wilko not dead shock

Just last February Wilko Johnson, having been previously diagnosed with cancer and having refused further treatment, had resigned himself to his fate. With his farewell tour finished and having recorded a final goodbye album with Roger Daltry, with his typical humour said at the time "It was a case of hurry up so I can hear it. I mean blimey, I'm supposed to be dead already"
Wilko's acceptance of his condition had drawn many an admiring comment, he had even gone through the arduous task of television interview's explaining his thoughts and how he'd made the decision that would inevitably mean the end of his life would not be far away. Wilko's doctor had told him he had until October last year, yet his determination in carrying out his last tour and recording had seen him carry past that date.
As you watched his interviews and obvious ailing body you had to think this may be the last time you would see him. A silent farewell was waved at the time to one of the great characters of rock.
Months passed and nothing further was heard. It all seemed as inevitable as Wilko had intimated.

Then, last night the BBC midnight news with there usual or rather unusual habit of slotting in a piece of breaking music news announced that at the Q (magazine) Icon awards that night there was a completely surprising appearance by none other than Wilko himself, who had just received his award.
With his usual upbeat and cheerful Canvey Island bonhomie he probably gave one of the all time show stopping acceptance speeches anyone could possibly give.
"He was cured of his cancer". (!!!!????)
He went on to explain that after a second Doctor, a curiously named Mr Chan, had seen his case and then proceeded with the therapy required. Well maybe a little more than therapy, Wilko had an 11 hour operation to remove the tumour from his body,
"it weighed 3kg - that's the size of a small baby!" he told, you might think would be an open mouthed audience.
"it was so big I had trouble playing me guitar around it ", probably meaning during his tour dates. "Anyway they got it all".
"I'm now recuperating and hoping to regain my strength completely soon and go back on the road".
He finishes his speech adding "The moral of the story is you never know what's going to happen".
Er yes Wilko... we've got no idea either.
One things for sure though, Wilko Johnson is a most remarkable man.
Get well soon mate.

marka

the spirit's suing... again!

After yesterdays news of Spirit's bass player Mark Andes suing the Led out of Zeppelin over "Stairway To Heaven",(see previous post or here), and by the way even the BBC News ticker ran that story this morning such was it's surprising nature, now Billboard have just announced that along with drummer Dennis Carmassi the pair who played in 80's rock band Heart are suing The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame -

"their likenesses and the songs they performed were used to promote Heart’s induction. The duo’s complaint states that when fans and fellow musicians offered them congratulations for their success, they were “humiliated” to explain “that they were inexplicably not chosen for induction.”

So the Andes litigation march is on, and quite possibly it's with same lawyer as the Zeppelin case, although he's not been named so far.
The Rock Hall had, in their usual manner, only inducted those that were in the original 70's band and as Andes and Carmassi joined Heart in the 80's they weren't part of the glad handing on the night Heart were summoned to the Rock Hall bun fight in 2013.
But despite whinging on about being "humiliated" the complaint makes it quite clear this isn't the reason for the lawsuit -

“Plaintiffs are not asking that defendant Rock Hall induct them into the Hall of Fame. Instead, this is an action to protect the rights, reputations, and likenesses of Mark Andes and Dennis Carmassi through the causes of actions false light invasion of privacy, misappropriation of name and likeness invasion of privacy, injurious falsehood, libel, slander, and right of attribution falsification of rock and roll history for Defendants’ wilful and unauthorized use of Plaintiffs’ images and likenesses."

Don't you love the bit - "falsification of rock and roll history".
Most PR people and the press who thrive off such bollocks must be quaking at their lunch time boozer with amount of BS that's always spread about rock and roll. Good luck in stamping that out.
Anyway here's old Mark Andes, obviously most peeved at 2 major rock establishments messing about with the real story of rock and roll so he's starting a new career in the courts to put it all right.
Old rockers don't fade away they just hire a lawyer and sue your sorry A..

And now on Dec. 26 on 2012 at the Kennedy Center Honors, Heart's Ann and Nancy Wilson perform.. wait for it... "Stairway To Heaven".
Watched by members of Zeppelin who look as if they've just sat on something unpleasant.
Oh the rock and roll irony of it all.

kissy fits and don't make up (pt2)

So tonight is the night of The Rock And Roll Hall of Fame... or should we say The Rock And Roll Hall of Flame, as attendant participants.. and the operative part of that word is "pants", gather in the arena of the corporately blessed.
The outstanding question of the day is not whether there will be a live performance of the original lineup of Kiss.. they're not performing by the way, but will the band of old sods actually sit at the same table without breaking out into a Kissy fit of hand-bagging.
The last few weeks have seen the row between the old original members descend from pussy scratching arguments of who should be part of a live performance, to in recent days, all out abuse amounting to.. and how's this for unpleasantness, accusations of antisemitism!
The latest row (see post for the initial flame war) comes by way of recent remarks made by original and still existing member of the band Paul Stanley whinging on about his two ex colleagues Ace Frehley, (1973–1982, 1996–2002)] and Peter Criss, (1973–1982, 1996–2002] in his recently published memoir, saying -

they "felt powerless and impotent when faced with the tireless focus, drive and ambition of me and Gene. As a result, the two of them tried to sabotage the band – which, as they saw it, was unfairly manipulated by money-grubbing Jews."
all quoted text via Hennemusic

Not pulling any claws there then. Naturally Frehley and Criss went on the counter saying -

"I mean, Jesus Christ! ("doh!" - ED) My fiancée is Jewish. How can I be anti-Semitic? Is he out of his mind? 40 years in the music business! I've worked alongside Jewish people my whole life. And I'm anti-Semitic? It's ridiculous. I think he's trying to sell his book, and it's a pretty sad commentary if he has to resort to verbal slurs and innuendo. It's ridiculous."

Stanley responded in turn -

"Unfortunately, I can't say it's taken out of context. It's very clear that there are a lot of people who are anti-Semites. There are a lot of people who, underneath the surface, have a resentment towards the resiliency or the determination of Jews. If you wanna hang your inadequacies or your failures on somebody, it seems that, 'Hey, it's his fault.' So, no, I stand behind what I said and I have no agenda and I'm not saying anything to be vindictive, I'm not saying anything to be malicious. I'm just stating the facts."

Sensibly other members of the band have kept their painted gobs shut over the matter. But as you can imagine tonight's little Rock And Roll Bun Fight could well be just that. In fact it would turn the whole event into something approaching rock and roll credibility if the presentations were interrupted by the Kiss table breaking out into a good old late night punch up. Shame Sid Viscous wasn't still with us it would have been right up his street. But this is 2014 and Kiss are near pensioners now so the closest they'll come to a punch up is who can grab the nearest seat to the litter tray.
The more likely scenario will be them all sitting tight lipped on proper adult behavior or with faux bonhomie they cheerily grin themselves through the night extracting every last compliment they can from a room mainly full of sycophants.

On a brighter note Joan Jett will fill in for one missing notable and join all the guys from Nirvana before the band is also inducted.
No doubt we'll see all the results of the evenings goings on tomorrow. If anything fun happens, and that's reasonably unlikely, we'll post it then.

kiss and don't make up

So this is how it went. That empire of malfunction 'The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame' invite the original members of Kiss to reform for a one off performance on the awards night. Old fans like this, old band members like this, so what can go wrong.
Well when the bands as long in the tooth as Kiss are still around it's naturally expected that all the original members are not going to make it through the decades for various reasons.. you can invent your own here there's a good chance of being right. And that it seems is the real axe in the back because when it's heard that two of the later replaced original members are to receive the induction and not any one of 4 others who replaced them over the years, then Kiss fur does fly. Lengthy statements are issued from the original existing Kissites (you'll probably guess who they are) about not wanting to belittle the efforts put in by those who followed the original line up so they have no alternative but to cancel the live appearance on the popspacular award farce because they who run the event are not too happy about stand-ins for the original band no matter how much wad they've earned the group over the years. It seems the RARHOF have high standards when it comes to original group lineups. Blimey.. who new.
Anyway since then everyone of these Kisslodites have been fraught with hand wringing, and rising above it all, and being professional, and feeling frustrated and disheartened, and feeling sorry for the fans and.. well you can imagine the upset.
This coming from a group of ageing men who still like to put on make-up this is to say the very least.. just lame.
The lot of them are all Rock and Roll handbags.

"Everything's changed save the way we think."