WIGGUM DAILY

 

Especially for long time WD reader Bobba, who’s been telling anyone and everyone at work all week about this video and pestering me to put it up… here it is. Not sure what’s up with the judge on the left of screen. He’s either dead, or on horse tranquillizers.

 

 

What an awesomely powerfull set of pipes, for ANY singer, let alone one so young in years. Fairly sure she made it to the final and got beaten by the break dancing robot that caught on fire.. or something like that.

 

 

In honour of the pure awesomeness of THE CURE, here’s another of the all time classics. Sporting one of the all time great bass /keyboard melodies of anything written in the last fifty years, it then tops that at the end with trumpet and sax dancing all over the core melody right to the very last note… Genius stuff indeed.

 

 

The self loathing, sad sack, pathetic goth wannabe, emo try-hards that frequent a supermarket razor blade aisle near you would do well to study these guys hard and see what they COULD become… if only they had talent and drive and…  actually…any emo’s reading this.. forget it… you’ll never be as good as Bobby and the boys… why not do us ALL a favour and just end… anyway,  I didn’t mean to lose all touch with punctuation, or sentence structure, but it’s working OK so far,  so I’m gonna run with it for the rest of this… and before I digress any further and draw away from the awesome force that is THE CURE…

 

 

This guys is an awesome flute player and a mean beat-boxer to boot.

I ran out of breath just watching it. 

 

 

 

From the song REMINISCING by the masters of harmony LITTLE RIVER BAND today’s MOTD features what must surely be one of the great opening lines to any song…

 

 

A single breath, rapid fire lyrical delight that nicely set’s up the the rhyme for the short sharp second line of the song "Would it turn out right".  Now everyone is familiar with the album version of this song that’s bound to be on high rotation down at the local Gold-FM radio station. First recorded in 1978 with the band’s original vocalist GLENN SHORROCK, the song reached #3 in the Australian Top 40 and made it to #5 over in the USA, the first of six consecutive Top 10 US Singles for LRB.

 

In 1982, Glenn Shorrock left the band to pursue a solo career. His replacement was a young looking JOHN FARNHAM who fronted LRB from 1982-1984 until leaving himself to continue his successful late 80’s "You’re The Voice" fuelled solo career. The version of REMINISCING we present for you as today’s MOTD is a 1983 live performance by LRB with Farnham manning the mic.

 

 

With LIVE vocal harmonies the equal of any studio recoding from The Beach Boys or Bee Gees, we see on display the talent of the LRB performers and especially Mr Farnham.  I reckon even Glenn Shorrock, who wrote and performed the album version would be envious at vocal talent, and on stage presence that "Farnsie" brings to this performance.  Think of this version next time you hear the original on the radio. And enjoy today’s MOTD.

 

 

Nothing fancy today.

Just a simple guitar riff MOTD to start your weekend off.

 

 

Less than a minute and you’re done.

 

 

In attempting to describe the subject of our MOTD I’m picturing a sliding scale of the Australian music landscape.  With bands such as ROSE TATTOO, THE ANGELS and AC/DC on the far left, with your HOODOO GURUS, LIVING END and JET a bit further up. Then slightly to the right of centre comes INXS, DRAGON, COLD CHISEL , through to POWERFINGER, CROWDED HOUSE, YOU AM I, SKYHOOKS right on up to the far far FAR right with KYLIE and PETER ANDRE‘.

 

I figure that AIRBOURNE,  fits in about 1/3rd the way along from the far left.  Slotting in nicely ahead of fellow contemporaries Jet and The Living End.  Make no mistake, these boys (all under 22yo) can R.O.C.K. !!!   With names like Joel & Ryan (brothers), Roadsy & Streety what else would expect really.

 

 

 

Hailing from the fair city of WARRNAMBOOL on Victoria’s far west coast, their hobbies include turning copious amount of electricity into sound by utilising an Ãœber ensemble

of Marshall Stacks.   Airbourne have been sighted tearing up rock stages all around the world, recently appearing as feature artists at the twentieth annual SXSW event in Austin, Texas.

 

Click HERE to listen.

 

If you enjoy fresh sounding,  balls-to-the-wall, foot-to-the-floor,  GIBSON GUITAR fuelled rock, then I reckon you’ll love our MOTD.    Visit the bands’ OFFICIAL PAGE for details of upcoming live performances, join the mailing list, and for further info on the guys…

 

 

Something a little different for our MOTD. You may have heard the news that KURT VONNEGUT passed away this week on Wednesday at the age of 84 in his Manhattan home, the result of a fall some weeks earlier that caused serious brain damage.  For those not familiar with his work, the link above can do a better job filling you in than I. 

 

For those too lazy to read for themselves, Kurt Vonnegut was an American WWII soldier, turned novelist and writer. His time as an advanced forward scout for the 106th INFANTRY DIVISION saw him captured in Dec of 1944 during the BATTLE OF THE BULGE and subsequently held as a German POW in the city of DRESDEN. He was there during the ALLIED COMBING CAMPAIGN of Feb 1945, one of only seven US POW’s to survive those bombings and became a first hand witness to the horrific aftermath.

On the subject he recalled "Utter destruction… carnage unfathomable". It was these events that greatly influenced his life’s literary work.

 

One of his more famous works was the 1969 novel SLAUGHTERHOUSE FIVE, the title being a reference to his place of detention in Dresden, an underground meat packers slaughterhouse, and the reason he and his fellow POW’s survived the Allied bombings.  Let’s move forward in time to the year 2003 and we are nearly there.  Kurt got together with Melbourne musician and composer SIMON HESELEV to work on a collaborative spoken-word project in which Kurt reads a passage from his novel Slaughterhouse Five, and Simon sets it to music, which we present for you here today in memory of Kurt Vonnegut.

 

It takes a little bit to get going, but once it takes off, the imagery created by the words is profound and the message a poignant one, from a man who was there and witnessed these events with his own eyes, ears, nose, and hands. 

 

 

In early 1974 ROGER GLOVER took over production of THE BUTTERFLY BALL rock-opera from fellow DEEP PURPLE  band member JON LORD.  The  break-away single from the resulting 1975 album was the melodic, Beatle’esque anthem LOVE IS ALL.

 

 

Featuring as today’s MOTD, this is sure to bring back many memories for anyone lucky enough to be around in the late 1970’s.  The punchy vocals of RONNIE JAMES DIO keep this number tracking along at a steady pace. As does the dominant rhythm section that demands to be heard on an equal footing with the lyrics.

 

Couple all that with a hyper coloured, psychedelic animated film clip and we’ve got a retro winner, worthy of a place among the WD MOTD archives.

 

 

 

 

Everyone’s favourite dwarf/musical genius PRINCE is providing your Sunday MOTD.

This is a live and acoustic version of his 1991 number one single CREAM, from the album DIAMONDS AND PEARLS, performed here without the aid of his at-the-time shiny new backing band NEW POWER GENERATION.  

 

What this clip shows for me is how much of a perfectionist this guy is and also how much true talent he has within his diminutive little frame. The way he sits there up on that stool and reels off the guitar licks and sings as well as any studio album recording, without seemingly trying, instead spending more time interacting with the audience.  That spells GOOD.