Yes B, not only that, but its already done and we’re now just playing the waiting game…where the f*&k have you been for the last 18 months.

Where indeed.

I’ve been right here missing salient information since 1976 if you must know.

Dave Grohl of Foo Fighters on drums, Josh Homme of Queens of the Stone Age on guitar and vocals and…yes its true,  the ledgend that is John Paul Jones of the almost mythological Led Zeppelin on Bass guitar. I mean, …what a line up. Its gotta be good. Hasn’t it? And with a name like Them Crooked Vultures…

Man, its been on the real down-low and its been kept there too. Noone knew much about it, apart from that Dave Grohl mentioned about 2 years ago that he’d like to work with John Paul Jones, then there were murmurings of Josh Homme being involved and then, towards the end of July 2009, a video appeared on youtube.com of the 3 peice in the studio cut to a 30 second clippet from a new track.

There has been some speculation as to weather this was a hoax video, but unless someone got into the studio and out with a video camera, which is not likely, when even the website has no idea whats going on – www.themcrookedvultures.com – this is for real.

So, the latest that I can glean, is the forthcoming album which may or may not be out on October 23rd, and will possibly, but possibly not, called Never Deserved the Future.

There have been a few surprise performances over the last couple of weeks and, presumably to get an inkling of what sort of reception they might get and to get ready for full on touring. JPG is getting on a bit you know. These included Pukkelpop in Belgium, a relatively small venue in Amsterdam and, I just found out, they opened for the Arctic Monkeys in Brixton, London last night – which I would have given up work for and driven to, had i not been the king of missing out.

So just for all you special people like me who didn’t know about this until now-ish, this is for you…and errr..me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WYYdli0P8YI

Name :

Background:
Born in Portsmouth, Virginia, Mike Watt and his Family moved to San Pedro in California where he met his best friend and soul mate D.Boon.
Completely ingnorant of music at the time, Watt and Boon picked up Bass and Guitar respectively and started to do music themselves.
Mike Watt suggests that having no role models whilst trying to navigate the instrument left him free to develop his own style and approach to playing bass guitar.
The mid 70′s saw the young Watt fall in love with punk music and form a band that later became The Minutemen with D.Boon and George Hurley. They signed with SST records in 1980 and toured constantly, releasing a number of Albums and EP’s alond teh way until the untimely death of  D.Boon in a van accident 2 days after Watts Birthday on the 22nd December 1985.

Watt had decided to quit music altogether after the death of Boon and going through a profound depression, members of Sonic Youth picked up Watt and wouldn’t let him quit.

Mike Watt

A fan of the Minutemen, Ed Crawford, drove from Ohio to San Pedro to persuade the rhythm section of Watt and Hurley to continue playing with himself as singer/guitarist and thus fIREHOSE was born.
They released 3 records on SST and were then signed by Columbia.
In 1993 they called it a day shortly after the release of Mr. Machinery Operator.

Watt met Kira Roessler, Bassist for Black Flag, in 1984 and they were married in 1987. This lasted until shortly after fIREHOSE dispanded.

In January 2000 Watt fell ill with an infection in his Perineum forcing emergency surgery and 9 weeks bed rest.

The next few years were spent writing his solo and collaberation albums of which there are many and in 2003 Watt was asked to officially play bass or the Reunited Stooges after joining members of The Hives backing Iggy Pop for a small set of Stooges numbers.
He still fills that position today(july 2009), and still plays and collaberated with many different musicians.

Known For:
He would mostly be known for the post punk offerings of The Minutemen and fIREHOSE and more recently The Stooges but has colaberated with a veritable who’s who of contemporary recording artists, a long but not complete list of these artists follows:

Henry Rollins, Eddie Vedder, J Mascis, members of Sonic Youth & the Red Hot Chili Peppers , Janes Addiction, Frank Black, Dave Grohl, Evan Dando, Mark Lanegan, Porno For Pyro’s and notably he also played six track s on ‘My December’ the 3rd album release by American Idol contestant Kelly Clarkson.

Mike Watt is usually to be found with either a Fender or a Gibson Bass.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fHFjGI26soI

How?.. you may ask. Good question. I’ll tell ya.

The Nexus series strings have been coated with a special black polymer using a unique microscopic coating process which gives the strings a protective but equally flexible black coat which is the hallmark of the Nexus series strings.
Its is claimed that the polymer coating protects the strings from corrosion and contamination, extending their playing life as well as a giving smooth and silky feel when played.

The Bass strings have the black polymer coating set over a Type 52 nickel alloy wrap, and they are available in two guages, NXB40(40,60,80,100) and NXB45(45,65,85,105). For 5 stringers, there’s just a low B with a guage of 130.

Sounds intereseting. Anyone got any first hand experience here?

It was 25 years ago in June that the Minutemen realesed their LA post-punk poster-child album ‘Double Nickels on the Dime’ which today is seen as one of the best American punk rock albums of the 1980′s. And quite rightly so too.

45 tracks combining the finer elements of Punk, rock, country, Jazz, blues and spoken word, covering a variety of themes touching on the Vietnam war and racism in America to the human language the working class experience and home.
They chose to ignore conventional song structures and instead experimented with different rhythms, textures and dynamics. The album tracks are mostly all very brief with only one song tipping the 3 minute barrier.

Although it wasn’t commercially successful on its release on SST, it marked a point in time when punk bands started to shrug off the shackles and limitations of the Hardcore punk scene and started doing their own thing.

Mike Watt(Minutemen, fIREHOSE, The Stooges) and the tragically departed D. Boon, were childhood pals and grew up in the small town of San Pedro, California  listening and learning to play music together until 1976 when they discovered punk. The next few years saw Watt and Boon in short lived band Starstruck, then forming The Reactionaries with drummer George Hurley and Vocalist Martin Tamburovich. This dispanded and then in January 1980 Boon and Watt formed the Minutemen. George Hurley had joined a different band after The Reactionaries disbanded but eventually joined Watt and Boon in the Minutemen in June 1980. Their very first gig was opening for Black Flag.

The next 5 years saw the Minutemen release the LP’s ‘The Punch Line’(1981), ‘What makes a man start fires?’(1983), ‘The Politics of Time(1984)’, ‘Double Nickels on the Dime’(1984) and ’3-Way Tie for Last’(1985) and also a host of EP’s throughout this time.

Their final gig was with an up-and-coming band called R.E.M. on the 13th December 1985, just over a week before D. Boon was killed in a Van accident on the 22nd December 1985, putting an end to the Minutemen. Watt spiralled in to depression but was picked up and supported, notably by Sonic Youth who helped and encouraged him continue playing as he was just about ready to give up music altogether.
To this day every piece of media that Mike Watt plays on is dedicated to D. Boon, and he has been quoted as saying ‘Double Nickels on the Dime’ is the best album he ever played on.

High standing players such as Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers cite Mike Watt as an influence on his bass playing from an early age and he will be appearing as one of our bass gods in weeks to come.

For now though, do yourself a favour if you haven’t already, go get ‘Double Nickles on the Dime’ and celebrate the anniversary of what I personally believe to be one of the most important records in punk rock history.

I jam econo.

Not only that, but it seems that he is quite good at it too as he has also won numerous awards for his efforts.

Even though Blur have reformed just before the summer this year, he has not given up on his cheese business, telling The Times,  “I’m starting to make cheese for Prince Charles,it will be the poshest f**king cheese in the world, but it’s only going to cost £3.”

Estate managers at Highbury House, Prince Charles’ private residence  asked James to turn half a million litres of organic Ayrshire milk into high-quality, low-cost cheese to be sold through the royal estate.

“I think everyone should be able to afford royal cheese,” added the Blur bass man.

A spokesman for Prince Charles praised James, calling him “one of Britain’s most exciting and passionate new cheese makers”.

He’s an OK bassist too.

You’ll be happy to know I omitted jokes about ‘Cheesy basslines’ and a special 3 cheese ‘Fromage-a-trois’…

The band, who were just completing their new album Eros have made a decision to shelve the album, and make an entirely new one, driven by the tragedy they have all been through together, and they way they have all dealt with it.

Deftones front man Chino Morino spoke to Kerrang Magazine saying “To see your brother in that condition… I can’t even find the words to explain how it feels. I’ve spent the last 20 years of my life right next to him. Every little thing we do, I’m used to doing with Chi by my side. Now, when I look over, he’s not there.

“At the moment, he’s still in a coma. It’s a weird stage. When someone’s in a state like that, he’s still here with us but yet he’s not. He’s in limbo. It’s been pretty tough. I miss my friend. I want him to come back. I hope he comes back soon.”

He added: “I know that, deep down, Chi would be proud of us and, in a big way, we’re doing this [new album] for him. We’re trying to do the best we can for him, for us, and for the situation, and that’s to bury our heads in music. If anything positive can come out of this, then working on this music has really brought the rest of us guys very, very close.”

It is now being reported that the album will be dedicated to Chi Cheng when it is released.

Get well soon , man.

In his online post on Monday(2oth July 2009) Sixx wrote :
“I did an interview with The Wall Street Journal. You would think they would be smart enough not to hire a stupid writer for such a reputable newspaper . . . Somehow, the interview got into talking about Twitter and I explain to him my thoughts on over0exposure through too much info on the net… Of course, he turns it around that ‘I hate the Internet’ and you just scratch your head and wonder, why would a guy do that? Worse, why would The Wall Street Journal hire someone with such a small brain?”

He al so adds, “Motley was one of the first to use the internet to get information to fans, using downloads (free and paid for) to get our music around the world, to offer exclusive content to our fans . . . The essence of the point I was making (as I spoke on my iPhone with all of its new cool apps) is that there are elements of the Internet that I think are not cool — like why do people need to know where someone is at the moment or what they are thinking that second — on Twitter.”

Its a bit daft really, Sixx maintains his own myspace blog and his own website www.nikkisixx.net, so writing abut him hating the internet was a little short sighted, and really doesn’t make much sense.

The article in the Journal quotes Sixx as saying, “I’m so over the Internet. Twitter is ridiculous and there’s too much info out there. Celebrities, movie stars and rock stars are losing their mystique . . . We want to control as much as we can of what’s getting out there about us so that people who come (to see Crue Fest) are blown away.”

I tend to agree with what he says actually, anyone who’s secrets, rumours and lies are spread across the internet could quite easily have a bad relationship with it. Especially when writers are twisiting what they really mean. Its got to get your back up a little.

What do we reckon? Are celebs, rock stars and movie stars losing thier mystique due to social networking web tools like twitter and myspace etc? Will it eventually dilute the idea of stardom?

It puts me in mind of what Daft Punk might have made if they were 18 or 20 years previous and if they had todays equipment.

Vocal styles on the album range from brooding melodic 2 part harmonies reminiscent of any number of 80’s Bands to punky/shouty vocals, to none at all.

Personally, I like the track construction. For me, they feel like electronic songs delivered in a rock song format. All feel quite commercial so I expect there will be a lot of these guys on the radio and ‘inna da club’ .

Not to discredit it in the slightest, but one track sounds like a cover version of the theme tune from 80’s Kids action show, Air Wolf. Its not but …it could be. Sweet.

’Messages’ is an album highlight for me, super poppy and well danceable, with a funky smooth, slidy synth over the top.

’Tupac Robot Club Rock’ is also a blinder with vocals from Plastic Little – great hip-hop/electronic crossover.

Atari-Alt-Pop

Man, how wrong can you be about a subject title. I mean, I really had no interest in Motley Crue at all back when they were big, I imagine it was my self imposed musical snobbery circuit kicking in and deleting any reference to bands I ‘shouldn’t’ like. Either way when I picked the book up I had no real Idea who Nikki Sixx was apart from him being the Bass player in a spandex clad, girly, hair metal band.

I’m talkin’ about a book called ‘The Heroin Diaries’ by a man called Nikki Sixx. This is a man who should by rights be dead, and has been…twice. It’s a year in the life of Nikki Sixx back when Motley Crue were just getting big and signing their first deals etc.

People…its grim, and no messin’. A year in the life of a Heroin addicted rock star, is a savage rollercoaster ride of nausea and incredulous surprise…and that’s just for the reader – I can’t even come close to imagining what sort of state he must he must have spent those years in. With my heightened sense of morbid curiosity, I was sucked as soon as I had finished the first page. Its graphic, and it is a true portrayal of a man coming apart at the seams…literally.

It’s easy to read this and figure it’s a work of fiction, but this is different. The book was actually pieced together from Nikki Sixx’s diary, long buried in storage for over 20 years. The nice thing about this is that throughout the diaries, when there are mentions people, there are paragraphs written by those people about the events he describes in his diaries. It’s cool to read the different view points put forward by the very people he talks about, but 20 – 25 years later.

It provides and interesting insight into the LA music scene in the mid 80’s – a lot of bands came from the same scene, Guns ‘N’ Roses, Ratt, Skid Row, it was never my thing really, but nevertheless I have enjoyed the resurgence of 80’s rock that has permeated the office in the last few months, and reading this book has helped immensely.

It made me want to read The Dirt, which is a collection of accounts of events written by each of the band members of Motley Crue. For pure rock ’n’ roll – you can beat this book, its every teenager’s wildest dream in documentary format. For me reading these books has let me understand the music a little better, enabling me to further cast off the chains of musical snobbery that once ruled my little world.

Errrmm…read ‘em.

There is however this other reaction that I have come to yearn for from second albums and it’s that of surprise. Its when, on that first listen I can’t quite get my head around how they made this record after hearing the first. Like it’s a complete departure from the music I had anticipated and eagerly waited for, but yet something inside tells me my soul is still getting fed, and it’ll be just a little more time before my head catches up and realizes why.

It’s that bit there that I have come to yearn; the bit where I know I like it, but have no idea why, or quite how much. I like the finding out part.

‘We get it B, move it along’.

OK.

we are scientists 296×300 The Dutchie SessionsSo the latest band to do this wonderful thing to me and on quite a large scale actually, is We Are Scientists. What started as a US, 3 piece rock band created one of the most easily likeable records ever for me. It was around the same time we were being force fed Franz Ferdinand and The Arctic Monkeys, that We Are Scientists gave us ‘With Love And Squalor’ in 2005. It held a little more for me, it was simple, it was rockin’, you could relate to pretty much any track lyrically, and it felt very honest. Simple, spiky rock-riffs and crunchy delayed guitar effects, backed by solid, melodic, bass lines and held down with an almost signature drum sound. It’s a good recipe for any rock record if you ask me. A couple of visits to different venues see them play, cemented We Are Scientists as one of my top 5 acts to see live, partly due to the stand up comedy routine gig-goers are treated to between songs. Any search on Google will result in a promo video of some form, showcasing their humor, which for an American band is quite British, and really very funny.

So it’s a good package, great album, good live act, good promo… I’m in, what’s next?

Well, what’s next pretty much freaked me out if I’m honest. Really, I just wasn’t expecting what I heard. I should explain at this point drummer Michael Tapper quit the band somewhere between making the first album and the second, and the band continued using hired musicians but were now essentially a two man band. I imagine this to be the catalyst of what was to follow in the studio. The departure of the signature drum sound Tapper brought to the band enabled the remaining members Keith Murray and Chris Cain to create what ever they wanted.

And create they did.

My first hearing of anything from the new album was on the radio, the first single release from 2008’s  ‘Brain Thrust Mastery’ was ‘After Hours’, an upbeat melancholy acoustic treat, lamenting a love for those early morning post-party hours, when you just hope it will be as good tomorrow night. No departure lyrically – the sad part of good times, but the music is immediately more shiny.

So I figure, OK, a mellowing & maturing.

Errr…No.

Whilst the lyrics still have the same simple subject matter us mere humans can relate to, the music has upped and crash landed in a studio on Mars…in the 80’s, no less, and has inflated itself with keyboards, extra guitars and even, ladies and gentlemen, on one track, what I believe to be a real life, 80’s cheesy Sax. All this with a knob on the mixing desk, labeled ’shiny sprinkles’, turned right up, and another knob labeled ‘Dirt’ just up past the half way mark.

It took me some time but I love this album. It sounds like a completely different band dishing out the same honesty. A musical departure, yes, but one that has twisted and turned me in every direction in my quest to form an objective opinion for myself. I always said I’d listen to anything that made me feel anything, obviously anything inducing nausea, vomiting or a bad taste in the mouth would be turned off pretty rapidly, but this album gives you a million reasons to keep listening and not one that I can think of to turn it off. It feels good.

I don’t know whether you will like it, but I know one thing for sure, I’m really looking forward to seeing what they do with their next album.