Superband

One of the guys I work with posed a question to me. He said it was to get to know me a little better. I don’t know if the answer would help him know me better as a person, but it might help him know my musical taste a little better. The question was this, “If you could form your own superband out of members of other bands, who would you choose? Limit ten members.”

It’s actually an interesting question. There are many musicians and singers out there that I really like. Narrowing it down to less than ten is a daunting task. I gave it some thought and this is what I came up with. Remember: these picks are just my personal preferences. I’m not saying anyone on this list is better than anyone else.

Bass guitar: Flea – Red Hot Chili Peppers – Now, I don’t even like the Chili Peppers, but I give credit where credit is due. Flea is a hell of a bass player. Plus, he was in the Back to the Future movies, which gives him an added dimension of cool.

Drums: Shannon Larkin – Godsmack – Not only does he kick ass on the drums with Godsmack, but he also has a side project playing with a blues band, so he’s versatile.

Rhythm Guitar/Backing Vocals: Shaun Morgan – Seether – I have pretty much liked everything that Seether has put out and Shaun is a big reason why. I know he’s the lead singer in his band, but in this one he’s just providing backing vocals.

Lead Guitar: Aaron Fink – Breaking Benjamin – Well, he’s the original lead guitarist for Breaking Benjamin. He was with them for their first four albums which were, in my opinion, their best albums.

Keyboards/ Rapping Vocals: Mike Shinoda – Linkin Park – Not sure how much rapping I want my superband to do, but maybe I’ll have some. Either way, I needed someone who could play the keyboard so I figured I’d pick someone who could do both. Plus, I do like some of Shinoda’s solo stuff.

Female Vocals: Sharon den Adel – Within Temptation – Put simply, this woman has the best voice I think I’ve ever heard. She can sing anything: rock, pop, even opera. Don’t believe me? Listen to this song, which is a little bit of rock and opera together.

Lead Vocals: Brandon Johnson – Late Night Savior – This was the hardest one for me because there’s so many good vocalists out there. I ended up picking Brandon for this spot because there’s just something about his voice, the way he sings, that resonates with me.

That’s all I got. I know I still have three spots left, but I’m OK with that. If I were to fill them, I’d do it with a string trio. Put a little violin/cello/viola behind it. I don’t know anyone who plays those instruments, or which of those particular musicians is good, so I’ll just leave it at that.

What about you? Do you know who you would pick to to build your own superband?

Music Post

It’s been a while since I’ve done a post about music. A few years ago, I used to do one once a week. They were called My Weekly Soundtrack, and in them I’d put the links to YouTube videos of songs that had been stuck in my head at some point during that week. A few of you were fans of this series of posts, but after taking a break from blogging a while back, I never revived the idea.

For those of you who are hoping that this post will be that revival, it’s not.

It might be fun to start up that series again, but I doubt that I’d keep up with it for very long. There’s no point in going on with it if I’m just going to drop it again soon.

So, what I’m going to do instead is review a few albums, that have released within the last year or so, by bands that I have followed for a while. Up first is the one I liked the least.

Ember by Breaking Benjamin was a big disappointment to me. Up until this album, I’ve pretty much liked everything they’ve ever done. On this one, not so much.

Don’t get me wrong. There are a couple of good songs on it. Red Cold River isn’t bad. But, overall, it just really wasn’t that good to me. Listening to it, I felt like they were going out of their way to not sound like Breaking Benjamin anymore.

The next CD is the newest on, Evolution by Disturbed. I haven’t listened to this one as much as the others. I try to give an album a few listens before I render judgment and I might need to listen to this one at least one more time before coming to a final conclusion. I’m kinda on the fence about it.

On one hand, there are a number of regular Disturbed-type songs, and they’re good. On the other, there are a couple of songs in the same style as Sound of Silence. I mean, the melodies were different. The lyrics were different, but all I kept hearing was, “Hello, darkness, my old friend.” I’m not sure what to do with that.

The last of the albums is the one that I thought I’d like the least, but, in my mind anyway, ended up being the best of the bunch: When Legends Rise by Godsmack.

Godsmack’s previous album, 1000hp, was not very good in my opinion. So, when this one released, I wasn’t expecting much, but I was blown away by how much I enjoyed it. Most of the songs are very catchy and infectious, but still have a good dose of kickass to them. Their first single, Bulletproof, is a good example of that.

There’s not really a bad song on this album. Sure, there’s a couple teetering on the border between decent and good, but there aren’t any that are bad. I can’t think of many albums that have no bad songs on them and this is one of them.

That’s all for now, folks. May all your music be good.

My Weekly Soundtrack: Song Sequels

When you think of the word sequel, I’d say the first thing that pops into your head is movies, or maybe books. I doubt that you’d think of songs. Believe it or not, there are actually songs out there that have sequels.

This is the first of these that came out. It was off of 1991’s Black album. It’s The Unforgiven by Metallica.

The next song is the from the self-titled debut album in 1998: Voodoo by Godsmack.

In 1997, Metallica followed up The Unforgiven, on their album Reload, with this: The Unforgiven II.

In 2006, Godsmack released IV, which included their sequel Voodoo Too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NKon7VUIP4c

Apparently not wanting to be outdone, in 2008, on their album Death Magnetic, Metallica released a third Unforgiven.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J3m6et00DfQ

What do you think people? Song sequels: good idea or bad idea?

My Weekly Soundtrack: 10/29

Baby E has three shows that she likes to watch….or at least have on in the background as she gets into everything she’s not supposed to be getting into. The first two are ones that she’ll watch with her cousins, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Bubble Guppies. The third is all her. That’s to be expected, however, as it is a princess show and she’s the only girl (on my side of the family anyways). The show is called Sofia the First.

Sofia, like any of the other movies/shows about Disney princesses, has its characters occasionally breaking out into song for no particular reason. In one, Sofia’s sister starts singing as she’s walking through the castle. Then, as she’s walking, the castle maids join in, singing background. Granted, outside of other Disney movies, I haven’t seen all that many musicals (This is because I find it incredibly weird when people break out into song for no reason). I’ve seen enough to notice something, though: Apparently nobody has a bad singing voice. Even the people in the background are good singers. They also somehow know exactly what the main character is going to sing.

Here’s a scene that I’d like to see (although because I don’t watch musicals, this may have already been done before and I just don’t know about it): The main character breaks out into song. After a minute of singing, everyone in the background joins in. Seconds after everyone joins in, it becomes obvious that one of the background singers is singing the wrong words and is incredibly off key. Everyone in the song stops and looks at the bad singer. He, or she, apologizes and walks away. The main character looks at one of the other background singers, shrugs, and then they start singing again where they left off.

Anyways, now that I’ve rambled

Weekly Soundtrack: 10/22

It’s that time again, dear readers.

No, it’s not time for the Wheel of Morality (although it’s never a bad time for an Animaniacs reference). It’s time for my weekly soundtrack. There’s no theme or anything this week. Just random songs. Hope you enjoy them. On with the show….

My Weekly Soundtrack: Accidental Vacation

I’m sure that one or two of you noticed that I didn’t do one of these posts last week. It’s not because I didn’t want to, or that I didn’t have time to. It’s because my internet was shut off (On a side note: being broke sucks ass). I was able to keep in touch with a few of you through email (which I was able to do at work), but other than that, last week was internet free for me.

For this week’s soundtrack, I’m just going with songs that have been stuck in my head lately. I wrote a song about it. Want to hear it? Here it goes!

My Weekly Soundtrack: 8/13

I didn’t do one of these last week. I have a good reason, too: I just didn’t feel like it. What? That’s not a good reason? Oh, well. It’s a reason, anyways.

There are no themes or hidden messages in this week’s set. They’re just songs chosen at random. Hopefully, they aren’t ones I’ve picked before. I like to try not to use the same ones over and over again.