Out here there’s a hole in the sky/Doors open to the other side

Friday 22 August – The thing about listening to bands that play covers is that there is only so many times that you can listen to G 'n' R, Van Halen and Thin Lizzy without getting a bit blasé about it. I’m not knocking the expertise of the bands. Blimey, I couldn't do it. But it gets a bit 'samey'. Not so tonight’s offering at The Roman Bath, a 60's covers band called "The Jet Blacks".

We first saw these back in December 2007, and there is an introduction to them here. I arrived just before they started and John (who was sitting on a stool) was just concluding a warm-up by playing Peter Green's Albatross. The Jet Blacks are a four-piece from Yorkshire, maybe even York itself (are you twangy44?) Shortly after the warm-up they launched into the first of three sets, punctuated by 10 minutes breaks.

They covered songs such as: Just One Look, Yes I Will (The Hollies), Sweets For My Sweet, When You Walk In The Room, Love Potion Number 9 (The Searchers), Foot Tapper, Riders In The Sky, Geronimo/Kon-Tiki, Man Of Mystery, Apache (The Shadows), I’ll Never Get Over You (Johnny Kidd and The Pirates), It’s So Easy (The Crickets), You’re No Good (Swinging Blue Jeans), Please Don’t Tease, The Young Ones (Cliff Richard and The Shadows), Bad Moon Rising (Creedence Clearwater Revival), Bare Footin’ (Robert Parker), C’mon Everybody (Eddie Cochran), I’m A Believer (The Monkees), Wipe Out (Surfaris) Bad To Me, I’ll Keep You Satisfied (Billy J Kramer and The Dakotas), Half Way To Paradise (Billy Fury), Do You Wanna Dance (Cliff Richard), Hi Ho Silver Lining (Jeff Beck), I Saw Her Standing There (The Beatles), Glad All Over (Dave Clark Five). They also managed to squeeze in an Elvis medley (Hound Dog, All Shook Up, Teddy Bear etc.), and a Rock ‘n’ Roll medley (Roll Over Beethoven, Johnny B Goode etc.) Absolutely first class and very well played.

What’s on my p-pod this week? – Well, on Tuesday I took delivery of the second album from Southern-fried rockers Black Stone Cherry, Folklore & Superstition. Now I’ve seen these guys live and they are pretty damn awesome, so would the second album stand up to their debut? In fact they had previewed two tracks, Blind Man and Reverend Wrinkle when I saw them at The Duchess(oops!) Fibbers, so I knew that there would be at least two good songs on there!

Where the first album was full on heavy rocking all the way through, F&S shows a maturing style. Blind Man seems to flow naturally on from the first album and Please Come In has an opening worthy of Led Zep, but it softens as the track goes on. Reverend Wrinkle is a great track and pulls the album into the realms of heavy metal. Soulcreek on the other hand is much more mainstream and has a Yeah Yeah sing-along chorus. Things My Father Said is a soft-rock, Aerosmith ballad moment, and to me it sums up the variety of styles that BSC can achieve without compromising their under-lying Southern rock foundation. Track six is The Bitter End, which, though it ebbs and flows, is a full on metal track with fantastic vocals and frantic drumming.

Long Sleeves is quite heavy but has a really melodic chorus, Don’t ask me why / I’ve seen children die / Watched men take their lives / I’ve seen woman cry / My momma always said to wear long sleeves. Brilliant riffs. Peace is Free is probably my current favourite track, a real Embrace-style anthem. This is probably the song most likely to be a single, being the most 'Nickleback' in style. Devil’s Queen really has my head nodding up and down. Full on hard rockin’ riffs with a bit of voodoo harmonica, a great chorus, and a superb guitar solo that should gone on for at least another ten minutes. Track ten is The Key and they must have been on the wacky baccy when composing the lyrics for this one. A spooky, metal riff opens into a simple guitar solo which then leads into distorted starting vocals. The chorus is a bit Lunca Coil, it’s that heavy. But the middle eight is real Southern rock with tambourine tapping and howling harmonica before the weird vocals come in again. Someone, please, help me find the key.

You features Corey Taylor-like vocals in another radio-friendly ballad. Very mellow and a great sing-along chorus. It takes true love to stand the test of time. And it takes you babe to make me smile. OK, it sounds cheesy but it really works. Sunrise yanks us back to the hard rock/metal sound with alternating loud/soft passages. This is slightly spoilt by switching to a reggae-style which is a bit incongruous and light-weight against the rock riffs. This is probably the weakest song on the album. Shame. The final track is Ghost of Floyd Collins. This opens with cawing crows and a hill-billy talk over before a wave of heavy drumming and big rock riffs sweep us into the story. The lyrics are a bit vague, only hinting at a story that never really gets told. Great guitar playing, lovely time shifts, mammoth riffs, spot on drumming, fantastic bass line and it all ends in a stony silence, book-ended by the crows.

I highly recommend this album.

Against the sky/Streams of light/Call out to me and you

Friday 15 August –Apologies for the radio silence but I've been on holiday for the last two weeks. Let's rewind to the disastrous evening of Friday 1 August where, due to monumental stupidity, I managed to miss a great evening out with The Druid. I was panicked into believing that Chris Johnson would be playing at The Punchbowl, starting at 20:00 (in fact he started at 21:30). Of course, when I arrived at 20:15, punters were still eating their tea and there was no sign of Chris. There was a big queue at the bar so I didn't hang around to find out what was happening and immediately when to Plan B. Sadly, I had forgotten my mobile 'phone so couldn't contact The Druid. Plan B was The Roman Bath and I waited in there until the band was about half an hour into their set before calling it a night. It turned out that The Druid had been dogging my heels as I moved around town, desperately trying to contact me. Talk about ships that miss in the night! I've learnt my lesson, I take my mobile with me now.

I enjoyed the holiday, two weeks with my five-year old grandson. In the first week we travelled to London and stayed at a hotel in Kensington. It was the first long distance train journey that he’d undertaken and I was very impressed that he never got bored or whiney as you might expect of such a young child. We stayed for two nights in London and took in the Science Museum and the Natural History Museum. He is particularly into dinosaurs at the moment so he thoroughly enjoyed himself. As an added bonus we watched a Dinosaur film on the Science Museum’s IMAX screen in 3D. Fantastic. We spent the second week at home making a holiday scrapbook, writing and printing a small magazine, visiting York Art Gallery and the Minster, and making and painting miniature figures (he's a geek like me).

So, that's everyone up-to-date. The holiday is over and Friday it was back to normality with three of us paying a visit to The Roman Baths where the band de jour was Wild Messiah (and on MyFace, thanks Ian.). The band consisted of four frighteningly young chaps (their combined age about equal to mine!) the bass player wearing black PVC trousers and playing semi-naked, a bit like Sid Vicious I guess. The front man had modelled his look on Billy Idol. They hail from Barton-upon-Humber and consist of Mark Williams (Lead Vocals, Rhythm Guitar), Martin Shepherd (Bass Guitar), Glen Brown (Lead Guitar, Vocals), Brad Brown (Drums, Vocals). I arrived just as they started a cover of Michael Jackson's Beat It. During the rest of the evening they played a mixture of covers and their own material all played extremely well. The bass was mixed a little too loud and the timing sometimes faltered slightly, I couldn't be sure if that was down to the drums or bass as the effect was so minor. The singer had great presence and a good voice. The lead guitarist was proficient although he sometimes took to wearing a pink feather boa. Combined with his curly hair it put me in mind of Marc Bolan. Here is a list of the tracks they played. Of the ones I didn't recognise I'm not sure if the track was theirs or a cover, but they definitely did at least four of their own.

Beat It (Michael Jackson), Big Girl (You Are Beautiful) (Mika), White Wedding (Billy Idol), Brand New Start (?), Rocking in the Free World (Neil Young), Detroit City Rock (?), Walk Away (?), Have A Nice Day (Wild Mission), Won’t get fooled again (The Who), Gimme all your lovin' (ZZ Top), You give love a bad name (Bon Jovi), All right now (Free), Whiskey in the jar (Thin Lizzy), Nothing to lose (LA Guns?), Without You (?), Pour Some Sugar On Me (Def Leppard), Fallen Angel (?), You Really Got Me (The Kinks).