The Police in St. Louis...

Ok, so Mark talked me into going. He insisted, saying just because I decided not to go didn't mean he didn't want to see them. So we bought $50 tickets online and took a little getaway in St. Louis for the show two weeks ago.

It took place at the Scottrade Center downtown, a place alot like Kemper here in KC. We went down to the venue early in the day and went backstage to connect with our friends on the crew. The production manager Charlie Hernandez, whom I've known for 25 years, said they would be out for at least a year and do 4 legs of the tour. (Maybe coming to KC.) On the other hand, Danny Quatrochi, Sting's longtime guitar tech and personal assistant told us that he thought it would be good if they made it together for this first leg of the tour. Ha! Different stories from different parts of the touring entourage. They both offered us tickets, but we told them we'd already purchased some. "There isn't a bad seat in the house," Charlie exclaimed.

We returned for the show around 6:30pm when the doors opened. I was impressed with the ease of parking and the lack of traffic to deal with at the venue. It was very laid back in the building, even letting people pass through with cameras.

On the ride there, we heard the opening act, Fiction Plane, on the radio being interviewed at a local station. They played one of their tunes there in the studio called, 'Two Sisters' (killer song) and spoke with the DJ's. Oh, by the way, the frontman bass player and singer, is none other than Sting's eldest son, Joe Sumner, who is very outgoing and full of personality. This made us very enthused about seeing them perform.
When the three musicians came out on stage at exactly 7:30pm, seats were still empty and fans were filing in. They were very reminiscent of The Police 30 years ago, young, edgy and good. Mark and I really enjoyed the fresh energy. Joe announed that the band would be in the concourse between shows to sign CD's and meet the fans. So we went down from our seats on high to get a load of them. So cute, Joe looks astonishingly like his dad and sounds like him, too. The line to meet them went 1/4 of the way around the circular concourse. They were a hit!
(Go to http://www.myspace.com/fictionplane to hear songs and get more info.)

Mark and I took our opportunity to get closer to the stage, finding empty seats in the $225 section to the left of the stage behind the handicapped section. They were perfect, no one was in front of us. After a 30 minute changeover, the house lights went down and Bob Marley's "Get Up, Stand Up" blasted thru the speakers. Stewart Copeland was the first on stage, positioning himself behind the massive drum set and hitting a giant gong with a mallet. Sting and Andy hit the stage, the lights went up and the extravaganza began, 'Message In a Bottle' led the way.

Good opening, much excitement, plenty of roaring from the 17,000 pumped-up fans. The show went from thrilling to good as it progressed, most of the songs taking on the slowed-down tempo and changed arrangements that we'd heard about. The best thing was watching the skill and craftsmanship of the three seasoned musicians, especially the eager and energetic Stewart Copeland running from his drum kit to an array of windchimes, bells, and various hanging percussion items behind him. All in all, it was a good show, not the show of 25 years ago, but good for the men they are now. As Mark says, "They were angry punks then, they are rich & comfortable now. How could they possibly recapture that feeling?" Anyway, I'm glad I went. The set list is as follows:

Message in a Bottle
Synchronicity II
Walking on the Moon
Voices Inside My Head / When the World is Running Down...
Don't Stand so Close to Me
Driven to Tears
The Bed's Too Big
Truth Hits Everybody
Every Little Thing She Does is Magic
Wrapped Around Your Finger
De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da
Invisible Sun
Walking in Your Footsteps
Can't Stand Losing You / Reggatta de Blanc

Encore 1
Roxanne

Encore 2
King of Pain
So Lonely
Every Breath You Take

Encore 3
Next to You

Bob Dylan, the Older the Fiddle, the Sweeter the Tune

"Tonight we saw Bob Dylan and his band electrify Kansas City's Starlight audience with Modern Times material and some old ditties revisited anew. Dylan's cinematic snapshots open up wonderful moments in the social climate of America spanning the counter-cultural movement of the sixties to his current perspective on New Orleans. The concert ended with an utterly spine-tingling rendering of All Along the Watchtower, with the crescent moon slipping into the night sky. Bob Dylan seems to appear slightly younger since I saw him last, the grooves more infectious, the mountains more thunderous, and in the midst of it all, an increasingly coherant, comprehensible and musical voice, rendering a message that deconstructs itself immediately, "something is happening, but you don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones?" Or in delicate strains, an upright base, softening drums, pedal steel searing the heart, Dylan's piercing commentary finding that beautiful note then as if to obey some sort of divine symmetry, disappearing like a ghost in the machine, as if something has happened and we don't know what it is. But it is not a function of age that diminishes the energy, for it was there at the Starlight, old songs, sacred to us, made fresher still, leaving us with little ripples of spiritual joy."
by Mark

Police Shows so far...

Well, by now you have probably been hearing about The Police shows that have been occurring since May 28th. The reviews are mixed, but a lot of them are from very disappointed fans.

From what I can extrapolate, the fans that are pleased with the shows are ones that don't mind that the songs are drastically changed and for the most part, unrecognizable. They are just happy to see the band back together, no matter what. And probably alot of them never saw them in the 80's. Here is an example:

The Police Phoenix, AZ June 18, 2007 Review by Les.

"This was a great concert. The sound level was perfect. Andy Summers played some phenonenal guitar solos (Can't Stand Losing You, for example). Every song sounded great. Hearing Synchronicity I and Spirits in the Material World would have been nice, but the show couldn't have been much better. I have a whole new appreciation for some songs after hearing them live. Wrapped Around Your Finger, Can't Stand Losing You, Driven To Tears, and When the World is Running Down were perfect. Don't Stand So Close To Me was played too slow and Every Little Thing She Does Is Magic didn't have pop, I thought it would. Overall this was a 5 star show."

I have watched many of the clips on YouTube (http://www.youtube.com/) of the shows and I have to admit I am with the fans that are disappointed. The fans that are not happy with the performances seem to be the ones that saw The Police 25 years ago, like me. Those of us that witnessed the edgy, angry, articulate, powerful force that The Police represented in those early days. I am not saying that they should sound exactly like they did then, that is unrealistic. But I am saying that from what I've read, people want to hear the songs as close to what they were in those days. I know I do. Here is another example:

The Police Oakland, CA June 13, 2007 Review by anonymous.

"The songs were performed so poorly I chose to forget the set list. They opened with Message in a Bottle which was a farce. They closed with the most hideous version of Roxanne ever. The encores were not worth waiting around for.

The short review is that the current Police are a horrible cover-band of their old selves. Sting's gratuitous 'eee-ohhs' were lame, the fact that they tuned down almost every song was pathetic, and some tunes were so altered it took several minutes to realize what they were playing. Sting obviously can't sing the high choruses that are the trademark of Police tunes. Andy Summers sounded like he couldn't care less about musicianship. I heard so many shanked notes and f-ups it was embarrasing. I kept wondering when the Police were going to wake up. The crowd looked confused as well. They tried to rock, but ultimately everyone sat down after it was clear that the Police were tired (and DONE). Most of the songs lacked so much energy it was like watching the show in slow-motion. They were a 33 1/3 record played on about 25 speed. People were leaving in droves before the first encore. We soon followed suit.

I think the best summary of the show comes from my best friend. When another friend said he wanted to hear 'King of Pain' before we took off, my buddy said, 'I don't want to hear what they've done to it'. Basically, this show tarnished all of my teenage memories of a once-awesome band. They are old, can't sing the high notes, need a lot more practice, and they gotta stop playing the b.s. 'new-fangled' versions. I was listening to the Police's adult-contemporary style and was only reminded of Michael Bolton, Rick Astley, and STING."

I personally think that Sting just cannot make himself go back to the past in that way and that he is deliberately playing the songs differently. In his jazzed up, slowed down, off tempo way. It's just who he is and Andy and Stewart are going along with it. I don't want to believe they are doing this for the money, but I'm sure it has a whole lot to do with it.

I wish I could say that they do not sound any better than other bands who were wonderful in the 80's, but Pink Floyd blows that theory. Did you hear them play together for the first time in 25 years at Live 8, two years ago? They gave me chills, even watching them streamed on AOL on my computer. And I read that most people felt the same way. So it is possible to relive the past.

This does not make me want to travel any distance and pay an inflated amount of money to see The Police live. I would rather save my memories of how great they were (and my money) and watch them on TV when they do the Live Earth show on July 7th from Giants Stadium in New Jersey. Watching from the coziness of my own living room. I think that's going to be good enough for me.

If you would like to read some of the reviews by fans, go to: http://www.stingetc.com/concerts

New Website is up...

Well, the new website is now up and functioning. Check it out at www.rockandrollstories.info

It is still very much a work in progress, but I will adding more and more stories often. These are mostly excerpts of stories from the book I've been working on for years called, Rock and Roll Medicine, but I'll also be adding stories from my friends in the music business, as well.

So have some fun with your rock and roll memories and let me know what you think. I'll also be happy to take requests for stories.

Be excellent to each other and party on, dude.

Later, Penny

New Website

I am about to launch a new website called, "Rock and Roll Stories." I realized I was limited with this blog space from being able to post the stories I have to share of the days I did concert catering.

So I am creating a space big enough to have lots of pictures, stories, articles, bios, paraphenalia, and fun from back in the 80's when all the really fabulous music was occurring.

I will be launching this new website within the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned...

Police Tour

So, I'm sure you have all probably been seeing and hearing the Police Tour being talked about on the radio and TV. It is, in fact, a reality now. And on an even grander scale than was first suspected in the rumor mill. It is now The Police World Tour which will probably be keeping them on the road for the better part of a year. (If they can all stay on good terms with one another.)

From what I've read on one news report, Stewart and Andy are referring to Sting as their great leader. So, it's pretty clear who's probably calling the shots. Especially in light of the fact that they wouldn't be touring at all if Sting hadn't finally agreed after all these years.

So far they have not announced any plans on being in KC (the closest dates are St. Louis, July 2nd and 2 shows in Denver, June 9th & 10th) but I know from working in the concert industry that a show can get added at any time or another leg of the tour for that matter. So I'm not giving up on the fact that they may still be doing a stadium gig here later in the summer.

Ok fans, I will be keeping you up to date on future news of the tour. I've also been working on some of my adventures with Sting and the Police and will be posting a story soon.

Be excellent to each other and party on...

The Police re-form for Grammy performance Feb 11!

NEWS FLASH: This week in Vancouver, the trio has been spotted by local residents and fans coming to and fro from a rehearsal space. The sightings were unconfirmed until today when a public announcement was made by the GRAMMY.COM website.

"FIVE-TIME GRAMMY® AWARD-WINNING BAND THE POLICE REUNITE FOR FIRST TIME ON THE GRAMMY AWARDS WITH HISTORIC KICK-OFF PERFORMANCE.

SANTA MONICA, Calif. (Jan. 30, 2007) — In an historic GRAMMY® moment, the Police(Sting, Stewart Copeland, and Andy Summers) will reunite and perform together for the first time on the GRAMMY's when they open the 49th Annual GRAMMY® Awards telecast on Feb. 11, it was announced today by The Recording Academy®. With five GRAMMY Awards to their list of accolades, the Police, one of the most famous bands in the world, create a purely original sound by infusing reggae with pop and rock — a sound that will be heard around the world from the GRAMMY stage."

According to StingEtc.com tour dates should be announced soon.
Awesome!!!

Police Reunion?

Hello everyone. Three months have flown by and a new year has begun. Time to get back to blogging. I hope you all had a wonderful holiday season and you're ready to begin anew. New projects, new goals, new enthusiasm. So here is some exciting news. At least it is for me.

In case you haven't heard, there is a rumor the Police are reuniting for a summer tour. Here is a quote from Billboard.

"Rumors are swirling that the Police will reunite for 2007 dates in England and the United States, which would be the legendary trio's first since disbanding in 1986. Sources tell Billboard.com the reports are legitimate but would not publicly comment until final details are nearer to completion. This year marks the 30th anniversary of the release of "Roxanne," the single that broke the Police in the United States." Discussions have been underway as to how this will be commemorated," reads a post on Sting.com attributed to an A&M spokesperson. "While we can confirm that there will indeed be something special done to mark the occasion, the depth of the band's involvement still remains undetermined."

But, on the website StingUs.net they say it's not a rumor and a 60 city tour in May and June is soon to be announced. Well, this is news. Sting has claimed for years that he just doesn't see himself playing with Stewart and Andy publicly again. He's obviously changed his mind. OK by me.

For those of you who saw the Police in concert in the 80's I'm sure you will agree with me that those shows were some of the most riveting and electrifying shows ever. Especially the Ghost in the Machine tour in '82. For me that particular show at Kemper Arena in Kansas City was mind blowing. I felt my life was changed. I was so impassioned about the show, I went to see them two weeks later in St. Louis. That show was just as profound.

Mark and I saw Sting perform Police songs a year ago on his Broken Music tour with his very talented young bandmates and it was not too bad. But it wasn't the Police. And it just made you wish you could hear him do it with Andy's excellent guitar work and Stewart's kenetic drumming. So, we will be anxious to see if they can recreate the magic this summer. I hope the rumor is true.

YOU'VE GOTTA' SERVE SOMEBODY...

Since we are on the subject of Bob Dylan, here is a little story of an encounter with Dylan in the winter of 1980 when he played the Uptown Theatre for 3 nights, here in Kansas City, during his 'born again' phase:

(pictured: Bob & singer, Regina Havis.)



When I ask the tour manager if I can get the newly painted wall in the tiny Uptown kitchen signed by Bob Dylan, he tells me, "Oh, I don't know if that's possible." Acting as if Dylan can't be bothered, he says, "Maybe on the last night he's here. We'll see. Who's signature is this?"

"Timothy Leary," I tell him. Leary is on a lecture tour and just appeared here a few days before and his showy signature is scrawled across the blank wall. 'WE DEFIED GRAVITY. FABULOUS TRIP... LOVE, TIMOTHY LEARY'

As dinner is being served in the VIP room by my nieces Kelly and Paula, I stay put in the tiny kitchen dishing up bowls of scrumptious banana pudding from the refrigerator to interested takers from the crew. After replacing the large pan of layered vanilla pudding, thickly sliced bananas, piles of creamy whipped topping on a vanilla wafer crust, back into the fridge, I turn around and find none other than the legendary Dylan standing in the doorway holding out his plate.

He is slightly built, dark eyes gazing out from beneath his large frock of hair, smiling faintly. I am taken aback. He says to me in an almost inaudibly soft voice, "I hear you might have some banana puddin' in here. Could I maybe have some?"

In my surprise and never one to miss an opportunity, I reply, "Well sure, but while you're in here could I get you to sign the wall?"

He looks at me quizzically. I tell him to step in and I close the big door so he can see the entire wall. Now it’s just me and Bob in the little closed room. I have him all to myself.

He seems a small figure, dwarfed by the activity that surrounds him. He looks up at the wall and asks if his band has signed it. I show him the signatures of Fred Tackett, Jim Keltner, Spooner Oldham, Tim Drummond, and the two lady singers. He looks pleased.

(pictured: Spooner Oldham, Keith Luecke, Roger Jones, Yours Truly, Kansas City Kelly, Fred Tackett, & Beautiful Paula.)



Then he points to the giant scrawl and says, "Who is this?"

I tell him it's Timothy Leary.

"Oh really, he was here? What does he do?" he asks.

I tell him, "he talks." He is very surprised and interested. He reads the scrawl and asks me what it means. I tell him Leary walked off the edge of the stage during his performance and Dylan forces out a sputtering laugh. I hold up a big magic marker and he takes it from my hand.

He positions himself to the left of Leary's signature. His feet squarely planted on the ground as if to embrace the wall. In a large sweeping motion, with flamboyant strokes, in huge letters, he writes, ‘MAY GOD BLESS YOU IN A MIGHTY AND POWERFUL WAY. LOVE, BOB DYLAN.’ He then turns and says, "Can I have some banana puddin’ now?"

The Genius of Bob Dylan

The legend comes to grips with his iconic status; an intimate conversation prior to the release of the new ''Modern Times''
JONATHAN LETHEM

"I don't really have a herd of astrologers telling me what's going to happen. I just make one move after the other, this leads to that." Is the voice familiar? I'm sitting in a Santa Monica seaside hotel suite, ignoring a tray of sliced pineapple and sugar-dusty cookies, while Bob Dylan sits across from my tape recorder, giving his best to my questions. The man before me is fitful in his chair, not impatient, but keenly alive to the moment, and ready on a dime to make me laugh and to laugh himself. The expressions on Dylan's face, in person, seem to compress and encompass versions of his persona across time, a sixty-five-year-old with a nineteen-year-old cavorting somewhere inside. Above all, though, it is the tones of his speaking voice that seem to kaleidoscope through time: here the yelp of the folk pup or the sarcastic rimshot timing of the hounded hipster-idol, there the beguilement of the Seventies sex symbol, then again -- and always -- the gravel of the elder statesman, that antediluvian bluesman's voice the young aspirant so legendarily invoked at the very outset of his work and then ever so gradually aged into.

It's that voice, the voice of a rogue ageless in decrepitude, that grounds the paradox of the achievement of Modern Times, his thirty-first studio album. Are these our "modern times," or some ancient, silent-movie dream, a fugue in black-and-white? Modern Times, like Love and Theft and Time Out of Mind before it, seems to survey a broken world through the prism of a heart that's worn and worldly, yet decidedly unbroken itself. "I been sitting down studying the art of love/I think it will fit me like a glove," he states in "Thunder on the Mountain," the opening song, a rollicking blues you've heard a million times before and yet which magically seems to announce yet another "new" Dylan. "I feel like my soul is beginning to expand," the song declares. "Look into my heart and you will sort of understand."

What we do understand, if we're listening, is that we're three albums into a Dylan renaissance that's sounding more and more like a period to put beside any in his work. If, beginning with Bringing It All Back Home, Dylan garbed his amphetamine visions in the gloriously grungy clothes of the electric blues and early rock & roll, the musical glories of these three records are grounded in a knowledge of the blues built from the inside out -- a knowledge that includes the fact that the early blues and its players were stranger than any purist would have you know, hardly restricting themselves to twelve-bar laments but featuring narrative recitations, spirituals, X-rated ditties, popular ballads and more. Dylan offers us nourishment from the root cellar of American cultural life. For an amnesiac society, that's arguably as mind-expanding an offering as anything in his Sixties work. And with each succeeding record, Dylan's convergence with his muses grows more effortlessly natural.

How does he summon such an eternal authority? "I'd make this record no matter what was going on in the world," Dylan tells me. "I wrote these songs in not a meditative state at all, but more like in a trancelike, hypnotic state. This is how I feel? Why do I feel like that? And who's the me that feels this way? I couldn't tell you that, either. But I know that those songs are just in my genes and I couldn't stop them comin' out." This isn't to say Modern Times, or Dylan, seems oblivious to the present moment. The record is littered -- or should I say baited? -- with glinting references to world events like 9/11 and Hurricane Katrina, though anyone seeking a moral, to paraphrase Mark Twain, should be shot. And, as if to startle the contemporary listener out of any delusion that Dylan's musical drift into pre-rock forms -- blues, ragtime, rockabilly -- is the mark of a nostalgist, "Thunder on the Mountain" also name-checks a certain contemporary singer: "I was thinking 'bout Alicia Keys, I couldn't keep from crying/While she was born in Hell's Kitchen, I was livin' down the line." When I ask Dylan what Keys did "to get into your pantheon," he only chuckles at my precious question. "I remember seeing her on the Grammys. I think I was on the show with her, I didn't meet her or anything. But I said to myself, 'There's nothing about that girl I don't like.' "
For page 2 go to:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/story/11216877/the_modern_
times_of_bob_dylan_a_legend_comes_to_grips_
with_his_iconic_status

Check out this movie...

This is our movie pick of the week.
Why:'The Secret' is a movie about the Laws of Attraction. Wonderful information on how to tune into the flow of the universe to manifest what you want in your life. Ask and you shall receive.
To order, go to: http://www.thesecret.tv

Brodie Rush hosts Pitch Music Awards...

My talented son Brodie, of Be/Non fame, will be hosting the Pitch Music Awards at the Uptown Theatre tonight, August 11, 2006 7:30pm.

If you want to see him in action, now is your chance. Admission is only $5.

http://www.be-non.com

The Long Shadow of Led Zeppelin by Mikal Gilmore

If you like Led Zeppelin here is an excerpt from a story in the current issue of the Rolling Stone.

Savaged by critics, adored by fans, the biggest band of the Seventies took sex, drugs and rock & roll to epic heights before collapsing under the weight of its own heaviness

There is no other story in rock & roll like the story of Led Zeppelin because the story is an argument—about music, who makes it, who hears it and who judges its meanings. Mainly, though, it's an argument about the work, merits and life of a band that has been both treasured and scorned now for more than thirty-five years. The arguments started as soon as the band did, rooted in a conviction that Led Zeppelin represented a new world, a new age—a rift between the hard-fought values of the 1960s and the real-life pleasures and recklessness of the 1970s. Either the band was taking us forward or taking us under, illuminating the times or darkening them. Those in the band weren't always sure themselves where everything was headed; things moved big and moved fast, and nothing simple happened. When everything was done, good and bad, the music withstood it all. Led Zeppelin—talented, complex, grasping, beautiful and dangerous—made one of the most enduring bodies of composition and performance in twentieth-century music, despite everything they had to overpower, including themselves.

Led Zeppelin were playing for new ears, and three and a half decades later, their music still plays the same way. Those sounds rushed through us and ahead of us, into territory that seemed to have no ending.

Led Zeppelin would come to epitomize the 1970s as nothing else ever has, but their ingenuity and ambition were deeply rooted in the changes of earlier decades. Jimmy Page was drawn to guitar in the 1950s by Lonnie Donegan's skiffle sounds and Elvis Presley's sexualized rockabilly, and by the 1960s he was a major player in the London pop scene. He made a reputation playing on sessions for the Kinks, the Who, Them, the Pretty Things, Herman's Hermits and Donovan, among others. In 1966, Page joined Jeff Beck in the Yardbirds. But the band was fraying from Beck's dark-cloud temperament, and in mid-1968, all the members had abandoned the group. Page, with the help of the group's manager at the time, Peter Grant, assumed the rights to the band's name and set out to find new members.

When John Paul Jones, an arranger and bassist who had worked with Page on Donovan's "Sunshine Superman," heard about the new band, he called Page to say he was eager to join. Page told Jones he would be back in touch; first, there was a singer he had to see. Page was looking for a vocalist who was versatile and undaunted—who could interact spontaneously with guitar improvisations. He had thought about Steve Marriott, formerly of Small Faces, and Terry Reid, but they weren't available. The day after Jones' call, Page and Grant went to hear Robert Plant, whom Reid had recommended.

Plant was from an industrial area known as the Black Country, in England's Midlands. Like Page, he had been drawn to Elvis Presley, though Plant had a special affinity for American country-blues singers, such as Skip James, Bukka White and Memphis Minnie. He also had a thing about Lord of the Rings, which inspired the name of the band he was singing in, Hobbstweedle, when Page first heard him performing at a teachers college in Birmingham. When Plant sang a version of Jefferson Airplane's "Somebody to Love" in what Page later described as a "primeval wail," the guitarist said it unsettled him. It was exactly the voice he wanted. "I just could not understand why," Page said, "when he told me he'd been singing for a few years already, he hadn't become a big name yet." Page and Plant met at the guitarist's houseboat on the Thames and discussed their tastes. Page played a track recorded by Joan Baez, "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You," and explained that he wanted to find a way to put a song like that in a new context, one that would bring alive both the darkness and lightness of the material and heighten those contrasts. "We were dealing from the same pack of cards," Plant said last year. "You can smell when people . . . had their doors opened a little wider than most, and you could feel that was the deal with Jimmy. His ability to absorb things and the way he carried himself was far more cerebral than anything I'd come across before and I was so very impressed."




Plant recommended John Bonham, a drummer he had worked with. Bonham admired soul and Motown drummers and jazz musician Gene Krupa. But it was Cream's Ginger Baker, Bonham said, who "was the first to come out with this 'new' attitude—that a drummer could be a forward musician in a rock band, and not something that was stuck in the background and forgotten about." Bonham was nobody to remain in the background. He had a crushing attack and had been tossed from clubs for playing too loud. Page later said that when he first heard Bonham, he decided what his band would sound like. "This could be a breakthrough band," Page told Bonham.

Jimmy Page, John Paul Jones, Robert Plant and John Bonham came together for the first time in a room below a record store in London. Page suggested that they try "Train Kept a-Rollin'," a rockabilly song popularized by Johnny Burnette that had been given new life by the Yardbirds. They had their sound and groove in that first song. "As soon as I heard John Bonham play," Jones told the drummer's biographer, Chris Welch, "I knew this was going to be great—somebody who knows what he's doing and swings like a bastard. We locked together as a team immediately." Plant has said that was the moment that he found the potential of what he could do with his voice, and also that it was the moment that defined the band: "Even though we were all steeped in blues and R&B, we found in that first hour and a half that we had our own identity."

Days after that first meeting, Page took the New Yardbirds to Copenhagen and Stockholm for some shows, playing covers and some new material of his own. Page understood right away that working any longer under the Yardbirds name would prove a liability. He settled on a new name, according to one legend, from a remark that the Who's drummer, Keith Moon, had made when Page, Beck, Moon and Who bassist John Entwistle had flirted with the idea of forming a group. "It would probably go over like a lead zeppelin," Moon joked. The phrase stayed with Page; it afforded a further example of contrasts between hard and light things. Peter Grant, who would now be the manager of this new band, decided to remove the letter a from lead—he was worried that the word might be mispronounced as "leed."

For rest of story go to:
http://www.rollingstone.com/news/coverstory/long_shadow_of_led_zeppelin

Rock & Roll Memoirs

Over the last couple of years there have been some very good memoirs written by musicians. If you are interested in reading about the people making the music in the 50's and 60's, here is a list of some to check out.







I just happened to stumble across "The Hurdy Gurdy Man" by Donovan Leitch early this summer at the library. I was a big fan of Donovan in the 60's and found his book fascinating when I read so many parallel's with my own teenage years. Having read Sting's book, "Broken Music" in 2004 and Dylan's book, "Chronicles Volume I" shortly after, I discovered all three men discussed alot of the same events and people from their own personal perspectives.



If you want to read about being in the music business from a woman's point of view there is Tori Amos' book, "Piece by Piece." She discusses her childhood being raised by a Cherokee grandfather, who taught her the medicine ways of the native people to the Christian indoctrination of her father and paternal grandparents, who were all ordained ministers. Towards the end of the book she warns you of the do's and don'ts of the recording industry.





I am now reading simultaneously the biographies of Nick Mason, drummer for Pink Floyd, a very large almost coffee-table-like book with many colorful pictures, called "Inside Out" and Eric Burdon (of the Animals) "Don't Let Me Be Misunderstood." I find his book personally interesting because I met the Animals when I was 16 and became good friends with their road manager, Terry McVay, for many years.



Andy Summers (of the Police)has a new book coming out in October called "One Train Later." Hopefully I'll be done with the other two books by then so I can get started on his.

Happy Reading... Penny

Welcome to the Rock and Roll Cafe'

PENMARK Speaks:

Song of the day: Tom Petty's "Saving Grace"

Why: Great rhythm, and lyrical discourse that weaves into the fabric of these sun-baked days; a commentary on the antipathy that is gripping the land.

referencing...
"the sleeping cities...
It's hard to say, who you are these days
you keep running for another place, to find that saving grace."


All quiet in the heartland, though
hot winds rage across the plains
This heat wave could be an aftershock of those
Civilian casualties in Qana.
We're just observing it now,
from the sanctuary of our homes.
No protests, no voices raised, no marches
no parades, no congregations, no visualizations.



Book of the day: Cool Mind Warm Heart
Author: Steve Roberts
Publisher: St. Lynn's Press

Why: Enlightening. Addresses the socio-political climate in a humanistic but unembittered tone, encapsulating divinity
in the context of daily life, by recognizing that the only thing that separates us from the divinity of a Jesus or a Buddha, is the perception of separateness. With fierce devotion to compassion, Roberts, stirs us into looking within, through a sequence of essays, cleverly titled, for example, "Why I love Alzheimers" or "What if Jesus had been Molested by a Priest" or "The Elusive Meaning of "Support Our Troops"" or "Being Mothered by Stones."
http://www.coolmindwarmheart.com

Perhaps as the Police said in "Spirits in the Material World"


"There is no political solution, to our troubled evolution"

Perhaps the revolution of the sixties produced a counter-revolution, the neo-conversative take-over we are experiencing now. A principle of polarity is in place, and the more we oppose something, the more we create it. We're going quantum from here on out. No protest, just pro-whatever. We're moving into the feeling space of that which we want to create. We're observing what we've created, gestating, learning, observing, like stones weathering the day. Choosing non-action.
Transcending the carnage and the apocalytic fervor.
We're no longer looking, just running for that other place, to find that saving grace.
But we're not done. The paradigm shift is on. The quantum revolution commences.
We're harnessing the energy in the vacuum of an atom, with soft thoughts of peaceful nights in Tel Aviv and Beirut, where the children of Arabs and Jews, sleep soundly tonight.

Mark