Blog: Rock Town Hall

Sometime today/tonight we're going to attempt a monumental Back Office feat. Our goal is to move RTH off of the old and aging current platform onto a bright new shiny one. There will certainly be hitches some of which we are already aware of and will address as soon as possible but there will be others. Hopefully the ability to login and comment will remain active and we can use this thread to point out issues. In the unlikely case that login and/or comment is unavailable we will post updates here on the Main Stage [...]

We spend a lot of time and energy around here being ever-so-slightly cleverer than the rest of the rock blog world -- and that's usually a good thing. But sometimes you just want some editorial comfort food -- something reasonably filling, and vaguely tasty. Something tried and true. Something like... a KRAZY KAPTION KONTEST! Rules are simple enough: following is a selection of funny fotos from around the web. Your job is to assign a KRAZY KAPTION to as many of them as you please. Of course, as in all things [...]

First, what must have been the commercially released video to accompany this star-studded cover of The Buzzcocks' most-successful song. A list of the contributing artists appears toward the end. Then, if the notion of the UK as a small, close-knit music community unlike anything we could imagine in the United States still hasn't hit you, there's the following, more mind-blowing homemade video: Read more » Original post blogged on b2evolution .

Townspeople, This is your Rock Town Hall! If you've already got Back Office privileges and can initiate threads, by all means use your privileges! If you'd like to acquire such privileges, let us know. If you've got a comment that needs to be made, what are you waiting for? If you're just dropping in and find yourself feeling the need to scat, don't hesitate to register and post your thoughts. The world of intelligent rock discussion benefits from [...]

How dare you call Billy Joel "evil!" Original post blogged on b2evolution .

Covering the Division Series in both leagues is too much for one man, so I offered to relieve Mr. Moderator of the burden of analyzing the walk-up music selections of the four American League contenders: the Tampa Bay Rays, the Minnesota Twins, the Texas Rangers, and the New York Yankees. In doing so, I also hope to steer clear of Mod's Rockist NLDS analysis and pay attention to the relative strengths of the hip-hop and modern-rock selections that many of the sport's contestants choose. I don't want to harp on this, but it was probably Mod's Rockist bent [...]

Surely you recall some of the groundbreaking analyses we've performed since 2008 in predicting baseball's postseason play according to the power of each team's walk-up music . With the 2010 Division Series playoff matches about to begin, it's time we get our first look at this year's most-rocking contestants. Let's start with the National League, and then we'll catch up with the American League tomorrow. We'll keep this initial overview concise to allow us room to drill down as less-musical teams are eliminated. Let's start with my hometown team, the Rocktober -tested tough [...]

See if you can hang on through the hyperventilating woman interviewing The Buzzcocks in Toronto, in 1979 (following a set up by some more recent Toronto VJ). As your reward, a little past the 5:00-minute mark, there's a pretty clean performance of "What Do I Get?," a rarity among the typically sloppy Buzzcocks live cuts from ye olden days that I usually come across. What I really want to get at, though, is the inanity of media members who expect musicians to aspire to STARDOM and the whole "star treatment" routine. How intoxicating [...]

I know some of you will pick up what I'm about to lay down here: *Huey Lewis didn't suck.* In fact, I'd say he was, on the whole, quite good for American popular music, in the same savior-of-AM-radio kind of way that Hall & Oates were. Not sure his hits were *quite* on the same level, but -- come on -- does "Heart & Soul" suck? How about "This Is It"? Of course they don't suck! In fact, I'd go further to say that HL&tN had a [...]

Even without Peter Tork, check out how well The Monkees serve as pitchmen for Nerf balls! Genius. Mr. Gorbachev, put those Monkees in the Hall! If you were to cast a working band or solo artist to pitch a children's product who would it be and what would they pitch? Original post blogged on b2evolution .

John Lennon would have been 70 this week. As you may have heard , the entire solo Lennon catalog is being reissued, remastered, reboxed, rebought. There will be countless reassessments of the man's solo career, with references to long outdated terms like primal scream therapy and lost weekend . These reassessments will likely include seemingly outrageous defenses for generally considered turds, like Some Time in New York City and Rock 'n Roll . There are bonus discs involved in these reissues, including demos from the Plastic Ono Band debut and a stripped-down [...]

He's gonna do it 'til he don't like it. Original post blogged on b2evolution .

One could make a strong case that Anthony Burgess A Clockwork Orange has had a significant impact on the literature scene (vocabulary, style, etc.). And I think many of us would agree that Stanley Kubrik 's movie also has lasting cultural significance. But what about that novel's impact on music? As recently mentioned in a recent RTH post , Heaven 17 is the name of a band referenced in the novel and in the movie. Other bands have also acquired their "eemyas" from characters or vocabulary in the [...]

John Wetton: yet another good egg enters the Halls of Rock Following a tosssed-off aside in a recent analysis/appreciation of a Lark's Tongue in Aspic -era King Crimson performance an immediate groundswell of support gathered around the previously inconceivable notion that John Wetton (Asia, King Crimson, Roxy Music, UK, Family, Uriah Heep, and much more) was the Sexiest Man in Prog-Rock . To clarify, it's not that Wetton's good looks had previously been inconceivable but that good looks ever [...]

As ladymisskirroyale suspected, our latest Mystery Date , a song entitled "4jg," was by early Human League , or maybe The Human League under their original name, The Future . I downloaded this track from a collection of early demos, The Golden Hour of The Future , and didn't pay attention to which band name this track was recorded under. There's no doubting the band name for this track, from the same collection: The Human League, "Dance Like a Star" Read more » [...]

• The Future / The Human League - Dance Like A Star

I'm not saying "We need Rock Town Hall." I'm saying "We enjoy Rock Town Hall." What are you high on these days? Original post blogged on b2evolution .

Let's review the ground rules here. The Mystery Date song is not necessarily something I believe to be good. So feel free to rip it or praise it. Rather the song is something of interest due to the artist, influences, time period... Your job is to decipher as much as you can about the artist without research . Who do you think it is? Or, Who do you think it sounds like? When do you think it was recorded? Etc... [...]

• RTH Mystery Artist/RTH Mystery Artist - mysterydate092810

I've noticed that since I started following RTH, I've been listening to music differently. So it came as a surprise that over dinner, Mr. Royale and I were initially unable to identify an instrumental version of a familiar song that we heard while we were waiting for our Pad Thai to arrive. There was that Wes Montgomery-style jazz guitar. There was a soft, burbling saxophone. Mr. Royale initially placed it as a cover of Charlie Parker's "Little Brown Shoes." But we noticed that we continued to listen alertly in that way that you do in [...]

Oh, Tori! From Slate , courtesy of Townsman berlyant , professional wrestler Mick Foley's life was changed by Tori Amos: I eventually gathered my courage and made a pilgrimage to Tori's side of the convention hall. There she was: bright orange hair, high distinct cheekbones, and a warm smile for each fan who posed by her side. I was about 10 feet from her when she looked over, got up from her chair, and extended both her arms. "I can hug you?" I [...]

The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Nominees have been announced. And the nominees are: Beastie Boys, Chic, LL Cool J, the J. Geils Band , Darlene Love, Laura Nyro, Donna Summer, Joe Tex, Chuck Willis, Alice Cooper, Bon Jovi, Neil Diamond , Donovan, Dr. John, and Tom Waits. Perhaps I'm still holding a grudge against Bon Jovi for his lunkheaded comments about The Replacements ("Last Great band of the decade? I don't even know who they are.") in the late '80s, but really, the fact that he and Tom [...]