Why Cliff will always remain a footnote AKA Noisy Monday

There's been a massive love-in for Cliff Richard ever since his 70th birthday last week with a load of hand-wringers quacking on about how John Lennon got all the celebrations for his 70th the week before but there was hardly any for, ugh, Sir Cliff. I'm nowhere near a Lennon apologist, but I don't recall Cliff Richard writing some of the most memorable tunes in popular music history, or, along with five other people, changing the face of popular culture forever. But then, perhaps I'm being picky, aren't I? I dunno, all I can see of Cliff Richard is that he's part of the establishment light-entertainer who nicked his act off of Elvis Presley. I want my pop and rock stars a bit rebellious, that's what pop and rock music's about, isn't it? I'm sure Cliff had his fingers crossed when he was giving it all that 'Hang loose, Daddio!' back in the late fifties and early sixties and was looking at the long game. Maybe I'm being very old-fashioned in being this cool.
Not only that, but his old backing band get nowhere near the recognition they deserve. I don't recall anyone ever saying that the sainted Cliff inspiring anyone to pick up a guitar. Along with Burt Weedon's Play in a Day manual and Lonnie Donegan you can trace an arc that goes like this:



To this:



To this:



To this:



To this:



To this:



To this:



To this, last year's Christmas No.1, saying 'we're not taking the middle-of-the-road shit any longer.' Only one person in that list of groups has accepted a Knighthood, some would say he deserved it, even if it did make him part of the Establishment. Thank you, Hank B Marvin, Bruce Welch, Jet Harris, Burt Weedon and Lonnie Donegan. Not thank you, Cliff Richard:

Metal on metal

I watched that Anvil: The Story of Anvil the other night. It's not very good despite all the plaudits it received. What I was expecting was a warm-hearted look back at a band who could have been contenders but never quite made. A film that investigated why they never made it, and their peers like Metallica, Motley Crue and Guns 'n' Roses did.

According to the blurb "Anvil were a major influence on the burgeoning thrash metal scene at the time. Members of Metallica, Anthrax and Slayer pay tribute." No they don't, they just come on at the start of the film and say "Anvil? Oh yeah, I remember them." That's it, not "Anvil? Well without Anvil we wouldn't be where we are today." And do you know why they don't say that? It's because Anvil aren't very good. Their so-called anthem, Metal on Metal, is just pretty average. The rest of the stuff I heard is third rate metal using adolescent sex (or the lack of it) as its subject matter. Look over any rock festival posters from the 1980s and there's Anvil at the bottom of the bill.

We're also told, according to the DVD box, to expect a "warm-hearted film about friendship." That's not really possible when Anvil's main man, Lips, is such an annoying prick given to moments of violence towards tight-fisted club promoters and even his own drummer, the man he was supposed to have made this pact with when he was fourteen that they'd "carry on rocking together forever." The drummer's name, by the way, is Robb Reiner, just one consonant too many away from sharing the same name as the director of This is Spinal Tap. Which is quite apt as Anvil's career trajectory mirrors that of Spinal Tap, especially the closing scenes of a rapturous return to Japan. The Japanese have a thing for a sub genre of heavy metal that I like to call 'Shit Metal.'

So the blurb's all wrong and what you get is a slightly depressing film about Lips cajoling Robb to go out on tour/make demos/try and get funding to make a new album in the UK. Fortunately for Lips - if not for the listening public - his older, and much more successful sister, stumps up the $12,000 to enable the band to record their new record in the Kent countryside. What follows are scenes of Lips chucking his toys out of his pram while sacking Robb. Robb returns to the fold about half an hour later when Lips has calmed down a bit. We then have to endure Lips hawking his record around major record labels without success. Lips gets upset.

Fortunately for Lips some bright spark invented the internet and you can buy it off him direct. Result! Not.

The saddest scenes though are near the beginning when a dodgy East European promoter books them on a European tour. It's very nearly heartbreaking to watch Lips approach metal luminaries like Michael Schenker, Carmine Appice and Tommy Aldridge at a Swedish metal festival to be met with blank 'who is this guy?' looks.

Robb emerges as kind of likable. You can tell he thinks they're flogging a dead horse but doesn't want to let his mate down. Surely there must have come a point in the past twenty years where he thought to himself 'enough is enough.' They both have day jobs, by the way - Lips delivers school dinners in a van.

No doubt Anvil will find short term gain from making the film, but they're still only making bottom of the bill at this summer's heavy rock festivals. More for curiosity value at a man who plays a guitar solo with a vibrator. Yes, really.

Anyroad, I went to see one of my favourite metal bands of the moment last night. The Amazon review for their new album contains this: "Fourth album from the successful American progressive metallers and follow up to their 2006 major label debut 'Blood Mountain'. That album, while their most successful, drew criticism from some fans for its seeming lack of focus. This album seeks to remedy that issue by having a unified concept in which an astral traveller wanders the spirit realm, exploring themes from quantum physics to Czarist Russia, and musically is as complex, brutal and enthralling as their earlier work." Which is pretty much what I want from heavy metal, not a turd with a Flying V and a dildo.

"Oh God, please, no, not again"

It was forty years ago last Saturday that Black Sabbath's debut album was released. So it's forty years ago last Saturday that heavy metal was invented. I can't let the passing of such an important anniversary (well, it's important to me) go without being marked. So may I direct you to my heavy metal blog for the lowdown on, to nick a phrase from The Beatles' statue in Liverpool, 'four lads from Aston who shook the world'.

As an aside I watched a BBC documentary about heavy metal recently. Ozzy was on there explaining how they came up with the sound; they used to rehearse in a room opposite a cinema that happened to be showing a horror film. They looked on the crowd queueing up outside and decided that people liked being scared, so decided to make scary music. At their early gigs playing this music, according to Ozzy "Chicks would run out screaming, so we looked at each other and said 'This scary music's working a treat, isn't it?'" Priceless.

A gentle, lilting ballad...

...for fucking Valentine's Day about the horrors of Nazi death camp doctor Josef Mengele. Enjoy. (like anyone who reads this will actually want to listen)

Enter Metallica

This blog post was supposed to be about the joys of shopping in Fopp (the complete Day Today and Badlands DVDs and Nirvana's In Utero, and got change out of £15!), the horrors of dining in a restaurant alone (something I'm going to have to get used to) and the excellence of Waterstone's staying open till 7pm (I expanded my 'graphic novel' library). And also about the sinking feeling when you realise you've gone out without putting your watch on, I feel naked without a watch.

I wasn't going to mention why I was wondering the streets of Nottingham alone. I was there to see Metallica and I know that absolutely nobody who reads this would be interested in that, but sod it, if you don't like it, look away now.

Metallica are one of only two bands who I genuinely get excited about just before they hit the stage (the others being Rush, yeah, I know, I know...). It's been a long time since I last saw them, and I was so excited I thought I was going to wee myself.

Bloody hell, it was good. In fact I'd go as far as to say it's the best concert I've ever been to. The stage was 'in the round' (one big stage in the middle of the floor), that was a fantastic idea. The drum kit started off facing away from me and I found it intensely fascinating to watch a drummer from the back. Playing the drums - especially a double bass kit - obviously isn't as easy as it appears. During the set the drum kit gradually revolved to face different parts of the audience. There were eight microphones dotted around the stage so James Hetfield come move around during the course of a song and still keep singing. The band aren't even constrained by effects pedals - the roadies do all that for them.

There are other benefits to a 'round' stage. For a start the band have nowhere to hide, you get to look at your band member of choice whenever you like, even if they've got their back to you. You can also see them when they go offstage for a break during a short solo spot and see what they get up to (even if it is only changing a shirt, having a drink and talking to the instrument techs). Also with a 'round' stage, nobody in the crowd's ever all that far from the stage, especially in a relatively 'small' arena like Nottingham's. There's also the small matter of the band having to walk through the audience to get to the stage. Can you imagine U2 doing that?

Metallica have got a ton of stick over the past ten years over downloading and not being very nice to their fans (I'd like to say here that they were very misunderstood, and I'm not a Lars Ulrich apologist by any means). But I've been looking at their website this morning and I can't think of a better artist website. There's online Twitter-style tour updates, pictures from last night (the picture at the top of this post was taken last night), tour video reports, and by the weekend there'll be a recording of last night's show to be in my iPod. That's a proper recording, not a crappy bootleg.

They went over time because the crowd kept calling them back. They got fined. They didn't care. I went hoarse from shouting. I want to go and see them again soon.

I'm not an advocate of male crying, but even I was filling up at the end. After seeing Some Kind of Monster - although a fascinating document on human relationships - I thought I'd never see them again as it's heartbreaking to see one of your favourite bands on the verge of splitting.

They've come back stronger and better than ever. Even grizzly metal bands have the power to make a grown man cry.

Finally, I notice in August they're playing a racecourse in Ireland called 'Fairyhouse'. Is there a more un-metal name for a venue?

Cat's foot iron claw pt.2

A couple of things I forgot from the earlier post:

Re decent Christmas telly, I forgot about BBC4s Crooked House. Three half hour ghost stories written by The League of Gentlemen's Mark Gatiss, all based in the same house down the ages. Shows that you can use your imagination without resorting to flares-wearing robots or Mackenzie Crook wearing a false nose made from an old Corn Flakes box.

And regarding Prog Rock Britannia, has anyone at BBC4 got the gumption to commision Heavy Metal Britannia? Go on BBC4, you proved you can do a good documentary about music that constantly gets derided over the weekend. It's long overdue.