A quick midweek Cheese Gem — since I can’t find any songs about being on deadline, though I’m sure there are some:
I love this ridiculous song. Love, love it, love it. Yes, it’s absurdly sophomoric social commentary, to the degree that it makes any sense at all. But it is one of Elton’s best vocals ever, and has a string section ever rocked quite like this?
Listen to the bass in the verses. And then, in the bridge — under all that “Jesus, he wants to go to Venus” stuff — the bass all but drops out, and the cellos pick up the bass line precisely, playing the same fills. It is just such a homely and touching detail, and it suits this odd, unhappy song. The strings are the heart of this one.
(Paul Buckmaster arranged the strings on this and on many of Elton John’s early records, and he’s still doing that job for pop and rock acts now.)
One of many things I really hated about the early days of MTV was the incessant stupidity of Thomas Dolby’s “She Blinded Me With Science.” I think it must have been played about six hundred times a day back then. I still can’t think of one reason why that was. I mean the song is just kind of dumb and annoying. It was of course a hit.
Well, so was “Come On Eileen.”
A few years later Dolby put out a song I still love today. It has a prominent place on my iPod’s playlist counter. It’s dumb and annoying too.
“Hyperactive!” (A live version.)
Click here for the “official Hyperactive video” (It’s worth it if you like the song…)
This however works for me.
I think the bass is what got me at first but as time went on the delightful absurdity of the whole thing kind of grew on me to the point that I rock out on this where everyone else I know wants to either leave the room or do physical harm to me for playing it in the first place.
Here’s another room clearer if you dare.
These folks were always just too much fun!
The B-52s “Rock Lobster”
Every time I hear this I shake my head in amazement at the ingenuity, the creativity and the craziness that brought this about. I don’t know about you but it never would have occurred to me to write a song parodying 50′s sci-fi movies. I’m glad they did. I enjoy this every time!
First, by our terms, it’s not at all a bad thing. Basically, we’re talking about big, loud, often kind of silly songs, most of which fall into one of two categories: the cheerfully dimwitted or the goofily grandiose. If it is quiet or contemplative, it is not cheese metal (though it can still be be cheesy). Largely, these are guitar-driven, and a good jet-engine vocal also helps make a good c-metal tune.
For example, in the cheerfully dimwitted school, there is Foghat’s “Slow Ride,” which is an exemplary — even a definitive — cheese metal record as we use the term. It’s happy and sexy and dumb, and it seems to have been created expressly to delight the hearts of bar bands and garage guitarists. “Slow Ride” was one of the great AOR records and will be a classic rock radio staple evermore. Here’s a pretty nice live version. No date given — guessing mid-’90s.
Then there’s Golden Earring’s “Radar Love,” which is, first, a pretty decent Deep Purple impression. The relationship described in the lyrics is perhaps a bit eccentric, but it’s all thoroughly good-natured and sung (very well) with exactly the combination of conviction and good cheer that it demands. And it rocks.
Then, in the goofy-and-grand school, there is Rainbow’s “Man on the Silver Mountain.” Yes, it has the kind of prog-rock lyrics that can easily sound really stupid (he’s a wheel, he’s a wheel, he can roll, he can feel!), but Ronnie Dio just blows the roof off. And listen to the guitars, driving it and defining the song without overwhelming that masterful rock vocal. And the solo… man, I LOVE this song.
And finally, on those rare occasions when the noisy-dumb approach and the goofy-grand approach can be combined, good cheese metal can defy gravity. At precisely 1:30 on Def Leppard’s “Rock of Ages” (1:33 on the video below): liftoff.
One of Pink Floyd’s biggest pre-Wall hits, “Have a Cigar” is a poison pen letter to clueless and greedy label execs — one of a number of such tributes to the music biz released in the ’70s.
The spinning keyboards and edgy guitars are vintage Floyd for the period, backing up funny, biting lyrics from Roger Waters. That the terrific vocal is by Roy Harper – who was not a member of the band — gives a little extra edge to the song’s punchline: “By the way, which one’s Pink?”
My cheese gem: At around 4:15, when the keyboards roll in, then turn back on themselves with an upward run, cutting into the long, stuttering guitar break that winds down the song.
One of those early eighties bands that had a fair amount of success but never quite made the big time in America was The Cure. Sure they had several hits but were never fully accepted by American audiences.
It’s a shame as they were innovative, interesting and most of all wrote some really great songs.
The Cure were always on the dark side of rock music, classified as alternative or “post punk” for whatever that is worth. From the 1983 single “The Lovecats,” we found out there is a sense of humor in there, hiding, not wanting to be released by lead singer and songwriter Robert Smith if he could ever just let it out. He never really did although “The Lovecats” was a close call.
When describing The Cure, nihilism comes to mind. Usually that’s not a good thing. In rock music there is a certain tendancy for that path to be chosen but rarely has it made for really good music. The Cure were one exception to that trend.
“Love Song” is one interesting bit of music. A terribly sad love song about how much he’s in love. I don’t quite know how songs like these happen but I am quite happy they do. Watching one of the old VH-1 Pop Up Video shows a while back the bubble came up that the director wanted the band to smile more. They didn’t. It would seem wrong to me if they had I guess.
My Cure Cheese Gem is a really easy one for me to pick out. It has a very different approach from “The Lovecats” and certainly “Love Song.” First off there is a joy that had been rarely explored in The Cure’s music before. It really is a happy song though typically unconventional in story and lyrics in that for most of the week he doesn’t really seem to give a s—. It is The Cure after all. Well, can’t change that much.
The guitars are sparkling and fill the song with such a strong sense of happiness you have to wonder if it really is The Cure. In the lyrics it’s impossible to tell why the rest of the week he’s so down on things but boy does he really like Fridays.
A nice understated bass line and neatly done drums fill the bottom out while Smith’s always very emotive vocals slide over the top. The passion in his vocals have always been a major part of why I listened to them. In “Friday” he’s so delightfully over the top it is just one of those songs I can listen to over and over and get something new from it every time.
At the end of the song all the yells and “do, do, dos” add to the joy of whatever the heck he is so happy about.
Friday he’s overjoyed. (And in love.) That seems to be enough.
A Cheese Gem is that moment you wait for in a song every time it comes on… especially a great moment in a song you don’t otherwise like.
And here’s one, in Bee Gees’ “Tragedy.” By way of demonstrating, earlier comments aside, that disco didn’t always suck. Of course, there is a place in the world for dance music — what inspired so much loathing in the ’70s was the way pop radio jumped on disco, and it just consumed the airwaves — for what was actually not a very long time but seemed like years.
Any way, this gem comes early: right at the end of the first verse, as Barry Gibb goes up and up and up on “Holding you, holding you/Loving you/Loving yoooooooou….” and into that great refrain.
The Bee Gees had a long pop history, of course, before they became a disco phenomenon, and “Tragedy,” looked at purely as a pop record, really kind of rocks.
What happens when a band known for really fun power pop songs with a large chunk of Beatles influenced melodies and sounds goes in a more straight pop direction?
Well, usually it sucks.
Cheap Trick pulled it off.
With great style. In fact it has been one of my favorite Cheap Trick songs since it came out back in 1988 on the Lap Of Luxury album.
“Ghost Town.”
The big single from the Lap Of Luxury album was “The Flame.” A bit of a power ballad and Cheap Trick’s only number one single. It’s also one of the few songs of theirs that I really, really don’t like much.
“Ghost Town” however is a fabulous song. It has the usual slightly warped but always brilliant guitars of Rick Nielson, Bun E.Carlo’s understated yet somehow powerful drums, the intricate bass of the recently rejoined Tom Petersson, (He had left the band for a few years to pursue the always mysterious “other projects,”) and a slightly creepy keyboard floating by filling up the spaces behind the vocal and guitars.
Topping it off is a truly great vocal by Robin Zander. Zander is usually at his best when going full throttle. Loud is good and riding on the edge of exploding his vocal chords is pretty much to be expected from a typical Zander performance.
In contrast to ”Surrender” or “Dream Police,” Zander is subtle and smooth and shows a transition to his highest register with an unexpected ease. I think it’s his best vocal of all time. It’s very powerful and emotional while still being very masculine.
No wimps allowed in Cheap Trick.
The backing vocals are true to the song’s name and kind of sneak in here and there while Zander is doing a nice “ahh, ahh, ahh,” behind his own lead vocal.
The lyrics are full of images of heartbreak and loneliness:
“The world it keeps turning, but it don’t turn for me. Without you in my life, my life ain’t no place to be. “
“Till you come back to me.”
A great song for when you are depressed and want to feel worse.
I can ordinarily take or leave REO, the happy lightweights of the generally pretty ephemeral metal pop genre, but “Roll With the Changes” is pretty hard to resist, even if the lyrics don’t make a heck of a lot of sense.
There’s that great, rolling piano intro, Gary Richrath’s guitar roars in, then (Cheese Gem!*) eight superquick drumbeats: bam bam bam bam bam bam bam bam! This would still be Alan Gratzer, kicking the energy way up as the song is kicking off. He and Richrath get as close to plain rocking out as REO ever got on “Changes,” and it’s just a great bit of power pop.
*A Cheese Gem is a great little moment you wait for every time you hear a song — even if you don’t like the song.
Since Bridey brought it up, I’ll head down the slippery slope that is Journey.
I have always been a huge Journey fan. I saw them in concert every time they were in town from 1980 to the late nineties. The last time was with Steve Augeri at the Wiltern in their first time out with that line-up.
One cool thing we did was have dinner at a Denny’s right down the street before the show. We walked in and there were at least twenty people wearing Journey tee-shirts, head bands, belt buckles, tattoos. I was wearing my tee-shirt from the 1982 Rose Bowl show. We all wound up talking about the shows we had seen, the Forum 80, 81, 83, 86, Rose Bowl 82 and so on.
Augeri did a great job but it was kind of unsettling how much he looked as well as sounded like Steve Perry. Great show however.
A great Steve Perry vocal as usual. A killer guitar lead from Niel Schon. Ross Valory with the in your face bass and attitude, Johnathan Cain’s fire siren keyboards and then Steve Smith’s drums.
The drums are what make me really love this song. I would love it already but what Smith throws into the mix puts it over the top for me.
The drums in the first part of the song are pretty simple. Keep the beat and drive going. The first chorus, bring it up and go for it. The hold after the verse keeps the tension. Not too much, just enough.
Second verse, still simple with some nice fills but the fun is coming. At the end of the second verse, the wonderful wrist rolls on the toms at the break. After the solo, big rolls making it bigger and bigger while letting the rest flow by, just filling the spaces with great technique and just the right touch.
In “Yellow Submarine,” when the band begins to play — and plays about four bars and vanishes. It’s the sort of thing that sounds totally natural from the Beatles and would seem contrived and stupid from anybody else. George Martin at work.
In Journey’s “Lovin’, Touchin’ Squeezin,” well, first, just the fact that a song by Journey, with that title, is not a power ballad, but a die, b****, die breakup song, is delightful. But I always wait for the last time Steve Perry (a grand and consistently underrated singer, probably because he worked for, you know, Journey) goes way up high and loud on “Every, e-ve-ry DA-AY” — listen to that, and the whole vocal on that song, and think of another singer who could do exactly what he does. One of the few Journey songs I rather like, barring the 10 minutes or so of “na na na NA na, na na na NA na”s.
