Latest / Booked On Rock with Eric Senich / The 10 Albums We Can't Live Without & More with Author Greg Prato [Episode 175]

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The 10 Albums We Can't Live Without & More with Author Greg Prato [Episode 175] · Booked On Rock with Eric Senich

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I think they did that. They may have done that album while hi on
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LSD. I could be wrong, though, I'll possibly ask one of those
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drugs. Maybe I should do a podcast episode while on LSD. Yeah,
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have you ever written an article? N kids? Don't try this at home?
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I lie? I know? Dialogue? How's a fountain? The conversation?
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Right, that's a guyser? Interesting? Interesting, it's provocative. Caddy
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Man's back Man Rock and Roll. Welcome to Booked on Rock, the podcast
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For those about to read and rock. Find the podcast at bookd on rock
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dot com. You can find every episode of Booked on Rock there, along
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with links to your favorite listening platforms, exclusive videos, blogs, links to
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all of the social media sites. In the latest rock book releases another chapter
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in the dialogue series, a chill and chat with authors, fellow podcasters,
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musicians, and more. That we have author Greg Prado back on the podcast.
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Here's the author of several books and has written for song Facts, Consequence
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of Sound, Guitar World, Vintage Guitar Louder, among others. He's been
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a great supporter of the book Down Rock podcast, crediting the show in many
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articles He's written for Ultimate Guitar So As a thank you to Greg, I
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asked him to come on and talk about the books you released in twenty twenty
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three. We also talk about Queen van Halen, Zeppelin, Kiss, Lemmy
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from Motorhead, and Rush. And here's a question for you. If you
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had to pick ten albums you just could not live without, what would they
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be? Go to the show notes page or just go to booked on rock
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dot com. You can find links to the Book Down Rock, Facebook,
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Instagram, and x pages and share your top ten list. You can also
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do it by email at the Bookdown rockpodcast at gmail dot com. Greg and
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I come up with our top ten list in this episode, so let's get
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to it. We've got songs that we discussed in this episode. I'm a
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show notes page Greg Prato, Welcome back to the podcast. Hello Eric,
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how you doing. I wanted to have you come back on to talk about
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the books that you came out in twenty twenty three, and particularly that last
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one you came out, which is such a great conversation starter, fifty rock
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lists and surprise Twists. But before we start getting into the books, I
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figured I'd bring up some topics, some of the biggest stories in classic rock
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in twenty twenty three, right and get your thoughts on these. In twenty
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twenty you released the book A Rock and Rolling Man, bon Scott Remembered.
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In twenty twenty three. ACDC returned to the stage for the first time in
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seven years in October for the Power Trip Festival. This marked the return of
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singer Brian Johnson. He was replaced by Axel Rose as you know in the
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middle of the tour in twenty sixteen due to hearing problems. I saw a
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few clips on YouTube. Brian was struggling on some songs like Thunderstruck, but
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he did sound good on Let There Be Rock. What did you think of
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the performance? Well, I was shocked a few years back how well actually
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Axel sound did, especially singing bon Scott material. I thought he did a
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very good job. And it's funny because I'm not necessarily the biggest fan of
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Axel Rose or you know, or his singing. I mean early Guns n'
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Roses. I think he sounds fine, but I'm not the biggest fan.
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Yeah, I mean, it's absolutely nothing. I don't take it away from
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people that are big Guns and Roses fans. That just nar really my Cuppet
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team, but yeah. I mean I am a huge ac DC fan though,
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and I absolutely love Bond Scott and I also even love Brian Johnson too.
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It's it's funny because like with Van Halenant, like we've discussed in the
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past, I'm really just a David Lee Roth era fan. I really never
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liked the Sammy Hagar era with Van Hale, which is funny because I love
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Montrose with Sammy Hagar, but just the whole Van Hagar thing just was never
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a big fan of like, so that to me is a very it's a
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very clear line Van van Halet, David Lee Roth, van Halt, Sammy
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Hagar. Whereas ac DC with Bond Scott and Brian Johnson, I think fans
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are pre shape Brian Johnson a lot more because with that Brian Johnson ac DC
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would have just probably died and they would have wouldn't have continued on after Bond
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Scott passed away. So it's a little bit different. And honestly, I
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think, you know, you can't argue with how great Back in Black is
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so one of the greatest of all time. Yeah, so it's like a
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long story short I'd say, as long as Angus Young is alive, and
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willing to do it, and Brian Johnson can still sing. They should just
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keep going, is what I think they should see. Yeah, I say
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the same. And speaking of Back and Black, it is on a particular
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list that we're gonna we're gonna talk about later. I threw out that question
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to you to come up with a certain top ten list, so we'll get
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to that. But Back in Black's on there now. You mentioned Sammy with
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Van Halen, and another big story in twenty twenty three was Sammy Hagar announcing
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the Best of All Worlds tour with Michael Anthony on bass, Jason Bonham on
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drums, Joe Saturiine on guitar. It's gonna be mostly Van Halen songs in
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the set list, including Davira songs which Mikey's gonna sing, which is gonna
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be cool. And they appeared on Howard Stern as you know, and they
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played some Van Halen songs and Satch took some hits for his performance on there.
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It sounded rough on a few songs, but my thought is, let's
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make the final determination when the tour starts, because there's still a lot of
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time left before that tour starts and we've heard Saturn he talk about it.
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There wasn't any rehearsal for it, and even today actually there was an article
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just put up on the Van Hilen news desk of how he's having someone build
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a specific amp just to get the sound of Eddie. So I think he's
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going to be just fine when the tour starts. What did you think of
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the stern performance and what do you expect from Joe and the band this summer.
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I think it's going to be fine, and it seems like really the
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thing that most people had a problem with was when he was told on the
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spot to play the intro to the song Mean Street, and he kind of
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fumbled a little bit. But I do understand why people don't realize he obviously
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didn't practice it. So it's like, you know, if you hand them
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a guitar and say, hey, play me, I don't know, just
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like any song, if he's not familiar with it, he's not necessarily going
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to play it note for note, And that's obviously a bit of a tricky,
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uncommon thing that that song, and it's also not Van Halen's most like,
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you know, best known type song. It's different if you handed him
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a guitar and say, play me the chords to the song Panama. I'm
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sure he could figure that out, or as the beginning to that song,
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which absolutely loved the intro to Mean Street and the actual song Mean Street.
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But yeah, that to me, I was surprised people made such a huge
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deal about that. I saw that right. I remember hearing it or watching
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it and thinking, oh, he didn't play it that well. But it
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didn't really affect me that much because they knew it was just off the cuff,
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on the spot type thing. So I think Satch will do great playing
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the parts of Eddie Van Hanlin this coming summer. Kiss. Let's talk about
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that. The big event I think, the last big event in Classic Rocker
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of the Year twenty twenty three, of course, was that I don't know
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so called last show. I think it is the last show by the band.
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It's like the live actual band. And you wrote a great book twenty
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nineteen, Take It Off, Kiss Truly Unmasked, which covers the band's work
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from the eighties, which they really didn't cover much of the eighties era on
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those tours. May he threw in a few here and there, but talk
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about the final show at Madison Square Garden, December second, before we get
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to the avatars, What did you think of the final show? Yeah,
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I thought the ball was fumbled that they did not have Bruce Keel come out.
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They should have at the very least done that, And they were like,
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oh, the excuse was, well, you know, they're all wearing
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platform shoes, and you know, where is Bruce Kelock going to come out
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and look like he's three feet tall. Well that's a big load of bullshit
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because Joe Perry once came out and played Strutter with them about twenty years ago
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in Arrowsmith and Kiss were touring together and he came out playing I think he
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was wearing Paul Stanley's platform shoes. So you could just have Bruce Keell come
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out just wearing black platform shoes and he could have done a couple of songs
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as an encore. That would have been fine. I mean, the truth
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of the matter is that they always say the excuse like, oh, you
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know when Ace and Peter were in the band during the last reunion, well,
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ectually during the reunion with them, we couldn't really change the setlist around
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because those guys just couldn't play it. But then on Ace Frehley's tours.
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He plays deep cuts and stuff, which admittedly he doesn't he doesn't sing or
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it doesn't sound as good, you know, like now as he did when
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he was younger. But I recently interviewed Ace for the website called Ultimate Guitar,
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and he was honest. He said, you know, as you get
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older, we can't play things perfectly anymore, but we could at least you
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know, get it, you know, sounding somewhat like it is. But
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but just to make it, to make a long story short, they used
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the excuse like, oh, you know, we can't have those guys up.
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I remember Paul Stanley said that obnoxious thing that what kiss would sound like
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piss or something like that. He said that was a guest on Stern.
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Yeah, which that to me was kind of you know, because you know,
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look, I am a Kiss fan. But you know, I think
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Paul Stanley would be the first admit that his singing isn't as good as it
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used to be. I'm not one of these people that like tear them apart.
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I remember, like ten years ago, people were just ripping him a
9:07
new asshole, which to me, you know, you have to show some
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kind of fucking respect to the guy, after all these accomplished had had one
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of the greatest voices. Yeah, in the business, you know, one
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of the most underrated rock vocalists, I think Paul Stanley, especially the seventies,
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and even though I don't listened too much to the eighties, even though
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I wrote a book about the eighties, his singing in the eighties was really
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really great, Like he would sing high perfectly. And I'm not talking about
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just on record, but even if you hear him live on like the Crazy
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Nights tour and stuff like that, and that album vocals are really impressive.
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That album might be his best vocally, Yeah, Crazy Nights. Yeah.
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The thing is that just the show didn't it didn't have the feeling of finality
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to it, and we don't like any other show on the tour pretty much,
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right, Yeah, and we know why when we get to the end,
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you know, it's just a promotion for the avatars. But right,
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because I'm thinking, you have what was it three years the tours started three
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years ago? I think I think three or four, possibly four years ago,
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because yeah, they didn't play for almost a year because of COVID,
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so I think it was maybe four years ago. So you have all that
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time to plan that final show, and you're thinking, yeah, I don't
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know, do some kind of a role call thanks to all the guys that
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were here, Maybe a role call on the big screen. You don't have
10:26
to necessarily happen there, but at least acknowledge them. You know. Bruce
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Cullik has been doing a lot of interviews lately, and he's been saying some
10:33
very interesting things. I guess because Nowsin's Kiss is over, he can finally
10:37
speak his mind and everything. Yep. And one thing he's saying that he
10:39
said with her, which is interesting is he just came right out and said
10:43
that I don't think Doc McGee has any I forget the exact quote, but
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just that Doc McGee doesn't look at the non makeup era of Kiss as being
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worthwhile or have any kind of value, which I mean, I do agree
10:56
that to me. I mean, honestly, I really am The kiss I
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listened to the most is really a seventies kiss, and that's my favorite lineup
11:03
and I think that was the most groundbreaking and everything. But you know,
11:09
really you could have paid a little more, especially in the eighties. Without
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the eighties, Kiss would have died because in eighty one eighty two, Kiss
11:16
was at an all time low with popularity. It wasn't until after they took
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off their makeup that their career actually got rekindled, and then they were on
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MTV and on the covers of magazines. That's what my book Take It Off,
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kind of focuses on, and Bruce Kuwock was a huge part of that.
11:31
He's a very underrated guitarist. I mean that, to me was some
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of the best parts of non makeup Eric Kiss was what Bruce and also the
11:39
late great Eric Carr brought to the band. Absolutely, I'm every bit the
11:43
fan of the eighties Kiss as I am of the seventies Kiss. I think
11:48
I love it just as much, and I wish they would have gotten some
11:52
acknowledgment on that. But again, we know when we hear Paul say,
11:56
well, this is the end of one road the start of another, and
11:58
then they played the per for the avatars, like, oh okay, so
12:01
this is basically like an advertisement for the next step, right, And so
12:05
I think that that was disappointing because I remember Gene saying he's going to shed
12:09
a tear on that last show, and that's what I was hoping to have
12:13
that moment, you know, Jane gets says something emotional or something that would
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have made it feel final. But now let's get to the avatar thing.
12:22
So they do promote the avatar, but it's not coming until twenty twenty seven,
12:28
so there's something like that. Yeah, yeah, right, right,
12:30
I forget the year, but yeah, because they say that they want to
12:33
get it to look better I think, or something like that, right,
12:35
So I'm holding out on this in my opinions, but then I else I
12:39
read a quote from Gene Simmons. He claims that they're sinking like two hundred
12:43
million dollars into this or something, yes, which you know that shows what's
12:46
so screwed up about our society. I mean, why do you take the
12:50
two hundred million dollars and put it in this, like, you know,
12:52
help someone, help trying to solve some problem in the world, rather than
12:56
try to get the Kiss the Kiss avatars to look better, right, I
13:00
mean, while you put that towards helping the homeless or cancer research or something
13:05
something feeding the people don't have food. I mean, you know, I
13:09
just don't understand. Instead it's going into the avatars. Yeah, yeah,
13:15
I mean really we need better looking Kiss avatars that two hundred million dollars.
13:18
Yeah, I don't know, Yeah, I don't know. I mean as
13:20
I'm a huge Kiss fan, and so I think I'm just I'm considering going
13:24
to this. I just I'm just waiting to see what they do with it,
13:28
you know, because it's there's still some time for it to develop.
13:31
But if it works, that's kind of like what does it do for the
13:35
music business, you know, that they become ahead of their time or it
13:39
just falls flat. Well, I mean we were already in the whole like
13:43
hologram thing. In fact, I saw the Doo hologram about four or five
13:46
years ago. Now with this, what did you think of it? I
13:48
mean, you know, it was you know, you know, like I
13:52
can understand that they want to get the music of do out there and everything,
13:54
but you know, it was, you know, kind of goofy to
13:58
you know, be honest. I mean, they're arts are definitely in the
14:00
right place. But and it was a little different that it was do O
14:03
on like a screen and then they had actual live musicians playing, So that's
14:07
like a little different than when like was it the Tupac hologram. I think
14:11
was the first ever hologram at Coachella where it's just him by Jackson. Yeah,
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I don't know who. Where was the show that you saw? Was
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it on the East Coast here? Yes, it was at the Paramount in
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Huntington, Wow, Huntington, New York. Huntington, New York. Yeah,
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and yeah, you know it was good. Well, you know it
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was again, it was kind of a goof that you see, it's like
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you're watching a TV screen with But then again, I've been to some shows
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where the seats are so horrible that it's all you're doing is pretty much watching
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either the projection screen or you're just looking at the stage which little tiny ant
14:48
people. So yeah, I mean, is there really much a difference between
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that and seeing a hologram up close? I don't know. Yeah, did
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they do it? Was that like a full on tour like they were going,
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I believe it. Yeah, And that was I think the Ronnie's widow
15:03
that was it was, Yeah, Wendy Doo. Yeah, because I actually
15:07
interviewed her around that time, and again, like I know from her that
15:09
like her heart was in the right place and it wasn't you know, like
15:11
she was just trying just to keep his music alive, and you know that
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said there was a friend of mine who was going to that show who bought
15:18
his two kids, and he was telling me how happy he was that he
15:20
had this opportunity because he always told his kids that, you know, when
15:24
you're a little bit older, we'll go, we will go see d O
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live. And sadly Ryan James Dio died before they could go, so this
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was at least an opportunity for him to bring his two kids to see that
15:35
show. So I mean, from that point, that's actually worthwhile. Yeap.
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You know the book Done Rock Podcasts will be back after this talking with
15:46
author Greg Prado. And twenty twenty three you released the book Land Again and
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you were on the podcast to talk about that one and this is on the
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life and career of Mark Lanigan of Screaming Trees Queens of the Stone Age and
15:56
he was a solo artist. And you also released the one hun Greatest Songs
16:00
of Heavy Metal and you give your thoughts on various rock lists that appear on
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websites or magazines. That's a great book. The same on your book The
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one hundred Greatest Songs of Punk Rock, and that was also released in twenty
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twenty three. Those two books, the two one hundred list are those are
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Kindle only books? Kindle only, okay, so people can go to Amazon
16:19
to get that Amazon. I had you on to talk about another twenty twenty
16:25
three book, I Love Grunge, Grunges, Dead Outtakes, which is a
16:27
follow up to one of your best known and most successful books, which came
16:32
out back in twenty oh nine, Dead Grunge Is Dead. You also released
16:36
an updated, expanded edition of your book on the New York Jets called Butt
16:41
Fumbles, Fake Spikes, Mud Bowls and Heidi Games. The Top one hundred
16:45
Debacles of the New York Jets Update and Expanded and it's the torn Achilles Tendon
16:51
Edition. I could not believe what I was watching in that first game of
16:56
the season, and I remember it was during halftime. I was sitting with
17:00
my friends and I said, you know what, I have to now do
17:02
an updated version of this book and add what I just saw into this book.
17:04
And Hender Rogers I had to put it in there. So, yeah,
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what do you think of all this stuff with him and Jimmy kimmel Man
17:11
they hate each other. I mean, well, first of all, I
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don't really you know, with people with superstitions and stuff. I don't really
17:18
believe so much in like superstitions, but I do kind of believe, not
17:22
so much in curses with sports franchises, but there are definitely sports franchises that
17:27
are run so poorly that it does kind of then like I can't really even
17:34
put it's just like a bad mojo sure surrounding. And the Jets just I
17:41
don't know what it is with them, just year after year after year,
17:44
just when you think they may be turning a corner or something is going their
17:48
way. Just what is it? Murphy's blas whatever will go wrong, whatever
17:52
can go wrong, will go wrong. All right, So that gets us
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caught up on all but one book from twenty twenty three. We want to
17:57
talk about the most recent and when they came out, I think it was
18:00
October or November. Fifty Rock Lists and Surprise Twist. So this is just
18:04
it's a great book to It's a conversation starter at parties, that's for sure.
18:08
How did you get or it's a very good bathroom book, right,
18:12
it's a good bathroom book. Yes, how did you get the idea for
18:15
this one? I've done a lot of lists over the years for a bunch
18:18
of sites and magazines like I write for a wide variety of places, So
18:22
I just started compiling them all together. And then I also realized I had
18:26
a pretty good amount of them, so I said, oh, you know,
18:29
if I add a few new ones, I could bring the number up
18:30
to fifty. So I added some exclusive lists that have never been published before
18:37
for this book, and it covers a pretty good amount of ground. I'm
18:41
pretty sure from the sixties up to probably the nineties or covered, because that's
18:45
really I don't know, like when you hit a certain age, I don't
18:48
know music he just cuts off. I mean, not music, but just
18:52
what you're willing to listen to or accept, or just music that you think
18:56
is as good as what you grew up listening. It's so true, Yes,
19:02
I don't know. It's kind of like as the years went on,
19:04
just for some reason, slowly and slowly I stopped bringing more new bands in
19:10
that I think are really unique or interesting and don't just sound like every other
19:14
band. So I kind of wonder sometimes, like when I was younger and
19:17
listening to you listening to Metallica Master of Puppets for the first time is there
19:22
If I played that for someone older where they've been like, oh, this
19:25
sounds like everything else, probably not right. I think about that a lot.
19:29
I don't. I just I think that we were at the tail end
19:33
of rock's run, which was from basically I don't know, you could go
19:38
back to the Buddy hollydays, so you could say maybe mid to late fifties
19:42
to mid nineties, and then things just went to shit. Yeah, I
19:48
mean there's good stuff that's come out since then. I can't say there's absolutely
19:52
nothing, but no, because I would say from like the mid nineties into
19:55
the early two thousands, I was really into Radiohead for a while. In
19:57
the late nineties, I was really into I still am into the band Queens
20:00
of the Stone Age, Eaves of death Metal. I went through a brief
20:03
period of loving the Strokes. I haven't listened to them though in years.
20:07
I wonder if I heard them again what I would think of them. But
20:10
I really like their first album a lot. I thought they were going to
20:11
be the next, but then again, they are pretty big. Just I
20:14
don't I haven't listened to them. But we're far from that point where rock
20:18
bands were in the top forty we're rock and roll songs in the you know,
20:26
right, It's just I don't I hate to say it. I don't
20:29
see it's it's ever gonna happen again. I think I think it's I think
20:33
it's done. And what what happens when you have all of these artists and
20:36
bands who no longer tour and they passed away? What what does that leave
20:41
us with the rock fans? I don't know. They just I guess you
20:45
have to listen to all the albums and just ye thankful that we have them.
20:48
Right, Let's get to some of the lists in the book. Here's
20:49
a good one. Five best Queen songs not sung by Freddy. Pick any
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one of these from you if you remember from the book and tell us why
20:57
say was I believe wasn't some day one day? One of the one of
21:02
the selections, Queen two sung by Brian May. I'm surprised I'm in Love
21:07
with My Car was not in there. Uh yeah, that song, I
21:10
have to I was never a big fan of I mean, musically it's okay,
21:14
but lyrically that song I think just falls flat. Personally, Yeah,
21:18
I think Brian May has a very underrated lead. But then they can also
21:21
Roger Taylor was a great singer too. Yeah, that's what made Queen so
21:23
good is with the harmony vocals. They had three guys that could have been
21:27
lead singers, but Freddie Mercury, of course is on a whole other levels.
21:30
So but I mean Brian but in just about almost any other band,
21:34
Brian May and Roger Taylor would have been a great lead vocalist. So you
21:37
follow with the top fifteen greatest Freddie Mercury performances. They come with some interesting
21:44
backstories, which is cool. Here can tell the one behind the performance of
21:48
under Pressure on Saturday Night Live nineteen eighty two. Yes, well, supposedly.
21:52
What happened was Queen's tour ended. I don't think I even put this
21:56
in the book. Queen's tour ended one week before, for they got a
22:00
slot for Saturday Night Live, so they had to just sit in the United
22:03
States for a whole extra week after the tour ended, just to play this
22:07
one performance, and they did it. But the story goes that the night
22:12
before the performance, Freddie Mercury got into an argument with his boyfriend, a
22:17
screaming match or something, and he lost his voice and they thought that he
22:19
may not be able to sing, or if he was going to sing,
22:22
it was gonna sound crappy. But if you listen to it, he sounds
22:26
he sounds fine, So he was able to pull it off like a true
22:30
professional. Is that on YouTube because a lot of times they pulled the it
22:33
is on YouTube, you know, it is Saturday Night Live is pretty strict,
22:36
so I think they have they have the audio with just a picture and
22:40
then they have the video, but the video is like on an angle something.
22:42
I think that's how you get away. Yeah, So interestingly, you're
22:48
right. Sadly, Queen's SNL appearance would prove to be the band's last ever
22:52
live performance on US soil with Freddy as their front Yes so Hot. It
22:57
was the Hot Space album, which was their worst album, was their last
23:02
album they ever toured the US with you, which is kind of sad that
23:04
they went out on their worst album with the tour, but the actual tour
23:08
was great if you watch live footage, and they put out a live album
23:12
from that tour a few years back called Clean on Fire Live at the Ball,
23:17
which is fantastic and which was a big mistake on their part. The
23:21
Hot Space material, which was very dance Oriented Live is much more hard rock
23:26
sounding and much more it's like hard rock funk, whereas the album is very
23:32
flat disco. Ye no energy is very low energy. So they could have
23:37
done a dance rock merger and made it heavy and good, you know,
23:40
like Trampled Underfoot by of course led Zeppel And that's like a funk rock hybrid
23:45
that I think works really really well. So they could have done something like
23:48
that. But do you remember it? Sometimes it's been a while since authors
23:52
write these books, so they forget who is the host of SNL. You
23:55
have it in the book on to guess Chevy Chase. You got it?
23:57
Check right there, we go check me. Nineteen eighty two. Now I
24:00
wonder what movie was he promoting nineteen eighty two. Eighty one would have been
24:06
Modern Problems, which is one of my favorite You remember, isn't that the
24:11
one where is that the one he has mental abilities to make things? Yes?
24:15
Yes, Oh my god. You might be the only person remembers that
24:21
movie because that was like in between his hits. It was like kind of
24:23
it was in nineteen eighty three would have been the first vacation. Yeah,
24:29
yeah, so so September eighty t would have been a few months before that
24:33
ten unexpectedly great guitar solos. Everyone talks about the Killer Sacks work on Jerry
24:38
Rafferts Baker Street. You highlight the solo. Who is on that solo and
24:42
what led you to putting it on the list. Yes, not too many
24:45
people know this, but Scott Beao from the movie from the TV show Happy
24:48
Days plays the guitar solo. Did you know that? Yeah, to make
24:55
sure that you paying attention, I just want to make sure you're fully paying
24:57
attention to what I'm saying. I'm gonna let you tell everyone who the guitarist
25:04
is. Yes, let's look it up. Hold on, let's say it
25:07
because because I'll be honest, it's not someone that I know off the top
25:10
of my head, because it isn't like a well known you never know.
25:12
Because Chevy was in a pre Steely Dane absolutely right, absolutely, yeah,
25:18
he was with the drummer right if he was, he was, They were
25:22
called Steely Dan. They were called something else I think at Bard College.
25:26
Uh yeah, Hugh Burns there a Scottish chap as you're right by the name
25:32
of Burns. Yeah, yes, oh, he's played He played with Paul
25:36
McCartney, Jack Bruce Boys. Oh, he's also on Careless Whisper, which
25:41
which is another song as you know, relied heavily on saxophone. Yes,
25:45
you do have Let's Dance in there too, and that's I think it's amazing.
25:49
People Still there are people who don't know Stevie Ray Vaughans on that I
25:53
think I have, and I think I have your favorite guitarist on that list
25:56
as well, with a very obvious guest, right, yes, eat it.
26:02
Yeah. Twenty five Greatest rock Guitar Albums of nineteen eighty two. That
26:06
was a great year. That was one of my Yes, one of my
26:10
favorite UFO songs. The writer from the Mechanics album This album doesn't include Michael
26:18
Shankar on guitar. It's Paul Chapman. Yes, you include that album at
26:22
number twenty three. All the way up at number three is the lone album
26:26
from the David Lee Roth The Ears of Van Halen that takes any heat and
26:30
that would be diver down And you say, which I agree. The originals
26:34
are worth the price of the album, even if you're not a fan of
26:38
the covers. Right, Although I think Where All the Good Time's Gone is
26:41
a great cover. I think that's fantastic, which a lot of people didn't
26:44
even know because it's kind of an unknown Kinks song, right, But the
26:48
originals on that album kick ass. The only song I don't like on that
26:53
album is the cover of Dancing in the Street. That's the only one I
26:57
just don't like. The just yeah, I don't know if people say that
27:00
and I love it. I would say that of Pretty Woman when I hear
27:06
pretty Woman does nothing for me? And yeah, I mean yeah, honestly
27:08
not. You know what's funny is I like Intruder more than I like actually
27:11
Pretty Woman, which you yes, for the whole video. Yes, because
27:17
the video was on which now is so long they had to insert something to
27:21
which Now let me actually pick your brain about something. What I understand is
27:26
Eddie van Halen did instrumentals throughout van Halen, with little guitar interludes and stuff,
27:32
and they're always phenomenal, whether it be the beginning of Girl Gone Bad,
27:37
that beginning is fantastic. I love the beginning of Intruder. I love
27:41
Saturday Afternoon in the Park, I love Spanish fly eruption. Why the hell
27:48
would Eddie van Halen not have done in his lifetime a instrumental solo album.
27:53
Those songs I just mentioned are strong enough on their own that they would have
27:59
kept the attention of people that aren't guitar play just because the melodies and stuff,
28:03
and it's just interesting music. And it's also a wide variety of music
28:07
as well. So I don't know why, especially during those years where they
28:10
weren't getting along with Sammy or Dave, just him and mikel Anthony and Alex
28:15
van Halensh're just done a very interesting all instrumental I don't understand why. Yes,
28:21
I agree, and I'm going to tell you there's one song, because
28:23
you say you're not a big Sammy era fan, but there's an instrumental on
28:26
balance, and it's called Balance and the association is impossible titled after some kind
28:33
of dinosaur or something like that. Balacheothereum, Ballachi ethereum. There you go.
28:41
I say it in enough times, I'll get it down. But yeah,
28:44
so I think that Eddie might it must have crossed his mind. I
28:48
can only assume that he felt that he would have gotten resistance from a commercial
28:53
standpoint, that it wouldn't sell as like an album with a singer, because
28:59
the thing is he wrote. Even Michael Anthony said, he righte he really
29:03
wrote songs like their instrumentals anyway, right, and you know then Sammy and
29:07
Dave would come in and put the lyrics over him. I can give you
29:11
actually a very good example. There is an instrumental version of I Believe.
29:17
It's the song I'm the One off Van Helen. If you listen, if
29:21
you go on YouTube and listen to that, the instrumental by itself totally keeps
29:23
your attention. He's doing all fills and stuff that you don't even hear because
29:29
David Garth is singing over it. If you ever get a chance, go
29:30
back and listen to that. Yeah, all interesting guitar stuff that you don't
29:36
really hear because of the vocals. Over the vocals and just go down.
29:38
And I think it would have done well. It Obviously it wouldn't have.
29:42
I don't think Warner Brothers would have felt that it was gonna be a multi
29:47
platinum selling album. I get it. But it would have been for him
29:49
just to do it and for his diehard hardcore fans would have been awesome.
29:55
It would have been. Would you agree that it would have been better than
29:56
also and I'm not saying as a joke it would have been better than then.
30:00
Van Halen three, right, Yeah, I mean people used to ask
30:04
him how come you don't do a solo album, and he would always say,
30:07
this is really my solo album, this is my music, so why
30:11
would I bother doing anything else. But there's a song called Pleasure Dome off
30:15
of four Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. That's the one song where it doesn't it should
30:21
have just been an instrumental. It's Sammy's. It sounds like he had some
30:26
difficulty trying to come up with the vocals on that one. And if you
30:30
give that one a listen, I think you'll find that to be the case.
30:33
But yeah, it's just one of those things. Or maybe there's stuff
30:36
in the vaults. Maybe there is stuff in there that will eventually hear.
30:38
I don't know, I actually asked. I interviewed Wolfgang van Halen a few
30:44
months back before I believe the All Music site, and I asked him about
30:48
if there's any updates with going through the vaults, and he said something to
30:52
the effective I don't hold your breath. Yes, you're one of the few
30:55
that I think of the last year that even asked it because I think a
31:00
lot of reporters kind of gave up on it. So credit to you man.
31:03
You asked it and we put that up on the Vane Hill and news
31:06
estator. Yeah. Yeah, he said don't hold your breath. I mean
31:08
he basically I think he told you too. It's up to Alex at this
31:11
point. I think Alex is the one who's really you're going to make the
31:14
calls. Ten Led Zeppelin songs that prove Robert plant as a golden God.
31:18
Some of Zeppelin's most famous songs on here, but I do like seeing one
31:22
like in My Time of Dying that's number ten. What stands out to you
31:26
about his vocals of that particular track, Like why did you include that one?
31:30
So many you could put in there, I mean runs the gamut from
31:36
singing to screaming. There's like a blues soul rock I mean, just he
31:41
is a te I mean, he's definitely in the top five rock vocalists of
31:45
all time. As far as talent goes, there's very few, really him
31:48
and Freddy and if you want to include Ronnie James Dio, you know,
31:52
Halford, like those guys. I can't really think of too many other as
31:56
far as like technically or singers that could sing a wide variety of styles as
32:01
well. And I think what you mentioned at the end, oh my Jesus,
32:06
oh yes, yeah, yeah exactly. And then of course he also
32:08
coughs at the end. I love that stuff. I love that stuff.
32:12
That that's that's the stuff that's missing from the music nowadays too. It's just
32:16
that that leave the mistakes in what's the one where maybe that's the one.
32:21
It's in the beginning where you hear the airplane flying overhead and you hear it's
32:24
on physical graffiti. I forget the name. Is it a black country woman?
32:28
Maybe it takes on you and you hear him go not leave it?
32:30
Yeah, yeah, the book down Rock Podcasts will be back after this.
32:37
Ten times Lemmy was the coolest man on earth. Please share with us one
32:43
of these if you, if you can, if you need help, I
32:45
can look at well. I'm trying to thank you because honestly a lot of
32:46
these lists I did like years ago. That's it. Yeah, let me
32:50
see, here we go. We'll pick uh, okay, let me just
32:52
pick one and maybe it'll okay, God, I was gonna guess what one
32:58
may be. But it's probably better if you just tell me. Okay,
33:00
what's crashing through a wall? Oh? Okay, that was Actually that's what
33:04
I was gonna say. There's a Motorhead video called Killed by Death, and
33:10
uh, one thing about Motorhead with like that video is unlike a lot of
33:14
eighties metal videos, they had a bit of a sense of humor sometimes Motorhead,
33:17
such as with that. There's a the video is like that. There's
33:22
a love interest of Lemmys and I think is that the woman's parents don't like
33:28
Lemmy or something. And there's a scene where a motorcyclist crashes through a wall
33:35
and picks up the girl and it's it's it's Lemmy on the motorcycle in the
33:38
hats, but it's obviously not him going through the wall. But yeah,
33:42
it's not really Lemmy crashing through the wall. But yeah, serving as a
33:47
roadie for Jimi Hendrix is that's that's great. I mean, that is just
33:51
great. I once interviewed I was lucky to interview Lemmy a few times over
33:54
the years, and I told him once, I said, you're one of
33:57
the few people I could say that you knew Jimmy hen and also sid Vicious.
34:01
Yes, because Yeah, he used to I think sell sid Vicious,
34:05
either drugs or something like that. He was telling me. And then I've
34:08
also heard rumors that he may have also sold Jimi Hendrix some kind of drugs
34:12
as well. So you talk about there's a guy who died with his boots
34:15
on that he just waited until he couldn't play anymore. Yeah. Ten moments
34:19
that show the awesomeness of Neil Peart. Yes, you note the one aspect
34:23
of Peart that has off and overlooked because he was such an amazing drummer.
34:27
That's his lyrics, which is so true. If you had to pick a
34:29
favorite song lyrically by Neil, what would it be, without a doubt,
34:32
the song called Losing It, which people tend to not know what the hell
34:36
song that is, but it's from Yes. Yeah, the lyrics are a
34:38
fantastic Yeah, I mean I know like that. For instance, there was
34:43
the Great Rush documentary that came out a few years back, Beyond the Lighted
34:47
Stage. I think it's cool. Yeah, they got friend Martin Popoff was
34:51
a part of that, and there's a little part in it where they kind
34:53
of goof on Neil parts. You know, it's funny. Is I'm just
34:58
gonna make a little slight detour. For decades people called him Neil Part and
35:04
then somehow along the way, I think Getty Lee and Concert referred to him
35:07
as Neil Peart. Now everyone is saying I'm going with I don't know.
35:13
I used to pronounce it part like the shampoo part shampoo. But yeah,
35:20
the point being yeah, I mean, some of the early Rush lyrics get
35:23
to be you know, he was still kind of finding his way, but
35:27
by the time we get to Signals, he's really come into his own.
35:30
I mean even that I was thinking yesterday the lyrics to the song Tom Sawyer
35:35
is fantastic. But the song called Losing It, it's about just getting old
35:39
and what happens. I think it was inspired by I believe Hemingway and now
35:44
he committed suicide. Okay, But also there's I think there's it's about a
35:47
dancer too getting older, who who can there's Ballerina, which it's also a
35:53
thing about a writer. I think the writer part is it's supposed is a
35:57
nod to actually Hemingway. I think, I think, yeah, yeah,
36:00
But the lyrics lyrically it's great. After me that it is kind of a
36:05
depressing. Yeah, but it's fo the whole electric uh, the electric violin
36:10
solo is great and that it's beautiful. Did you did you hear? I
36:14
wrote a blog on this on my website, booked on rock dot com,
36:16
and I talked about how Geddy Lee was interviewed recently, saying, right after
36:21
Neil died, he's getting messages from people say, hey, man, you
36:23
need a drummer, and I get he's sa dude. That is pretty Actually,
36:29
had believe I just did you believe I just interviewed. You're always show
36:34
you a picture of someone I just interviewed recently. It's like just you know,
36:37
have have some compassion, you know, give it, give it a
36:40
couple of weeks at least. So like that's what Getty was saying. Oh
36:45
you got Alex Liveson. Yeah. I interviewed Alex Liveson for the website called
36:49
Ultimate Guitar. It's going to be running very very shortly video video. Oh
36:54
sweet. So what were the any questions that you can tell us you asked?
37:00
Did you ask about are you going to get back together? Yeah?
37:04
Well, the basis for the interview was he has a brand new AMP series
37:09
coming out, so I asked questions about that, but they did say towards
37:14
the end of the interview, you can ask a few questions about Rush,
37:17
which I did. Okay, I just wouldn't want to give away at this
37:21
point, but now, but there is some very cool Rush stuff in there
37:24
that and he gave some really thoughtful answers of things I never heard him talk
37:29
about. I mean, like some things he's talked up. But there is
37:30
definitely some cool, interesting stuff in there. All right. My favorite chapter
37:35
in your book five overlooked Kiss album tracks, because I feel there is much
37:39
more to Kiss. I can tell you one that I like the most.
37:42
Okay, mister Speed, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I'm I'm a huge
37:51
fan of their music. To me, they're much more than the show.
37:52
I don't know, Yeah, no, I always. In fact, I'm
37:57
gonna keep on tooting my own horn. That I went into ed Paul Stanley
38:00
and I told him that, you know, as a Kiss fan, I
38:01
always it kind of rubbed me the wrong way how everyone always focuses on the
38:06
show and the makeup and the costumes. I thought that Kiss wrote some really
38:08
great songs and or underrated players and everything. But I think that that's true.
38:14
Yeah, I can kind of understood what I was saying. Cool Strange
38:17
Ways from seventy four is Hotter than Hell, which is choice. That's one
38:22
of makes Phirley's best solos. I think I'd switch it out though, with
38:24
Parasite from that album. There's also a song off Love Gun called Almost Human
38:31
that has a great backwards Jimmy HENDRICKX type solo that he yes and Jean's vocals.
38:37
I think he's underrated as a vocalist too. He's just got a great
38:40
sound to his vocals. One from The Non Makeup Years, Not for the
38:45
Innocent from eighty three's Lick It Up. I can't argue with that one.
38:50
I do have one from the Non Makeup Years, Silver Spoon from eighty nine's
38:53
Hot in the Shade, I would say, and King of Hearts, King
38:57
of Hearts not far behind that. Okay. Those there some u Those are
39:00
some good ones. Trimming it down to five is not easy. Yeah,
39:04
it's kind of hard. Yeah. Winding down Top ten musical Oddities Number four
39:09
Crispin, Helly and Glover. The Big Problem, The Solution, The Solution,
39:15
Let it be from nineteen This is the back to the Future. Yeah,
39:20
this is of course Crispin Glover front. He is mister McFly. What
39:23
the hell is this album? I listened a little bit. It's like a
39:27
spoken very odd. He was obviously trying to be very very wacky and the
39:31
spoken words stuff. It's just maniacal singing and weird. STU. It's you
39:37
know, worth a listen, but it's not the type of thing you want
39:39
to put on like at a party. Yeah, it is odd. It's
39:44
on YouTube if anybody wants to give it a listen. I think it's on
39:46
Spotify too. If it is album, let me get his songs on the
39:51
on the show notes page. I'll put a link up there. All right,
39:52
So let's finish up with the list that I asked you to come up
39:57
with, and I have my own ten albums. Greg Crado cannot live without
40:02
interrupted. Of course, as soon as they sent you that list, I
40:05
automatically thought about another five more. All right, do you have to listen
40:09
in front of you? Or shall I read it? I don't have that
40:12
listen from me, So if you just want to, we can go one
40:15
by one and I'll just tell you a few sentences freach If yeah, now
40:19
you didn't, I don't think you ranked them ten to one, right,
40:22
I didn't, Yeah, I was. I could tell you that the one
40:23
album I would feel comfortable putting at number one, Should I just start off
40:27
with that one? Yeah? Which one? Alright? Blind Melon Soup nice
40:30
number one? One? Talk a lot about that. That's an album that
40:34
I don't like. Part of me is always like, I'm always like a
40:36
dark horse type of guy when it comes to movies and music and stuff like
40:40
that. A lot of people look at Blind Melon as a one hit wonder
40:44
and they think, you know, they didn't really dig deeper because sadly,
40:47
Shannon Hun died too young. But their second album is an album soup.
40:53
It's called came out nineteen ninety five, an album that I could listen.
40:57
I've been listening to it pretty steadily since nineteen ninety five, and I never
41:00
get sick of it, and just yeah, we're just a work of art
41:06
and the most underrated band to come out of the nineties. I agree,
41:09
so that that one, I would say, just you know, for I
41:13
know that there's been a lot of other albums that have been more influential and
41:15
have sold more, but that to me is just Greg Prato's number one.
41:20
That's Greg Prato's number one. I actually remember some of the ones I also
41:23
went with. Queen two was also on there. It's in there Queen two
41:28
because that was that's again another dark horse type thing that that's probably one of
41:34
Queen's lesser known albums. That in probably hot Space or they're probably two lesser
41:37
known and also least selling albums. But uh, it's like their most heavy,
41:43
darkest, froggy, fucked up sounding album, similar to Blind Melon Soup
41:49
and Queen two. It's an album you could listen to from start to finish.
41:52
It's a whole entire work of art type from the seven Seeds of rye
41:58
Oh okay, which is but then there's like there's great songs like I love
42:01
the song called Father to Son. Yes, that's great. That's a Brian
42:06
May lead vocals Brian May song. Is also a song called Ogre Battle,
42:08
which Paul Diano of Iron Maiden once told me he thinks that is the first
42:14
ever rash metal song. Wow okay, And that was written totally by Freddy
42:19
Mercury. So that's what makes Queen such a fantastic band is they offered us
42:23
a huge think of Freddy Murky writing their heaviest song over Battle, then also
42:29
writing crazy little thing called Love and writing the discoy parts of Hot Space like
42:36
body Language, and he definitely covered a huge one and of course gospel with
42:40
Somebody to Love. That's what makes Freddy Mercury such a force to be reckoned
42:45
with artistically, most versatile band in rock to songwriting. All four guys,
42:51
each of them had a number one single, yeah, on one chart or
42:53
another. Right, and then from that on, if you wanted to start
42:57
naming the albums, because I kind of forget which one, Yeah, let's
43:00
you got Sound Garden, super Unknown, Yeah, I always go between super
43:02
Unknown and also a Bad motor Finger but yeah, so really it depends on
43:07
the day I go. I alternate between those two. But Bad motor Finger
43:10
I like the sound, the I think production of it more. Yeah.
43:15
I try to ask myself, like, well, what if there's an album
43:17
that you just couldn't live without, Like if somebody said to you you can
43:20
never listen to this again. That's kind of the mindset I went into going
43:22
with this list. Meat Puppets Up on the Sun. Yes, a lot
43:25
of people would go with Meat Puppets two, and their best known best selling
43:30
album is the one called Too High to Die, which is a great album
43:32
which I later did a book with Meat Puppets and I borrowed that title.
43:37
It's called too High to Die. Meet the Meat Puppets. Oh cool,
43:38
that has backwater. Yeah that was yes, Yeah, yeah, that was
43:44
the hit. Yeah, v yes, van Halen fair Warning it Yeah,
43:50
I mean, of course I warn't. I was tempted to go with the
43:52
first Van Halen, but I figured, why not go with the one that
43:55
is the more uncommon selection, So I will fair Warning because is Yeah,
44:00
that's just I love it. I don't know. I tend to like dark
44:02
albums, like dark sounding albums, whether it be Queen two or Fair Warning
44:08
or Blind Melon Soup definitely has this dark, dark moments. You're right,
44:13
Divo, freedom of choice, that's in it. Devo is one of my
44:15
all time favorite bands. Again similar to Kiss, A lot of people can't
44:20
look past the whole flower pot thing and there's zany outfits, but a lot
44:23
of their lyrics are very, very thought provoking, and they also have a
44:29
sense of humor, which is great about what they did. Very visually stimulating,
44:32
especially for that time, groundbreaking when it comes to also music video.
44:37
They're one of the first bands to do interesting music videos. But yeah,
44:40
that album though, I Freedom of Choice that has the song Whippet, which
44:44
everyone knows. My two favorite Devo songs are the title track for Freedom of
44:49
Choice, which is great. You know It's a Girl You Want which Soundgarden
44:52
later did a fantastic cover of Thin Lizzie Live and Dangerous. Is this the
44:57
one with Huey Lewis, Yes, yes, it is, Yes, I
45:01
love it. Yeah, he comes out and he plays harmonica on a song
45:05
called Baby Drives Me Crazy. But he was in a band called Clover.
45:08
I thought they were opening. Yeah, okay, actually interview again. I'll
45:14
just keep two to my horn. I interviewed Huey Lewis a few months back.
45:16
I believe for song facts and is he doing good? But sadly I
45:22
don't know if he can perform anymore because of his hearing ones. I was
45:25
going to give you some good news on that front. Yeah, No,
45:29
it seems like he's Yeah, he says without his hearing aids, he's totally
45:31
deaf. Yeah, but in fact he said he's doing He was doing the
45:36
interview with me because he has a hearing aid that has a bluetooth connection in
45:39
it. So he's doing the interview, he could hear me in his hearing
45:44
aid through zoom or whatever. That's how we were doing the interview. But
45:46
just to get back quickly to the live renditions of a lot of those classic
45:52
tracks I think are better than the studio ones, and I just want to
45:57
quickly jump back to meet Puppets up on this for people that aren't that familiar
46:00
with that. It came out in nineteen eighty five, and it's a very
46:04
unique sounding album. It's like very psychedelic sounding. There's clean guitar, but
46:08
it's like psychedelic Hendrick c type weird stuff. I think they did that.
46:14
They may have done that album while high on LSD. I could be wrong
46:17
though, or possibly accid one of those drugs, but it's fantastic. Kirk
46:22
Kirkwood is a highly underrated guitarist, very original, was a huge influence on
46:27
a lot of the grunge bands like Sound Garden and Nirvana. The only thing
46:30
I will warn you about that album is as a vocalist, he kind of
46:34
warbles in and off of key. But that never that that never stopped David
46:38
Lee roth Right, It never did, It never did, And now you
46:42
got me thinking maybe I should do a podcast episode while on LSD. Yeah,
46:45
have you ever written an article? NA, kids, don't try this
46:53
at home. King's Axe Gretchen Goes to Nebraska. Yeah, one of the
46:59
most underrated bands of all time. I did a book of them king z
47:02
X called kings X The Oral History, which came out a few years back.
47:07
Yeah, that was an album came out nineteen eighty nine, very original.
47:09
Nineteen eighty nine was just when hair metal was phasing out and we were
47:14
turning into alternative and grunge and everything, and that album really sounded like nothing
47:20
else at the time. There. It's soulful, It has beatles elements,
47:24
has prog elements, heavy elements, acoustic elements. If you're not familiar with
47:30
that album, give it a listen. The production is maybe a touch dated,
47:34
but you know, it's still great songwriting, great playing. I think
47:37
if you're not familiar with it, definitely listened to it. Jimi Hendrick's Axis
47:40
Bold Is Love. Again, the obvious selection is probably are you experienced?
47:45
But Axis Bold Is Love is just a very interesting sounding album. Once in
47:51
Dude Steve I and he said that he picked up his whole cord vocabulary by
47:55
listening to that album, and if you listen to that and listen to a
47:59
Steve Ice song such as Sisters, can definitely connect the dots between a lot
48:04
of like an octaves and clean guitar, very interesting guitar tones, and again
48:08
it's I don't think it's really a true hit song on that album. Probably
48:13
like Little Wing is the best known song I think on the first Jimi Hendrix's
48:16
album I ever had was smash Hits. I don't think there was one single
48:20
song off of Axis Bold his Love on that best of album, but fantastic
48:24
album The Pretenders their self titled debut. I'm assuming that's the first album.
48:30
One of the most underrated guitarists of all time is James Honeyman Scott. Very
48:35
very interesting guitar style. Yes, late great. One of my favorite guitar
48:40
solos of all time is on the song called Tattooed Love Boys. He has
48:45
a break a right in the middle of a guitar soul that's fantastic. It's
48:49
almost like a David Gilmour type thing where he's giving you like a phrase stops.
48:54
He's giving almost like phrase that are like easily to digest kind of,
49:00
So if you're not for that, listened to that song Tattooed Love Boys.
49:02
That's a great song. And also, Chrissy Hine is a underrated lyricist and
49:08
I think she's a great artist overall, so I give her nothing but praise.
49:12
Yeah, I'm a Pretender's hits fan, so I know all the songs
49:15
from on the radio and the best of and all that stuff, so I
49:19
should really listen to some more of the Pretending. I renewed their latest out,
49:22
like I reviewed their latest album, and I kind of drop off after
49:25
the first few albums, but their latest album was surprisingly strong. Okay,
49:29
I have to give them credit for that. Cool. Now you have an
49:31
honorable mention because that's ten. But you did add one for good luck,
49:36
which is ACDC, Dirty Deed's Done Dirt Cheap. Yeah, because Bond Scott.
49:39
If I have to go with my top three vocalists of all time,
49:43
I gotta go with Freddy. Chris Cornell and Bond Scott are probably my top
49:46
three. There's something just special, unique about Yeah. I was thinking so
49:52
crazy. You think about the late seventies and especially early eighties, all the
49:55
great bands you had ACDC with Bond Scott. You had Van Hm with David
50:00
Lee Roth, and and then you had and then you had albums coming out
50:04
that like are kind of forgotten, like Billy Squire. Don't say no that
50:07
that album is absolutely phenomenal if you go back and listen to that. The
50:12
Car's first album was phenomenal. Trick, Yeah, you have Cheap Trick at
50:17
Buda Khan, one of the greatest live albums. But let me just quickly
50:22
throw out some albums that I could not fit on the list. We have
50:23
Faith No More Angel Dust, I wish Mark Lannigan Bubblegum is a great album
50:30
could have been on that list. Cheap Trick at Budakan. I would have
50:32
loved to have added to that list. Yes, so many albums you could
50:39
have. I could have had to Kiss Alive. Yeah. Yeah, the
50:44
just keeps going and going. The list, Well, that's the thing that
50:46
made it hard for me is some of these bands. There's a few bands
50:50
that I could just pick so many, but I just picked just one.
50:52
So here's my top ten. Let's what is your favorite Van Hellen album?
50:57
Go ahead, start with that. Yeah, my my personal one one.
51:01
If I had to pick just one, which is on the list here,
51:05
it's got to be nineteen eighty four, Okay, if I had to just
51:08
pick one, yeah, because there's a connection to it at personally. It's
51:13
the first Van Halen song I ever heard was Jump. I remember seeing the
51:16
video like it was yesterday. I can even see it in my head being
51:20
in the living room twelve years old, and then finally hearing the whole album
51:25
and just being blown away by it, and then years later listening to it,
51:30
going back and listening to it again when I became like a real so
51:35
it would have been like in eighty eight eighty nine, I started to just
51:38
invest all of my time into Van Hellen. Each week I would take the
51:42
money I got for my part time job and buy another album or cassette.
51:46
And when I listened to nineteen eighty four, including those two badass tunes House
51:51
of Pain and Girl Going Bad, it was like, Okay, this shit
51:54
is awesome, So I just I have to go with that one. Even
51:58
though I've said the story a zillion times, fifty one fifty is the album
52:00
that turned me on to Van Haleen, but nineteen eighty four is just that's
52:05
the band just to me on all cylinders and it's a short album. It's
52:08
not it's not a long. A lot of their albums are short. It
52:10
isn't like Van Halen two barely over thirty minutes long, right, and surprising
52:15
because Van Halen's my favorite band, it's not number one on my list,
52:19
so I'll go ten to one. Good. So we started number ten.
52:23
You two Joshua Tree, Okay, I actually bought that at Strawberries with a
52:30
gift certificate Christmas gift, and I got that one tattoo you and there was
52:36
a third one in there, but those are the two that I remember most.
52:38
And Joshua Tree is to me perfect. Pearl Jam ten yep, and
52:45
I could have picked Nirvana's never Mind, but that's an album I could have
52:50
put into you, right, but that at that period I gravitated more towards
52:53
Pearl Jam. I'm still such a huge fan. I love Nirvana, but
52:59
it was that kind of got my attention first. The Police, Ghosts in
53:04
the Machine Okay, yeah, I'm I love Zenyata Mandada is probably my favorite.
53:09
There isn't one bad album that they made, not so that's why it
53:14
was hard to pick. But this one, just like you were saying,
53:16
it's a little dark. It's good. It's got a dark edge to it.
53:20
Yeah, speaking of Tattoo You that I put as number seven, the
53:23
rolling song is tattoo You. It's not a lot of the Stones fans that
53:27
say it's not an official album because there's kind of like recycled songs, but
53:30
whatever, it's awesome. Again, going back to the dark theme, the
53:34
Cure Disintegration number six. Are you a Cure fan at all? You know?
53:37
It's a band that I have a lot of respect for. My wife
53:40
is a huge Cure fan and she'll play me stuff and I'm like, yeah,
53:43
this is actually pretty interesting. And I always mean to go back and
53:45
listen to them, but I have yet to them. And also depeche Mode
53:51
or two bands that i'll hear stuff. There's my Oh this actually sounds pretty
53:54
good. But back in the eighties I was knee deep in heavy metal.
53:58
So Disintegration is is their masterpiece and I it was like ninety one. My
54:05
roommate it's a big alternative rock fan. He played the CD for me and
54:08
I was like, mesmeriz so that that's a must Number five a CDC back
54:14
in black? What do I do? I even need to explain why Yeah,
54:17
that's a perfect I mean it's perfect. Now, Martin Popov is not
54:22
going to be happy with this choice. Def Leppard Hysteria. Martin's famously known
54:27
for panning that album. But I think it's fucking awesome. I love it.
54:31
It's pop rock perfection. Yeah, I love the I love the production.
54:37
Just to hold the sound that is the eighties rock sound. I just
54:39
love it. Do you agree to think that the kiss song read my Body
54:44
is a shameless rip off of or some Sugar? Oh? Hell yeah,
54:46
Oh of course that is one of the worst kiss songs cover. But We're
54:52
getting to Kiss. We're getting to Kiss next number three on the list.
54:55
And now I could have gone with a Live because I know I get it.
55:00
That's such a huge album, but Alive too. For me, I
55:05
love not only do I love the songs on it, but there's a story
55:07
behind it. When I was seven, I think maybe seven years old.
55:12
This is like seventy nine, a friend of mine who lived on the street
55:15
was a huge fan, and from what I recall, and he had all
55:20
the albums and I think he just kind of played them so much and they
55:22
got so beat down. He just replaced them with a whole new set.
55:25
So he said, here you go, and he handed me a stack of
55:29
Kiss albums and on top was Alive Too. And you open that gatefold and
55:35
that's that. You see the stage with the fire and all that which you
55:37
hear later was not It was kind of it was a stage whatever, all
55:43
all the fire and the sparks going off. And then you got the pictures
55:46
of Jean with a he's all sweating in the blood coming down so alive too,
55:52
and Rocket rides on there larger than life. I think you have that
55:58
as one of your songs in the book on the unknown Kiss tracks might be,
56:04
I think so. Yeah, I'm arch pretty sure. I'm pretty sure
56:07
all American man is on that. So those studio tracks are awesome. And
56:10
then I have Van Hill in nineteen eighty four, okay, number one,
56:14
the one album that I could not live without, Dark Side of the Moon.
56:17
Interesting, Dark Side of It is a great one. Altho, I
56:21
tell you I may be more of a wall guy. What do you think
56:22
of that? Yeah, I for some reason, I don't get burned out
56:27
on the Dark Side of the Moon songs. But I've got comfortably et cetera,
56:30
et cetera. Yeah, Yeah, yeah, yeah, it's true.
56:31
I'm like, hell, but I just duck to me, dark Side of
56:35
the Moon is because it's universally we can all relate to it. Yeah,
56:38
you know the feeling of going mad, money time, all that stuff.
56:44
Yeah, So there you go. I think that was a very I think
56:47
that was a very strong list to put together. Solid list. There you
56:52
go. So let's promote. Let's plug a website. You don't have an
56:57
official website, but you have you're on social Twitter. Yeah, to go
57:00
to Twitter, which is although is it called X or is it called twitter
57:04
X? Yes? Yeah, you got to keep remembering that. Yeah,
57:07
So it's either x dot com slash Greg Prayder writer or you can I still
57:10
type in Twitter, So Twitter dot com slash Greg Prader writer. You also
57:15
go to my good old Instagram page which is also Greg Prader writer, or
57:19
you can go to Also I can go to Amazon look up my books.
57:22
Just look up Greg Prado and you will find all my books there. But
57:24
we have a Twitter like I put all my latest interviews. I'm always doing
57:29
interviews for a wide variety of sites and also magazines. So I say Twitter
57:34
is the play and I have a link tree link on my Twitter page with
57:37
that's the link tree is a really good one. That's kind of everything.
57:40
If you click on the link tree thing, it'll take you to my where
57:43
to buy my books and also my past articles stuff. So what can we
57:46
expect this year twenty twenty four books? I have some projects coming up.
57:52
One book, I don't want to give it away too much, but I
57:53
have a book coming out in the next month or two which is about a
57:57
specific hair metal band of the eighties. Oh, I think you told me
58:00
about this. I may I may have mentioned it, but I want to
58:05
keep it hush hushed, and it spoiler a surprise that people didn't hear it
58:07
on the previous But I think it is a book you will want to probably
58:10
discuss when it comes out. And then that and then I also I may
58:14
have come up with my next big, big project book, which is still
58:17
kind of in the playing stages. I don't want to say too much about
58:21
it because sometimes I've done books which then other similar books have come up by
58:27
other writers. Not I don't think that they necessarily ripped me off, but
58:30
just something in the universe lined up and suddenly, yeah, I'm a little
58:35
bit paranoids. I just don't want to give it away, but it is
58:37
a pretty good idea of a style. It's a genre of music that's kind
58:42
of almost forgotten at this point, which I've been listening to it recently and
58:46
I think it's some of the best rock music of all time. So you
58:51
did a yacht rock book, I did it, and I also did a
58:53
grunge book. What could it be? Because you've been such a supporter of
58:58
me, I'm just I'm just going to tell you right now, it is
59:00
a It's a book of the best times people on sports teams or any kind
59:06
of player on a sports team did music. Oh No, because I was
59:12
gonna say, like Huey Lewis had the guys from the forty nine ers,
59:14
Hey, you could have? You could have. I was thinking of like
59:15
Super the Bears, the eighty five Bears. No, I'm just saying out
59:22
style of music that I just can't give away much more than that. It
59:25
is sincerely a style of music I've been listening to lately that hopefully by doing
59:30
this book, maybe it'll bring a little more attention to this type of music
59:35
as well. Greg Cradle, thanks for being on This is great man.
59:37
This is I think we covered a lot of a lot of we did a
59:40
lot of ground. Yes, thank you all. No, that was an
59:51
adventure. I was quite to shore you put onto the well. Let me
59:55
just close this conversation by saying you are one unique individual.