm singin' this borrowed tune
I took from the Rolling Stones,
Alone in this empty room
Too wasted to write my own.)

MP3: "Revolution Blues" from On the Beach
(Well I hear that Laurel Canyon is full of famous stars
But I hate them worse than lepers and I'll kill them in their cars)

YouTube: Neil Young, "Mellow My Mind," Live 1976

Neil Young: Trans-former Man

Neil Young Week Part III

Bob Dylan’s plugging in at Newport in 1965 and subsequent 1966 tour with the Hawks – the fans booing, calling him “Judas,” etc. - is widely considered rock's boldest act, a case of an artist challenging his fans by serving his muse. But in terms of fearlessly confounding audience expectations, even mighty Bob can’t touch Neil Young and his 1982 electronic album Trans.

Several years before Trans, Neil and his wife Pegi gave birth to a son, Ben, with a case of cerebral palsy so severe he is unable to speak. Grasping for ways to communicate with his boy, Neil found he had more success when he used a speech synthesizer called a vocoder. The struggle to break through to his son, and his fascination with new wave music (he was friendly with Devo, who supplied him with the phrase “rust never sleeps.”) inspired the sound and themes of Trans.


The music sounded nothing like anything Neil had ever recorded. Instead of his familiar proto-grunge or back-porch folk, Trans was full of synthesized handclaps and electronic drums. And Neil’s processed voice was eerie and unrecognizable.

Yet some of the hallmarks of a Neil album were firmly in place, namely strong melodies. At the time, Neil said something to the effect that if you cranked Trans on your stereo and listened to it through the walls from another room, it would sound just like all his other records. And he’s right. Just listen below to the Trans version of “Transformer Man” and then listen to how easily it translates into a “Neil Young” song in the performance below from 1993’s Unplugged.

Trans was praised by critics, but was a dud in terms of sales. So Neil did what any sensible rock iconoclast would do: he made a rockabilly album. So extreme were Neil’s digressions in the 80s that label honcho/free-man-in-Paris David Geffen sued Neil for making "uncommercial" records. Geffen demanded that Neil repay the $3 million he had received for Trans and Everybody's Rockin'. Neil responded by countersuing Geffen for $21 million, charging breach of contract and fraud. Both suits were dropped in 1985.

Trans remains unreleased in the US on CD, but you can get a couple tunes on the excellent Reagan-era compilation Lucky Thirteen, including “Sample and Hold” seen below. If you think the music sounds strange, wait 'til you see it being performed.

MP3: Neil Young, “Transformer Man,” Trans/Lucky Thirteen, 1982
MP3: Neil Young, “Transformer Man,” Unplugged, 1993
YouTube: Neil Young, “Sample and Hold,” live 1982

City of Brotherly Love: Neil Young's "Philadelphia"

Neil Young Week Part II
The soundtrack to the Tom-Hanks-gay-lawyer-with-AIDS film Philadelphia was notable for, among other things, two Oscar-nominated songs: Neil Young’s “Philadelphia” and Bruce Springsteen’s “Streets of Philadelphia,” which won. (The film was directed by Jonathan Demme, the rock-friendly maestro behind Stop Making Sense and later, Neil Young: Heart of Gold.)

Hard as it is to believe, the Academy got it wrong. The Boss’ tune, while decent enough, sounds straight from the streets of Asbury Park. There isn’t an ounce of gay in it. Neil’s haunting, heartfelt piano ballad, however, perfectly captures the despair and loneliness Hanks’s character feels as his life slips away and those whom he has loved and trusted abandon him.

In the second verse, Neil brilliantly recontextualizes (take that, Webster’s) Philly’s motto, “City of Brotherly Love” to illuminate the chasm between the world as it is portrayed and the way it is in reality.

“Philadelphia” is one of Neil’s most beautiful songs, right up there with “After the Gold Rush” and “A Man Needs A Maid.” Among rock giants, Young is arguably second only to Paul McCartney in his ability to seemingly pull a beautiful melody out of thin air.

“Philadelphia” was a high point in Neil’s renaissance as a popular and creative artist after some very interesting but commercially dubious detours in the 80s (more about that later in the week). His resurgence began with Freedom in 1989 and included Harvest Moon, the Kurt Cobain requiem Sleeps with Angels and the Pearl Jam collaboration Mirror Ball.

Herewith, for your thought-provoking socially-conscious, empathetic listening pleasure is the soundtrack version of "Philadelphia" and Neil’s performance on the 1994 Academy Awards telecast.

MP3: Neil Young, "Philadelphia"

YouTube: "Philadelphia," 1994 Academy Awards

Just think of him as one you never figured: Neil Young's "Powderfinger"

Neil Young Week Part I
Rock Turtleneck wishes a happy birthday to Neil “62 Years” Young, born November 12, 1945. This week, we celebrate the life of this maverick genius by recounting some favorite Neil Young moments from over the years. (Thanks to RT field reporter Richard Hauck for the suggestion.)

What makes Neil Neil? A voice and guitar that howl from the hinterlands. The thunderous thump of the low-E string on his Martin D-45. A never-wavering, never-optional intensity. The utmost beauty and epic majesty from the simplest of chords and melodies. Tales of innocence lost. Of North American myths and legends. Of life-and-death stakes. Of respect, responsibilities and regrets passed from one generation to the next. Plus he freakin' rocks.

It’s a lot of ground to cover. But what’s most remarkable is that all of this magnificent Neilness can be found in a single song: “Powderfinger.” The Side-B opener of his decade-closing Rust Never Sleeps, “Powderfinger” elegantly summarized all the terrain Neil had explored in Everybody Knows This is Nowhere, After the Gold Rush, Harvest, the “Ditch Trilogy” (Tonight’s the Night/Time Fades Away/On the Beach) and even Comes a Time.

Neil has recorded both acoustic and howling electric versions of "Powderfinger" – what we at Rock Turtleneck call “the Yin and Yang o’ Young.”

Herewith, three versions of “Powderfinger”: the acoustic version from 1974’s unreleased prequel Chrome Dreams; the electric 1979 Rust Never Sleeps take; and a live clip from the 1991 Arc/Weld tour. Look out, mama.

MP3: “Powderfinger” (Chrome Dreams version)
MP3: “Powderfinger” (Rust Never Sleeps version)

YouTube: “Powderfinger” from 1991 Arc/Weld tour

Roger & Them

Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who
(Universal DVD)

“Keith was a genius. John was a genius. I was certainly on the verge of it. And Roger sang.”-Pete Townshend, in Amazing Journey: The Story of The Who

Poor Roger Daltrey. A sensible, mortal man fronting a band of insanely talented - and just plain insane - immortals. No amount of microphone swinging, flowing golden locks, mohair or chest-baring can change the fact that he, while talented and charismatic, is the indisputable weak link in one of the most fearsome bands to ever take the stage.

Yet it is Daltrey who emerges as the poignant hero of the mod new DVD rock-doc Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who.

It was Daltrey we learn, who as a fight-loving young tuff in the Shepard’s Bush district of London, got the band together in the first place. And it is Daltrey who worked hardest to keep the band together through Keith Moon’s epic debauchery, John Entwhistle’s free-spending, coke-snorting, groupie-shagging, never-ending partying and Pete Townshend’s battles with genius, booze and egomania. It was Daltrey who fired Kenny Jones for his pedestrian drumming and replaced him with the much more Moon-like Zach Starkey (son of Ringo), leading the band into a stunning resurgance as a live act. And it’s Daltrey whom Townshend finally realizes he needs as much as Roger needs him, after years of dismissing him as an average talent. And while Roger may not be a musical genius like the others, without him there would be no Who to begin with.

If you’re a fan of the Who, your first question about Amazing Journey is probably “how could this possibly be better than The Kids Are Alright?” The answer is: it’s not. But as a linear biopic, it makes an excellent companion piece to The Kids Are Alright's performance clip-o-rama.

Amazing Journey tells the Who story through present-day interviews and archival footage worthy the DVD’s title. We see them as an R&B act the High Numbers, blowing through a cover of Martha & the Vandella's "Heat Wave." Six years later, they're blowing the minds of 600,000 at a 1970, 2am show at the Isle of Wight. The combination of Moon, easily rock's greatest drummer, Townshend using his white jumpsuit to full effect, Daltrey doing his darndest to keep up and Entwistle keeping the whole thing from completely falling apart, is absolutely thrilling to watch. As great as their music can be, they are even more incredible visually - as Amazing Journey (and the Kids are Alright) proves again and again.

The Isle of Wight show (also available on DVD), between Tommy and Who's Next, seems to be their absolute peak. From there the big-time rock money rolls in - and drug abuse and madness start to take their toll. It's the start of a long, slow decline.

By 2007, after Quadrophenia, Who Are You, countless farewell tours, the deaths of Moon and Entwhistle, it's just Pete and Roger, playing an acoustic set by themselves. As Amazing Journey makes clear, perhaps the most amazing thing about the Who's journey is not where they've been and who and what they've lost along the way. It's that 25 years after declaring "The End" on the cover of Rolling Stone, the two surviving members are still not quite ready to call it a day. Yet watching the heights they've reached again and again - from "Happy Jack" to "A Quick One (While He's Away)" to "Baba O'Reilly" to their raucous performance at the 9/11 benefit show at MSG - it's easy to understand why.

Trailer: Amazing Journey: The Story of the Who


MP3: The Who: "Amazing Journey/Sparks," Live at Leeds, 1970

In the Studio with Rock Turtleneck

Sure, YouTube is a great place to see skateboarding bulldogs and sneezing pandas, but it’s also a place where rock fans can check out rare footage of their favorite bands in the studio. Here are a few studio gems unearthed by Rock Turtleneck's staff of unpaid interns.


X, “White Girl”X captured L.A.'s seedy underbelly more evocatively than any band since the Doors, so it was only natural they would hire Ray Manzarek as their producer. X was considered a punk band, but that’s way too simplistic. John Doe & Exene Cervenka’s lyrics echoed the Beats, while Billy Zoom’s guitar stylings suggested rockabilly and surf. And their tales of drunkenness and heartbreak owed much to classic country. Wild Gift, their second, breakthrough record and Under the Big Black Sun, its successor, are high water marks of early 80s rock. Here they lay down “White Girl,” a key track from Wild Gift, while Manzarek twiddles the knobs.


The Beatles, "Hey Bulldog"
The official video to the Beatles hit “Lady Madonna” shows the fabs clowning around in the Apple Studio #2 where they reecorded most of their magnificent work. But it turns out that the footage is actually of them recording the brilliant toss-off "Hey Bulldog," which like "Lady Madonna" marked a return to rock & roll after months of psychedelia. Lennon & McCartney look more like they're recording a radio comedy hour than a blistering slice of rock. "Bulldog," one of the most underrated of Beatles tunes, is available only on the Yellow Submarine soundtrack. As always, the casual ease with which they produce greatness is a thing to behold, as it John Lennon’s transitional facial hair.


Wilco, "What Light"
The deluxe edition of Wilco’s latest record, Sky Blue Sky, includes DVD footage of the band recording the album at The Loft, their personal rock & roll rehearsal space/studio/Xanadu, equipped with dozens of vintage guitars and a sleeping area. In contrast to X and the Fab Four, Wilco seems to like a brightly lit studio. In that spirit, here’s a Loft run-through of the inspirational “What Light.”