We Will Rock You

Interview with Ray Shulman from Gentle Giant (Part Two)

admin — Tue, 18 May 2010 22:13:28 +0000

This is the second and final installment of my recent podcast interview with former Gentle Giant bassist/writer Ray Shulman.

In this episode we discuss whether Gentle Giant is progressive rock; playing on the bill with Yes and Jethro Tull; rehearsing for Gentle Giant tours; playing with Black Sabbath; changing labels over the course of years; managing themselves later in their career; changing musical approaches to try and stimulate more commercial success; the grind of touring and the role it played in the band breaking up; reasoning behind not wanting to re-unite; Gary Green and Three Friends; writing with Kerry Minnear again; upcoming Gentle Giant releases; and the renewed fan interest in the band.

Thanks once again to Ray Shulman, and special thanks to Anne Leighton of Leighton Media.

To listen in streaming, simply click the play button in the player below. To download, right click where it says “Listen to the Interview” and save to your computer or disc. You can also download this podcast from iTunes by searching for “We Will Rock You” in podcasts.

Interview with Ray Shulman from Gentle Giant (Part One)

admin — Thu, 13 May 2010 21:16:47 +0000

If you read this blog regularly, you already know what a huge Gentle Giant fan I am. Like a lot of other fans, I’ve always regarded the band as one of the most underrated of a particular era, so when the news came late last year that Gentle Giant was re-releasing its albums from the years it spent on Capitol Records, I was thrilled. Not only would this be a chance to get some great re-issues and bonus tracks, but I saw the opportunity to interview the band members and ask them all the questions I’d been holding onto all thse years!

I started with lead singer Derek Shulman, then guitarist Gary Green, followed by keyboardist Kerry Minnear. Now it is my great pleasure to present this new podcast interview with Gentle Giant bass player/composer Ray Shulman. Ray, of course, is Derek’s brother, and at one time their brother Phil was also in the band, which made for an interesting working senario for all involved. Ray talks about the challenges of brothers working together in Part One, as well as the recent digital and vinyl re-releases; finding and working with the original master tapes; the alternate and live tracks on the digital releases; process of making band decisions; the best and worst of Gentle Giant; and the compositional process for the band.

Special thanks to Ray Shulman for this interview, and to Anne Leighton of Leighton Media for arranging it. Stay tuned for Part two, which I will present on Tuesday.

To listen to the interview, simply click on the play button in the player below. To download it, right click where it says “Listen to the Interview” and save it to your computer or disc. You can also access this podcast at iTunes by searching for “We Will Rock You” in podcasts.

Interview with Andrew McNeice from Melodicrock.com

admin — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 00:42:30 +0000

Since its inception more than a decade ago, www.melodicrock.com has become one of the most important independent music sites in the game, sometimes scooping major news organizations with breaking news about some of the biggest bands in the world. Andrew McNeice is the founder and driving force behind the site, and this coming Friday, Saturday and Sunday he will present Melodic Rock Fest 2 in Elgin, Illinois. This 2 1/2 day event features a dizzying lineup of melodic rock talent, and I spoke to Andrew about what it took to put it all together, what gave him the idea, what we can expect from this year’s festival, and more.

We also talked about the early days of Melodicrock.com, how he built the site into the powerhouse it is now, and Andrew shared some terrific stories about some of his strange dealings with Van Halen, Journey and Def Leppard.

Listen to the interview in the player below. Special thanks to Andrew McNeice for this interview. For more information about Melodic Rock Fest 2 please visit www.melodicrockfest.com

Interview with Bowie Biographer Marc Spitz

admin — Wed, 17 Feb 2010 00:29:58 +0000

Marc Spitz has a long and diverse resume as a pop culture writer and music journalist. He was a Senior Writer at Spin, and his work has appeared in the New York Times, Maxim, Blender, Harp, Vanity Fair, Nylon and the New York Post. He contributes regularly to the British music magazine Uncut.

Spitz has written three novels, and his music biographies We Got The Neutron Bomb: The Untold Story of LA Punk and Nobody Likes You: Inside the Turbulent Life, Times and Music of Green Day have garnered much acclaim. He is also a playwright.

Marc’s newest book is an ambitious biography of David Bowie entitled, appropriately enough, Bowie: A Biography (which I recently reviewed). The book is a remarkably well-researched and thorough look at the pop culture icon, and has also garnered generally strong reviews.

I interviewed Marc Spitz by phone from hs home in New York only a week after the release of his Bowie biography. It’s always interesting interviewing another writer, particularly one who is also a rock biographer. No matter the choice of subject matter, there are experiences that are bound to be common to the experience. You’ll notice that I frequently laugh throughout this discussion, and that’s largely because I recognize so much of what Marc is saying from my own experience in writing an unauthorized biography of Styx several years ago.

This is a long interview, and among the topics we discussed are what made Spitz take on a Bowie bio; what differentiates his book from other previous Bowie biographies; the challenges of the project; interview process for the book; easiest and hardest interview subjects; overcoming “pathological shyness” to conduct interviews; why not interviewing Bowie might have been a good thing; how can a writer get inside a subject’s head; why Bowie wasn’t really that wealthy until the Eighties; best and worst of Bowie’s work; will Bowie ever work in public again; reactions to the book; and Spitz’ upcoming projects.

For more information please visit www.davidbowiebook.com.

Photo by Bryan Smith

Interview with Kerry Minnear of Gentle Giant (Part Three)

admin — Sat, 06 Feb 2010 04:35:12 +0000

This is the third and final installment of my recent in-depth interview with Gentle Giant keyboardist/singer/composer Kerry Minnear.

In this podcast episode we discuss the band’s early record deal with Vertigo, which was a tax relief scheme for a larger label; the mathematics behind Gentle Giant being able to continue recording; the grind of touring and how it contributed to the end of the band; the forthcoming Live at Winchester College DVD; how Three Friends came about and why Kerry decided to depart; more on the possibility of working with Ray Schulman again; and forthcoming releases.

Thanks once again to Kerry Minnear and to Anne Leighton of Leighton Media.

In Glass House
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Free Hand
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Power & The Glory
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Interview with Kerry Minnear of Gentle Giant (Part Two)

admin — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 20:04:47 +0000

This is the second installment of my recent in-depth interview with keyboardist/vocalist/composer Kerry Minnear of Gentle Giant. In this podcast episode we discuss playing on the bill with Yes; differences between Gentle Giant and Yes; John Weathers; recollections of Free Hand; Playing The Fool and Gentle Giant’s reputation as a live band; the relationship between Kerry and Ray Schulman as the principal writers; cooperation vs. competition; the possibility of them writing together again; what embellishments were added to the “Intro ‘74″ and “Intro ‘76″ tracks for the new re-masters; the individuality of music that was recorded with less advanced technology vs. the sameness of the digital recording process.

Thanks again to Kerry Minnear and Anne Leighton of Leighton Media. Please stay tuned for Part Three, which I will post Thursday.

To listen to the interview in streaming, click the play button on the player below. To download it, right click where it says “Listen to the interview” and save it to your computer. You can also access the podcast via iTunes by searching We Will Rock You in podcasts.

In Glass House
Price: USD 8.99

23 used & new available from USD 6.28

Free Hand
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27 used & new available from USD 5.65

Power & The Glory
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26 used & new available from USD 6.79

Kirk Woodring remembers his brother Kyle: “He saw the world through a different lens.”

admin — Sat, 30 Jan 2010 01:03:22 +0000

I never met Kyle Woodring. I first became aware of him a few years ago when I was working on a book entitled The Grand Delusion: The Unauthorized True Story of Styx. I was trying to get as many interviews with people close to the members of Styx as I could, and Kyle was the drummer for former Styx front man Dennis DeYoung in his solo career. I saw Kyle in concert with DeYoung, and shortly thereafter I e-mailed Kyle to ask for an interview and never received a reply. I wasn’t surprised, as it had become increasingly clear to me that the DeYoung camp was a closed shop to me in terms of that project.

I finished the book and forgot all about it until last September 8th, when I saw some fan posts on Facebook that Kyle had passed away unexpectedly. That got my attention, because he was young and seemingly healthy, and the cause of his death was unknown. As the day wore on some of his friends and colleagues also posted about his passing, and it was apparent from the tone of what was not being said that everyone was deliberately avoiding mentioning the cause of his death.

The next day Kyle’s brother Kirk posted to Facebook, “”Kyle struggled for most of his life with depression. At times his depression overwhelmed him. Despite all he had in his life, he often was unable to recognize his worth to the world. On September 8th he succeeded in committing suicide. I feel helpless and saddened to not have been able to help Kyle in his last hours. I’m sure many of you share this feeling of guilt. I also know that those truly intent on suicide rarely reach out once they are committed to the act. In fact the decision to act on these thoughts can bring about a sense of peace and calm. Depression is sometimes a terminal illness. I love my brother deeply and know how wonderful his life was. I will celebrate his light and know that the darkness is no longer present for him.”

I was struck by his unsurprised tone of resignation, especially in contrast to the slew of tributes that had come online from friends and colleagues who universally expressed their disbelief. ”Talking about Kyle’s death with a friend a day after the news came, we agreed that if he could go off the rails, anyone could,” wrote Robbie Fulks, with whom Kyle had played. ”Almost anyone I’ve worked with, as well as I myself, would seem a likelier candidate for suicide.”

Survivor guitarist Frankie Sullivan posted to Facebook, “I am deeply saddened to have learned of the passing of my friend and one time Survivor Drummer Kyle Woodring. He was the best of people and will be dearly missed by all. Godspeed Kyle.” Dennis DeYoung posted a picture of Kyle on his website with the caption, ”A gathering of angels appeared above my head. In memory of my good friend Kyle Woodring. “

Still, it gnawed at me, why isn’t his brother surprised?

This isn’t really my kind of story at all. I write about the music business, and sometimes that ends up touching the fringes of the personal lives of some of the performers I cover, and sometimes those people are privately troubled. It certainly isn’t a secret that the entertaiment business, by its very nature, caters to the exploitation of damaged personalities, which helps explain why alcohol, drugs and sexual addiction are sometimes a part of the equation. So there’s no reason to be surprised when yet another musician takes his own life. But I’m interested in the link between mental illness and musical ability, which can’t be defined but nonetheless seems obvious to me. Depression is so pervasive in the music business that I often wonder whether musical ability is, in itself, an illness, or perhaps a symptom of a larger illness. It may be a side effect of depression. I don’t know, but I can state without reservation that the vast majority of people I know who have genuine musical talent also have depression.

I set out to wrote an ambitious article about the death of Kyle Woodring that would examine the root causes of his depression and suicide. I intended to shine a light into the dark places of the musical psyche and perhaps make it a little easier to understand why a young man who had everything going for him would choose to end his own life.

But I failed. Kyle’s friend and former Icos band mate Danny McGuinness warned me in an email, “Having lost three friends, all incredibly talented artists, to suicide, I wonder if you’re chasing a ghost in connecting creativity and depression. It’s never as easy or neat an explanation as that.” And so it isn’t. No matter how obvious the link between music and mental illness appears to me, I can’t categorically make any assessment of what drove Kyle Woodring and his decisions. What standing do I have to do that? This isn’t a concert review, where I say whether I thought it was good or bad and then everyone forgets about it and moves on. Kyle Woodring is gone, and it would be disrespectful to his family, friends and colleagues for me to categorize his death through the flawed filter of my own understanding or lack thereof. If his own brother couldn’t really understand his depression when he was here, how can I hope to when he’s not?

What follows, then, is my audio interview with Kyle’s brother Kirk Woodring in which he shares some of the joys and struggles of Kyle’s life. While it’s not what I intended, I think in the end it’s more fitting than whatever I might have written.

I want to leave you with one thought that struck me from the interview. “Depression doesn’t have to be a terminal illness,” Kirk told me. “I liken it to diabetes or any other illness; if you treat it, it gets better. It’s not a character flaw, it’s not that you’re crazy. It is an illness.”

For more informtion on suicide hotlines http://suicidehotlines.com/

For more information on depression http://www.depression.com/

Interview with Kerry Minnear of Gentle Giant (Part One)

admin — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 20:52:17 +0000

The last few months have been an exciting time for Gentle Giant fans. After years of relative inactivity, punctuated by sporadic releases of varying quality, over the course of the last few months Gentle Giant has released a large slice of its catalog in digital formats for the first time, and now those same re-masters are coming to CD versions as well. On Tuesday EMI released In A Glass House (1973), The Power and the Glory (1974) and Free Hand (1975) on CD. February will bring additional releases of Playing The Fool, Interview, The Missing Piece, and Giant For A Day, and a DVD entitled GG Live at Winchester College will emerge later in the year as well.

I have been lucky enough to interview both Derek Shulman and Gary Green from Gentle Giant previously, so I was very happy to get the opportunity to interview keyboardist Kerry Minnear, who called me from his home in the UK on Thursday, January 28th to discuss the new releases and his career with Gentle Giant. Over and over what strikes me about the members of Gentle Giant is how different they are from most of the rock musicians I deal with. I routinely interview some of the most famous musicians of a certain time period, as well as some lesser-known people, and they tend to fall into two distinct categories. The ones who have succeeded but whose success is mostly in the past tend to be embittered, looking back over their shoulders at a time in their lives that has been gone for decades, but continues to define them in the public eye in a way they can never really escape. The ones who took a shot but didn’t really achieve commercial success tend to be embittered by their lack of success.

The members of Gentle Giant, by sharp contrast, seem to genuinely celebrate the music they created together; they seem to understand that the very nature of what they created was always going to limit its commercial prospects, and they seem to be okay with that, even proud of it. There’s a humility about the members of the group that isn’t really the norm for musicians. In the case of Kerry Minnear in particular, he is so soft-spoken and unassuming that it’s almost difficult to picture him in a setting where he was required to earn his living by going out and entertaining people en masse, and it’s almost impossible to imagine him having to function in the shark tank of the Seventies music business.

Perhaps that’s a part of why Gentle Giant never garnered more commercial success, who knows? I can only say that the band left a unique and lasting legacy, and it’s a great time to be a Gentle Giant fan right now. In this podcast episode Kerry Minnear discusses the recent burst of Gentle Giant business after years of relative inactivity; the new generations of Gentle Giant fans; why In A Glass House was not released in America initially; touring with Black Sabbath; touring with Jethro Tull; The Power and the Glory and why it became a concept album; and the differences between Gentle Giant and other progressive rock bands.

Special thanks to Kerry Minnear and to Anne Leighton for arranging this interview.

Stay tuned for Part Two, which I will post Tuesday.

To listen in streaming click on the “play” button on the player below. To download, right click where it says “Listen to the Interview”. You can also access this podcast through iTunes by searching We Will Rock You in podcasts.

In Glass House
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23 used & new available from USD 6.28

Free Hand
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Power & The Glory
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Interview with Marillion Guitarist Steve Rothery (Part Two)

admin — Tue, 19 Jan 2010 23:19:03 +0000

This is the second and final installment of my recent interview with Marillion guitarist Steve Rothery. In this podcast episode we discuss the challenges of marketing albums when you move around stylistically; the artistic freedom Marillion affords; the Marillion/Fish one-off reunion a while back; why that won’t lead to a full-blown reunion; changes in Fish’s voice and how that changes the music; should Marillion have changed its name when Steve Hogarth replaced Fish; what’s next for Marillion; the second Wishing Tree album Ostara; the slowness of the Wishing Tree work process; possibility of Marillion doing US dates coming up; why Marillion has not had the same success in America as elsewhere; possibility of Rothery doing some guitar clinics in the US; plans to do some shows or a book featuring his photography.

Thanks again to Steve Rothery, Lucy Jordache, and to Carol Kaye at Kayos Productions.

Ostara
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Interview with Marillion Guitarist Steve Rothery (Part One)

admin — Thu, 07 Jan 2010 22:08:01 +0000

Marillion is one of those bands that constantly challenges its audience. The band first rose to prominence in the Eighties as an anomaly, a progressive rock band signed to a major label and putting out hit records at a time when progressive rock was as good as dead. Early albums like Script For A Jester’s Tear, Fugazi, Misplaced Childhood and Clutching At Straws put Marillion on the map in the UK and internationally, while critics carped that the band was just re-hashed Genesis, due in part to the vocal style of lead singer Fish.

After Fish departed in 1988, the band took a slight turn in direction with 1989’s Seasons End, with new singer Steve Hogarth bringing a very different vocal style to the material, much of which had been demoed before he joined the group. Hogarth would have a better chance to showcase his individual contributions with the next album Holidays In Eden. The album was much more of a song-based record, with more pop leanings and little of the progressive embellishment of past works. The album was received well by what was essentially a new fan base for the band, while many of the group’s longtime hardcore fans saw it as a dramatic step away from the Marillion they had come to love. Thus began a division in the fan ranks that would continue to dog Marillion from that day forward, to the point that singer Steve Hogarth has stated publicly that he wishes the band had changed its name upon his joining so the current lineup would not have to carry the baggage attached to the name.

Over the course of two ensuing decades Marillion has released one challenging record after another, many of them having very little to do with one another or the traditional notion of progressive rock. The band has gone through periods of success and periods of relative obscurity, has gone from a critically despised group to a band that many critics now hail as an undervalued, misunderstood treasure, and has gone from getting ripped off by major labels to controllling and marketing its own work. Marillion’s latest album is entitled Less Is More and features acoustic re-arrangements of some of the band’s past work, as well as a new track.

I spoke with guitarist Steve Rothery from his home in England. This is my second interview with Steve; previously I spoke with him for a book entitled Unsung Heroes of Rock Guitar. Rothery is one of the stalwarts of Marillion; he is one of the founding members, going all the way back to pre-Fish days when the band was still called Silmarillion. Rothery has seen it all and then some in the ups and downs of his career with Marillion, and he’s always had a good sense of humor about the drama of the band, its fans, and the misconceptions and misperceptions that the band has often suffered at the hands of critics who, in many cases, might not have heard anything the band has recorded for nearly twenty years.

In this podcast episode we discuss the idea behind the new album Less Is More; challenged of re-arranging Marillion tunes in an acoustic setting; songs that didn’t work in that setting; electric playing vs. acoustic playing; the Marillion business model of using the Internet to fund and market its products; the global fan community as a family; changes in the business since Marillion’s early days; balancing music and business when you are a creative person marketing your own work; writing process in Marillion; longevity of Marillion and the give and take of being in a band over that long a period of time; differences in old fans and new fans; and is Marillion still progressive rock?

Thanks to Steve Rothery and to Lucy Jordache for arranging this interview.

Stay tuned for Part Two, which I will post next week.

Less Is More
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