Classic Rock Bottom

NEW MUSIC CORNER #13 (TAKING DAWN/THE DOOBIE BROTHERS/DOWN 'N' OUTZ/SANTANA)

by RJhog

I'm gonna tweak my format just a bit starting this week.  From now on, I'm gonna post from 3 categories.  Those will be a "New" band, a "Classic" band and a "Pick 'Em" or "Grab Bag", which could be anything.  Of course, I'm throwing a curve right off the bat because I prepped 4 albums for this volume of NMC.  So I'll have a new, classic, pick 'em and a bonus this week. 

New Band

  Band: Taking Dawn
  Album: Time To Burn
  Released: 2010




1. Take Me Away
2. Save Me
3. Endlessly
4. Can't Leave You Alone
5. Black Diamond

Taking Dawn's debut release is pretty cool.  This band opened for Kiss during their 2010 European Tour.  They have somewhat of a late 80's hair band sound.  This album is loaded with melodies, hooks and some very decent twin lead guitar playing.  I actually downloaded this from iTunes (which is very unusual) because it had 3 bonus tracks compared to the physical release, and I've included two of those here (Can't Leave You Alone and the Kiss cover Black Diamond). 

Cover Art:  C (not great, not bad, just there)

Recommendation:  Buy it!

Classic Band

  Band: The Doobie Brothers
  Album: World Gone Crazy
  Released: 2010




 6. Chateau
 7. Nobody
 8. World Gone Crazy
 9. Don't Say Goodbye
10. Old Juarez

"Wow" is my first impression of this album.  Tom Johnston still sounds the exact same, which is awesome.  The song Don't Say Goodbye has a familiar voice (Michael McDonald) on backing vocals.  For my money, Old Juarez may just be the song of the year.  It's fantastic.  The only drawback for me here (it's minute) is the other vocalist (I think it's Pat Simmons).  It's really a shame that McDonald isn't doing a couple of lead vocals here.  But like I said, Tom Johnston makes this worth the price of admission.

Cover Art: C (looks like actual art, which I know nothing about)

Recommendation: Buy it!

Pick 'Em Band

  Band: Down 'N' Outz
  Album: My Regeneration Vol. 1
  Released: 2010




11. Golden Opportunity
12. Storm
13. Overnight Angels
14. Career (No Such Thing As Rock 'n' Roll)
15. By Tonight

This is Joe Elliot's (Def Leppard) side project with some of The Quireboys and their take on Ian Hunter's catalog (I'm not sure if any of these are Mott The Hoople songs or not).  As far as cover albums go, this is one of the better ones.  Probably because the track listing is very unknown to me, therefore it sounds fresh.  This is well done, and Elliot can still sing pretty well, at least in the studio.

Cover Art: D (kind of crappy)

Recommendation:  If you have the dough, buy it!

Bonus Band

  Band: Santana
  Album: Guitar Heaven:The Greatest Guitar Classics Of All Time
  Released: 2010




16. Can't You Hear Me Knocking (Scott Weiland)
17. While My Guitar Gently Weeps (India Arie & Yo-Yo Ma)
18. Photograph (Chris Daughtry)
19. Back In Black (Nas)
20. Dance The Night Away (Pat Monahan)

This bonus album I have for you is crap.  Plain and simple.  Only a couple of songs here are even tolerable, those being Can't You Hear Me Knocking, While My Guitar Gently Weeps and Under The Bridge (which I did not include).  I do actually like Back In Black with Nas, not because I like rap, but the song fits the rap style to me.  The lyrics are perfect for rap.  Who would have known that in 1980?  Anyway, the rest is pretty much awful.  Photograph, Dance The Night Away and Fortunate Son (also not included here) are 3 of the worst covers ever.  I even like Vince Neil's covers album better than this.

Cover Art: B (the best thing about this album)

Recommendation: Total waste of money.

To listen to NMC #13, please click here.
                          

                         

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Replies to This Discussion

"Career (No such thing as Rock'n'Roll)" is a great (old!) song. I had'nt heard it before this summer, but it's probably my favorite-song of the year.

Somethings wrong with the player for me, anyway, so I can't listen to the music. Too bad!
File Factory is not working like it used to - the music player is no longer available as an option. Would love to listen to this, but cant...
Working on it...
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I don't understand...is this not working either? Did you try the link at the bottom of the original post?
Yeah it is. I was just being a turd.
Nice selections RJ.

TAKING DAWN...
This one was just OK for me, I liked it, but didnt hear anything to differentiate them from the rest of todays musics scene.

DOOBIE BROTHERS...
I own this as well. The list of contributors is impressive and the music is well written, produced, and masterfully played. You can tell they have aged well, and just like a fine wine, they have mellowed a bit, but not annoyingly so. The music in this release is very mature and layered real nice. With each listen I've heard something new and I like that about this version of the Doobies. Huge plus to hear Michael McDonald! Wish they had done more with him, but maybe that wasnt their choice....

DOWN 'N' OUTZ...
Ive heard this release prior to this posting as well, and I like it ok enough. Its not sticking with me though, not sure why...

SANTANA...
Agree with you on this. I didnt hold out much hope for this release anyway. I will take your advice and save a few dollars. The Back in Black tracks sucks real bad, I cant do rap, so it just aggrevates me everytime I hear a classic track remade or sampled like this. Pure Crap!!!
Typically I'd totally agree with you on the classic rock track being sampled or remade, but for some reason this is okay with me on this song. Not because it will replace it or become my preferred version, that won't happen. I think it's just the lyrics. I think they fit so well into the rap personna, and amazingly, they were written 30 years ago by about as white a boy as you can imagine (nothing racial intended there).

I'm actually listening to this right now.
I hope I didnt come across as mean, I didnt mean it that way, I just cant do the rap-rock thing.
Not at all...I know exactly where you are coming from...and 99 % of the time I totally agree.
Ok....officially HOOKED on Taking Dawn.

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