Music vs Real Life

Something a little different today... I've been going through serious record-buying (or just plain music-buying) withdrawal lately. I haven't gotten a thing since early January, when I found some used records at a downtown shop. But real life expenses have gotten in the way of pursuing my music passion for a while now. Even last fall, I had to trim down the spending for a time, just to make sure even a modest Christmas could happen. That worked out fine, but ever since the holiday season, real life expenses (health-related; no, nothing life-threatening, but still very important and urgent) have taken hold of my wallet.

So in lieu of a spending spree rundown, I'll just briefly mention some of the cool musical things I've been able to enjoy in other ways. 

To begin with, I watched a terrifically funny Finnish movie the other night, called Heavy Trip. It's the story of a small-town (in Finland) metal band who after twelve years of practice, finally get a gig. It goes badly, as expected, but then there's a possible much bigger show at a metal festival in Norway. I won't go into particulars here - just see it! - but it's a blast. Probably the best, and funniest, rock music movie I've seen in years. The actors are so natural that you forget they're acting. And in between hilarious bits there is some brutally cool black metal-type music. If you like metal... or rock... or just solid laughs... check out Heavy Trip. 

I also watched the movie trailer for Lords of Chaos, a U.S. flick about black metal... done Riverdale style. That means yuk! It looks super cheesy and lame, even judging by the promo. I'll give that a miss, even when it hits Netflix. 

The other night, when a decent choice of movies eluded me, I instead popped on the headphones and ran my Judas Priest Electric Eye concert video for the second time in a couple of weeks. This was the 1986 Dallas show, when Priest was touring for their Turbo album. At their peak here, the band really tore it up with a blistering performance, both musically and visually. Ol' Rob (well, not so old in this '86 show) provided further proof that he was among the the very best frontmen and showmen in the biz. More costume changes than Lady Gaga, I'd guess. All variations on the leather theme, of course.

Amazing guitar-work, naturally, given the twin-axe attack of KK and Glenn, with the rhythm section holding down a solid foundation to allow the showier players to shine. A monstrous robotic machine was the core of the stage set-up, and some of the band members got to ride on the robot arms and platforms. 

Not the greatest setlist in my opinion, focusing almost entirely on 80's songs (tunes like The Sentinel, Freewheel Burning, and Turbo Lover), but the fire and energy that Priest brought to the stage still made this an excellent, entertaining concert video to watch. Well worth the price of admission. 

Over Christmas-time, I got a couple of rock biographies, actually autobiographies, to be more precise. I read the two books very quickly, as they were both so fun and enlightening. The first was Heavy Duty, by KK Downing, one of the guitar maestros of Judas Priest. A cool book full of fascinating and funny stories, maybe a bit less detailed than I'd hoped, but still well worth a look if you're a fan. 

The other autobio I checked out was Thanks A Lot Mr. Kibblewhite, by that guy... you know, that singer for that British band from way back when.... um, Roger Daltrey of The Who, yeah, that's it. This, too, was a zippy read packed with anecdotes and facts, some of which I already knew and others I didn't. I enjoyed Townshend's book, Who I Am, a few years back, and while Daltry's story corroborated some of Pete's recollections, there were different versions of some of those crazy events of long ago. I guess between the passage of time and mind-altering substances, their memories just aren't spot on nowadays. 

Hopefully, in the coming weeks, I'll have some new physical albums here to talk about. Until then, keep the metal faith! Or just plain rock on...