Recently Heard: Live! In the Air Age

Live! In the Air Age, by Be Bop Deluxe

Because my reviews more often than not tend to be reminisces about how I first was introduced to the album, band, composer, book, movie, or what have you - because you know I already like the piece, as I'm reviewing things I have picked out and purchased myself or were gifted to me - it will come as no surprise that not only is there a story involved in it, but I think everyone should go out and by a copy of this album.

Be Bop Deluxe first came to my attention through their inclusion in a collection of heavy metal cover art. Right off the bat, I will say that these guys might be just a bit more heavy metal than David Bowie and probably slightly less than Pink Floyd. On art alone, I had no idea what they were about: Axe Victim had a skeleton head guitar taking up all of the view and this album has a scene from Metropolis (Restored Authorized Edition).

And then patrixa and my brother went to NYC, and she went to a record store and proceeded to talk about guitars with the guy there, telling him to listen to Fates Warning and, maybe, whatever my band name was at that moment. He, in turn, said that as a guitarist I should listen to this, and he sold her Live! In the Air Age on vinyl.

Here's the problem, and it's all mine. I love to introduce people to new music. I do this to the point of annoyance, at least with my wife, who now refuses to listen to anything I pick out on account of it costing me money, or, in the case of a gift, including things she doesn't like (organ, choral music, female vocals, male vocals she doesn't like, and so on). I have a track record for being resistant to new things at first - refer to the earlier review of Children by The Mission, or the forthcoming one on Marty Friedman's Dragon's Kiss for examples.

So I refused to listen to the vinyl for a while, thinking they were just a hack average-to-sloppy metal band. Finally, because I didn't always get a chance to listen to vinyl anyway, I recorded the album to tape. Putting it mildly, I listened to it on tape. Many, many years later when my friend John owned a music store, I had him try to hunt it down for me on CD to no avail. A quick search rather more recently on Amazon.com turned it up as an import from Holland, so it made my wish list, and now here it is (thanks to anon!)

This is without a doubt the best live album, especially for its time (1979). The clarity of each instrument is incredible. Of course, Bill Nelson's ability to sing and play complex guitar lines at the same time (as opposed to potentially multitracked one at a time in the studio) is amazing. This really does have some of the best rock - not metal! - guitar playing on it. Very bluesy, with a lot of the late 1970's jazz fusion thing going on. There's some long extended instrumental excursions, and odd and insightful lyrics. In a few places, there are some rock rhythms which sound familiar - and some of them were even used by metal bands many years later. This, perhaps, is the connection with metal.

Well, that, and the pentagram on the cover, behind the robot's chair, as she gets up and walks towards you...

Fish & Ships

A little more than a week ago we stuffed everyone into the car and drove through NYC. Sort of. We took 95 from here to there, here being somewhere in Joisey, and there being Mystic Connect-the-Dots. Yes, we went on Vacation.

This was a momentous occasion of sorts, as it was the first time we had a destination to visit, just us. Motel and meals out and so forth. In all previous years, we've gone directly to family. We've even stopped at a motel once or twice en route, but this was kind-of-sort-of out of the way (although not so much; we did go to Laconia for the second part of the vacation), and we also hung out for two whole nights.

On Thursday, we stopped for lunch at Bertucci's in Westport, CT - first place we found off the exit, and we were hungry. Brick oven pizza, not as good as the one in Watertown, though. We pulled into Mystic an hour or two later, and went directly to the Mystic Seaport. Weather was a bit cold - windy, with some snowflakes once in a while - so walking along the water's edge and out on the boats had a definite edge. Brandon loves boats - we spent most of the day with him trying to lead us to one of the boats as we looked at the exhibits.

Loved being in the old ships - especially the Charles W. Morgan. The buildings were great as well - stone and/or wood. Building and ship alike had the air of Old about them, and I feel very comfortable in that environment. "Recently" (a few months ago) I read about the Essex, and the Morgan and other whaling exhibits felt like they were continuing the learning experience from the book. No need to visualize a whaling ship when you're looking at the trypots, or harpoons and whaleboats and so forth when they're right in front of you.

I really enjoyed watching the smith doing his work - I probably could have spent days watching him work. Fascinating stuff, not to mention a wee bit warmer in with the forge than out in the wind.

That night, we decided we wanted seafood, and found a place named Ten Clams in the phone book - looked like it would have what we wanted (fish & chips, scallops, and clams) for a pretty decent price. Justin and I set out, and discovered Ten Clams closed an hour before we got there. So we wandered. Saw Mystic Pizza, a couple of closed little seafood shops, and were on the lookout for a small little place where the locals went. Discovered the Sea Swirl and a parking lot filled with locals. A bit pricier (for the dinners) than we were planning on, but damn good, although we didn't have confirmation of that until after we drove back to the hotel, suffering greatly at the delicious smell of dinner.

Speaking of discovery, a certain channel we don't have at home (basic cable, doncha know) had a couple episodes of a fishing show - The Deadliest Catch - on and, after a half a day of wandering around looking at exhibits about fishing, it seemed to continue the museum experience while reclining in our beds. Very cool.

Friday we went back to the Seaport, narrowly avoiding taking Brandon back on the big boats despite constant tugging in that direction, and caught all the exhibits we had missed the day before. The shipyard was reconstructing a trawler and that was incredible to watch. Brandon really wanted to go down and help the guys, but I'm sure they appreciated that we kept him out of the way. With that much energy, he'd have completed the work too quickly, and they'd have to find another exhibit. We did get Mr. B on a couple of boats - they had a trio harbored well out of the winds in a bit of lawn, and he climbed all over them. The ropewalk was very interesting - and somehow, despite the immense length of the building - we had missed it the day before, despite being all around it.

The gallery exhibits - one about African Americans at sea, another photos from the Rosenfield collection, and a collection of ship's figureheads - were also interesting.

We did get to Ten Clams - for more fish & chips, scallops, and clams, of course - for a late lunch, followed by a visit to the Mystic Aquarium. We weren't there that long, but it worked out. The place is rather small, and we had time to see all exhibits (the ray petting area and penguin exhibit were closed - I'm a wee bit suspicious about the latter one, for reasons that will be obvious to the TH folks) and catch the sea lion show. Brandon enjoyed the clown fish, Rachel really liked the anemone garden, Deb liked the shipwreck exhibit(s), and Justin - possible future marine biologist - wandered much of the time on his own, so I didn't really catch what his favorites were. The sea lions - both those in the show and outside - were great. I actually know how to tell them apart from seals now. I might have known that before, but, at least for now, I remember that I know it. My favorite part - also enjoyed by the others - was watching the belugas swim around their tank. Much coolness.

Friday night, Deb found that the Food Network was showing Rachel's Arch Nemesis in a show about travelling and eating for $40 a day - and lo, Rachel Ray was in Mystic, CT. Funny enough, for lunch, she pointed out the Sea Swirl, as it had fresh seafood, prepared correctly, and was the place all the locals went to. Yes, she quoted me almost exactly. Rachel admitted that Rachel Ray might actually be right for once.

Saturday, we drove up to Laconia. I toured my mom's new house (her temporary home, as she waits for her condo to be completed) and hung out with my brother (he has the second (and third) floor apartment, and they will rent out the first). We went out to Hart's Turkey Farm for supper. The Easter bunny found us Sunday morning, and left some loot for the kids, along with a bunch of hidden jelly bean filled eggs. Monday was Justin's 15th birthday - we woke him up with his gift. Deb stuffed it by his pillow, and I stood in the doorway and dialed his number... =)

Tuesday was the only "eh" day of the whole vacation, as we spent most of it on the road, and it also signified the last day of vacation, as it was back to work and school the next day (well, Rachel had Wednesday off, but the rest of us went back to our regular schedules).