Alvin Lee: One of the Most Underrated Guitarists of All Time

In response to Rolling Stone magazine's 100 Greatest Guitarists list that came out about a month ago. I was shocked to not see one of my personal favorite guitarists on the list of 100, Alvin Lee. You mean to tell me this guy can't even make a list of 100? Then I saw Jack White on the list and it all came clear. Rolling Stone probably makes these lists all the time. It's one of many lists that is made year after year. I see them all the time, but I noticed that Alvin Lee usually doesn't make it high or in many cases........ doesn't make it at all. I personally don't understand why. So I decided to make an argument that Alvin Lee should make a top 100 list all the time. If Jimmy Page makes it in the top 3 every year, then Alvin Lee should at least make it in the top fifty every year. Yes, I know Page has done way more for the guitar than Lee, but to put things in perspective, Alvin Lee in many ways was a more fluid live guitarist. That is my main argument. If a guy like Steve Jones (from Sex Pistols) is a greater guitarist than Alvin Lee than what the hell is the criteria of being a great guitarist?  I also wanted to know why is it not titled Greatest "Rock" Guitarists instead?........because most of these guitarists are rock guitarists. Are they saying that rock guitarists are the greatest of all? If not so, then why have these random picks like John Fahey? who is a finger style guitarist with free expression. Then if he is qualified to be in this list, wouldn't Django Reinhardt be number one followed by guys like Paco de Lucia? The list doesn't make sense! They also seemed to make their picks based on how big the guitarist's bands are. For example " let's put the guy from Tom Petty's band and let's put the guy from The Police." and so on and so forth. Then they would just do a random blues pick, "oh hey let's put Robert Johnson in there, he's famous n stuff, let's forget about all the other great blues guitarists pre 50's and put only the big ones on our list" and then they go... " let's just put BB King and Robert Johnson in random numbers they got to be in it, forget classifying them under a different list." Then they randomly put pioneer specialized guitarists like Chet Atkins and Les Paul in some random number of a "rock" list. The whole point is...... I understand that this is a banal mixed up pop-culture list. But still, even then, why the hell is Alvin Lee not in it?! So I made a list of reasons why Alvin Lee should for now on, make any greatest guitarist list that is mainly "rock" based. 

First off, the guy was an innovator. He could play guitar with a drum stick. 

Alvin Lee could detune so low while playing a dramatic scale and then come back in tune with the band at ease. 

In Woodstock 69 Alvin Lee and Ten Years After put on arguably one the best closing performances ever. Not to mention they probably inspired some of the best camera work on the Woodstock movie. 

Alvin Lee was so incredibly fluid in his playing that he can rock some jazz-blues like a pro. 

Not only was Alvin Lee a great guitarist, but he also did it while writing great songs and singing as well. 

Among many things, Lee was also cool as hell while playing some great guitar. 

Last but not least, this is my favorite performance from Alvin Lee. This encompasses everything he did great. The video was shot by Wim Wenders and is a single still frame shot that goes on for about 15 minutes, but it's totally worth it. Lee does it all on this one. He mimics famous guitar licks, he travels throughout the whole neck with sizzling jazz chords, experimental feedback and even uses finger tapping techniques at some point. Absolutely brilliant performance of what is probably my favorite Ten Years After song Can't Keep From Crying Sometimes. 

So there you have it. Those are seven examples of why Alvin Lee is a guitar virtuoso and why he deserves to be on any "100 greatest guitarists" list. 

Coachella day 3 Review

This is my review of Day 3. 

Airplane Boys - I remember people trying to hype up Airplane Boys and show some love or whatever. But trying to hype up Airplane Boys is like trying to hype up the new McDonald's burger or getting excited for the new Mcshake. Their music in particular live, does sound like one of those McDonald's urban targeted commercials. The beats are soft as hell and they still try to appeal to an indie crowd of supposed urban hipsters. Now I know they are not that bad, their music is okay on recording or whatever but please....... don't try to hype them up like they are going to "kill it" or something. In that case then everybody is "killing it " ......... Bon Iver fucking murdered it last night. On second thought, I realize the "killing it" concept is just an extremely stupid one to begin with. 

The Growlers - I kind of considered them an uncle band of my whole scene, which is the garage scene. I support that they try and spread their music around and Coachella is a great way to do it. With that said and out of the way I have a lot of stuff to confess. First, their music is descent but nowhere near any sort of hype that has been going around. The singer is very limited and could definitely put a guy like me to sleep, which kind of makes sense why Auerbach (Black Keys frontman) likes them a lot. Dan was probably like "hey you sing the same notes over and over like me" and the relationship begins. Singer Brooks Shield and the band are also yet another Doors style band, yes I know it seems like a constant reference throughout my review but what do you want me to do?.......  I guess The Doors are in right now. After a couple of songs I felt my blood stream slowly drag and slowly fail to circulate. A couple of songs more the blood fails to reach my head efficiently to keep my eye lids from staying open. It wasn't like a cool stoned feeling or anything but instead like that tired yawning sleepiness. They picked up the pace a little later with a cool reggae jam but that was hardly enough to revive me. Point being, this is some straight hippie stoner rock shit. Not my style, but I don't hate on it. Weird War was a great psych funk band that will melt your face and give you that psych feeling on some of their recordings. Growlers on the other hand will make you feel like you took a shot of nightquil while you still have a long day of work ahead of you. 

Gregg Gin and the Royal We - I wish I would have caught this guy's whole performance instead of that boring shit the Growlers did. Much respect to this old guy who is a "one man show" act. Apparently he is the guitarist of punk veterans Black Flag. He jammed out like he was on acid or something. And he fucked around with a bunch of wicked sounds. He didn't even care about the stage presence or anything. He just showed up and played with no bullshit gimmick in mind or concern for the audience's reaction. I caught the last jam which was pretty groovy and heavy. As soon as his performance was done he left with haste, not even turning or addressing his audience with a "thank you" or anything at all. I don't know if that is just how he is but it was refreshing to see that "don't give a shit" attitude by some middle aged dude. 

Wild Flag - They did their thing. The music isn't amazing or anything but it's descent. Not pretentious either. I give a lot of respect to rock veteran Carrie Brownstein who was the vocalist of Sleater-Kinney. She has seen an even bigger surge of popularity after the success of tv show Portlandia. She put on her stage persona and I was digging it a little. Kind of sexy actually..... okay nuff said. 

Modeselektor - This German electronic duo put on a descent show in my eyes. They had my attention for about ten minutes. I of course am not used to this type of music over all. It was their sample of a Tom Yorke hook from a Radiohead song that I could not put my finger on. I couldn't remember what song it came from and they used it brilliantly. The beat got more complex as it went on. These were cerebral stye beats that don't give you that much to dance to but do give you a bit to groove to. I am however a jurassic music listener, so I did eventually lose attention. The beat just kept going and going to the point where I couldn't tell if the song had changed or not. It seemed like one long 10 minute beat. But, will give them more listens since they did grab my attention for that long........ and that is saying a lot for an electronic group. 

The Hives - Okay let's get to the meat and potatoes of the day or as The Hives referred to themselves as the "main course." This performance gave me a lot of mixed feelings. The Hives were in fact the first rock show I had ever attended back in the year 2000 when they opened for International Noise Conspiracy. They were raw, fun and at that point released a classic punk album Veni Vidi Vicious. Since then they never made an album nearly as good. What they have become now is some kind of shameless salesmen style act. They started the set with what is presumed as their first song on their new album. The song was titled "Come On!" and a good way to pump up the crowd. Later they would play some of their lame new numbers, seriously they get really cheesy beyond control. What made this performance so memorable and one of the highlights of the festival is frontman Howlin' Pelle Almqvist and his persistence in getting the audience completely involved in the whole show. Up until that point no other act was that interactive with the audience, at least from what i saw. All of the sudden, it seemed that The Hives have insecurity issues and Pelle kept urging the audience to tell the Hives that they love them. It was both weird and desperate at the same time. What happened? Pelle felt like that annoying car salesmen that won't take no for an answer......... or like a door to door salesmen that is trying to sell you some sleazy ass pyramid scheme or a new product that is going nowhere. He has the stubbornness of a Jehovah's Witness or Mormon recruit. He is trying to convince you to come to their ceremonies and close your eyes and give up all your faith to the church of The Hives. Did The Hives become the Mormons of rock? ............ hmm now that I think of it they actually do look like Mormons in a weird way. With their clean cut short hair and fancy white shirts. Not to mention how obviously Almqvst would be the preacher of the church. They played some classic slappers like Main Offender , Hate to Say I Told You So and my personal favorite Walk Idiot Walk. Just before they leave with Tick Tick Boom Almqvst had the whole crowed sit down, the whole damn field just sit down........ just so they get up and rock out to the end of the song. Ehh, it's a lot of fun but reminds me too much of some kind of theme park show. It's that good ol' kids birthday party fun, just keep your kids away from the creepy Almqvst......... because he is like that sleazy clown who swears a lot in front of the kids. 

Weeknd - If I could cut and paste everything I said to describe Airplane Boys and put it in here, I would. 

Justice - They came on and dished out some catchy infectious beats. I preferred this performance just a bit over Modeselektor because I am a sucker for the old style format of electronic beats. Of course I understand that Justice could be repetitive as well, but their music was very candy and more familiar for someone not deep into electronic music. I wasn't too overly impressed or anything. The youtube stream cut off their performance and labeled it as a partial performance. A few people in the comment section got upset and demanded Justice back. The comments kept coming on and complaining that Justice got cut off for Beirut. I myself was more into the Justice show but would never demand them back over an actual live instrumental performance, besides that's rude. So calm down people, if you want to watch a Justice show so bad just play their song on your computer and turn on the screen saver. Cause it's practically the same thing. 

Beirut - Not bad, but not into them really. They opened the set with probably my favorite song from them titled The Shrew. Then after that they kept it going with the horn section collaboration, they kept it polka stye I guess. It got kind of boring as it went on. 

At The Drive-In - Never was I into this band but like them a lot better than the awful Mars Volta. If anything Cedric and Omar should have continued with this band and see where it went. There was a rumor in the comment section that Omar's mom had died recently and that is why he was not particularly energetic. If that is true then I give my full respect to Omar for being that brave to face up to a crowd that big after such a tragedy. Now the performance was okay; it's just that...... well I have always hated Cedric Zavala's voice. There are moments where he sounds like he is singing normal and then he abruptly breaks into this whiney high pitched off tune holler that sounds like he is desperately crying for help from getting raped. It's just not a very comforting sound, he needs to get rid of that at some point in his career, don't know if he already has or not......... probably not. The better singer that actually gives the band a bit of balls is Jim Ward. His backup vocals really give their songs an edge. They ended on their biggest hit One Armed Scissor and also a song I consider as one their better ones. 

Dr. Dre & Snoop Dogg 

I remember owning a copy of The Chronic in high school. I would bump it as I did chores and clean up the house, when my parents weren't around of course. And when I was in high school everybody of everybody had to have Dre 2001 in their cd collection. I remember those two records fondly. I never owned Snoops Dogg's monumental Doggystyle album but always bumped "The Shiznit" whenever I can. And of course I remember Snoop's classic hits. Now Dre is more of an entrepreneur and Snoop does just about any crappy collaboration with anybody for quick cash...... in other words he is well done and retired. Albums such as the The Chronic can now be found in the Urban Outfitters vinyl selection therefore it has it's "indie kid" stamp of approval I guess. The set started out with some classics from both albums and I was kind of into it at first for pure nostalgic reasons. Later Snoop would try and get the crowd into it with the hip hop oldie "Jump Around" by House of Pain. Everybody finally got full fledged into it and jumped around all at once. Snoop said that he had to make Dre a believer and Dre would later say "that's fucked up" and laugh. At first I though hmm is this lame? ......... okay yeah, it's pretty lame. If you have to get the crowd all wild up with a song that is not yours, that's pretty lame. Snoop began rolling his blunts getting high as shit. Wiz Khalifa came out to perform....... I can't believe that there is a man skinnier and lankier than Snoop Dogg. Whiz looks like he hasn't eaten in days....... he looks like he could go into Ethiopia and survive amongst the impoverished. That guy needs to eat something. Snoop said he was going to take a break and they were gone. 50 Cent eventually came out and all of a sudden it was a 50 cent concert after only like twenty minutes of the show as Dre and Snoop lazily took a break. Kendrick Lamar came out too to promote his new song with Dre, it was alright and I respect Lamar's flow..... he put it down on Dre's pretty solid beat. Other than that it just got worse as the show went on. Eminem came out and played some of his worst songs and had to leave or whatever. Then eventually the atrocity had to happen. I couldn't believe it at first. It was a close up of a Tupac impersonator? Was he wearing makeup? Then it became more clear, that it was some kind of digitally enhanced hologram of Tupac? I don't think I ever recall Tupac that buff before. The crowd and me were clearly more dumbfounded than shocked. There was an awkward silence throughout the field, wtf is going on! Silent uneasiness crept up as Snoop Dogg tried to get jiggy with his dead homie of the past. I couldn't believe this shit at all. Your going to bring back the dead and pretend he is there rocking it with you? Apparently this is what Dre used up some of his Beats earphone money to spend on. It's like "okay I know we are old and are not going to outdue Jay Z and Kanye on their shows, so fuck it I'm having a crap load of guest performers and bring 2Pac back to life. Huh beat that!" If this was his big finally and big pay off to outdo everybody I could only imagine who he is going to bring back to life next. Next weekends show Dre will resurrect Eazy E for a special collaboration where he will ask Eazy to squash the beef. Eazy E will finally put away his differences and embrace Dre with open arms. Dre and Eazy hugging in front of 90 thousand people........ Easy drops some hologram tears all over the place.......... NWA songs come on and Dre resurrects MC Ren and Yella back...... oh wait a minute those guys aren't dead. Maybe he could do a hologram Skype performance with Ice Cube as he is still in Australia promoting 21 Jump Street or something. Fuck it....... fuck it! all the dead homies that died in Compton come back to life all on stage....... joining hands as all these indie white kids start pouring their $12 Heinekens to the ground.......... all for the dead homies. 

        I can't imagine where this is taking us in the future. This was an atrocity of the highest order and some first grade lazy ass shit. I can't believe they are going to start bringing people back up from the grave to perform. Leave those poor souls to rest and write a song or two or something. And please, next time you pay $300 for a festival give the alive and well performers a chance and your undivided attention because they will need it, since you know their limelight is going to be taken away by performers that have been dead for 14 years. 

That's it, peace out. 

Coachella Review day 2

This is my day 2 analysis and comical review. Once again I am mainly writing this for humor so don't get your knickers in a twist.

This week is what I call the more "indie" week. They had some bona fide indie pop/rock acts.

I didn't catch most of this day. I didn't start watching till later because I was burned out from the first day's viewing. Which kind of sucks since I missed acts that I was looking forward to like The Buzzcocks and Flying Lotus.

Grace Potter - Kind of like a Sheryl Crow act. She has this free strong woman personality and her music might actually sell big to 40 year old moms who want to feel liberated after dropping off their kids at school and need to enjoy their only free time of the day....... so they put on some GPotter on the mini van cd player and drive a little bit past the speed limit.

St. Vincent -  The frontman girl is very sexy and attractive which explains why they are as popular as they are. Their music isn't anything to get excited about, but it has its moments. She played a wickedly cool guitar.

Andrew Bird - Bird is an extremely talented singer and musician. He has an uncanny ability to whistle. However, I don't think I needed to watch much of his show after seeing it once before. No disrespect to the guy, it's just that I don't care for that "one man show" too much. He did play with a band on this though, and I will say one thing, I think he is definitely more interesting than Bon Iver.

Noel Gallagher Interview - This interview has to be one of the highlights of the whole damn festival. This guy at some moments sounds brilliant and on others...... well more than often sounds really goofy. I don't know if it's all the drugs and booze that has fogged up his mind or if he was just always that premature in his ideas. He did speak of some truths though. He mentioned how the music game changes too fast for it's own good and that the digital world fucked up the chances for most artists trying to make a descent living off of recording music. I give him full respect for bringing those issues to light. But then he goes rambling on about how the consumer controls the music that is popular now, which is not really true. He uses the focus group studies that companies use now to find what the consumer wants or doesn't. I understand that this is true but this does not make or carry the multi million artists out there. Money is what carries the artist to the masses. It takes approximately one million dollars to make one hit single today. The corporations that have taken over the music world use their money to pay off DJs and websites and advertisement to repeat the same shitty songs over and over till the consumer just accepts it due to being brainwashed by repetition. I could only imagine that the labels focused grouped him (you know cause he is old and washed up) to see if anybody would like his new music and then they realized that not that many people care for his shit anymore. The label can't risk losing out money on this old guy so they decide not to go for it. So Gallagher took this personal and grew bitter about it and convinces his ego that focus groups decide everything in popular music. He then goes on to say that the consumer doesn't know what they want and are idiots and then claims that the world didn't want Jimi Hendrix but were forced to accept him. hmm.... I have no idea where he might have constructed this ludicrous idea. From what I read over years of admiration of Hendrix was that he was discovered by Chas Chandler in a hippie commune and was given a small three piece band. He recorded his first album with his cover of Hey Joe on it. The Rolling Stones had planned to cover that song in their next album and then once they heard Hendrix's version they decided against it. Paul McCartney got a whole round table of respectable musicians together to hear this Hey Joe cover and everybody was blown away. Brian Jones presented the Jimi Hendrix Experience at the Monterey Pop Festival and the rest is history. What Gallagher has completely wrong is that Hendrix was an undeniable force of talent that the world could not deny, they weren't forced to swallow down Hendrix. His talent and creativity was so immense that it left the musician world dumbfounded and in awe almost immediately. Noel Gallagher and Oasis were just a fad with pretty faces who gave people a limp half erection that just maybe there could be another Beatles. Of course we all knew it was a big fantasy and were only fooling our selves with their subpar rock. Hendrix was a force of nature in the musician world. By the time Oasis came out musicians were no longer the desired pop star. He likes to put himself in the realm of extraordinary musicians even though his band was an alternative version of a boy band. When the hell did Oasis ever perform a legendary show like Monterey or Woodstock to prove why they are great? The answer is never. His career was made by the corporate industry and eventually broken by the industry. All and all I know he is not a bad guy and most of the time he is saying things for comic relief; the way he said "Obama" was hilarious! And his constant reference to 'rock stars' is funny too, it's like he is still living in the 90s.

Shins - Can't tell you how so not into this band I am. They have some descent tunes here and there, and over all they are not bad. But a lot those melodies this singers pulls are just so cheesy. Yeah, they are a band that can deliver a good pop song recording from time to time........ but don't hold your breath for an unforgettable live performance from them.

Bon Iver - the Indie Mecca God of right now who has entered the mainstream recently. This is Indie at full blast, all rockets and ignitions ready to go. And it is boring as shit. He won a grammy I think, so naturally they give him the second biggest slot.  I call it the nap time area.

Radiohead - What more can I say that hasn't already been said about the greatest band of the last 20 years. The ever evolving force known as Radiohead put on a show worth the wait. They made two hours feel like two minutes. If I had to pick my favorite moment of the concert it would be their remix of Everything in its Right Place which I feel might actually be better than the original recording. The After the Gold Rush intro into it was absolutely sublime. Finishing the set with an old school classic like Paranoid Android was a great way to put it to rest. I looked at my clock and was shocked to see that it was one o'clock in the morning already.

That's it for day 2, like I said, I missed out on most of it.

Coachella Review day 1

First off, this is only a day 1 review according to the youtube live stream so I couldn't really watch everything obviously. So this isn't a full coverage type of article. But however, what I did catch I will try to summarize briefly. Lastly, this is not to be taken seriously but only for humorous effect so don't get your panties tied up in a bunch.

First three acts - Givers, Honey Honey and James all sounded almost the same in their whimsical fashion. I don't know which band, but I believe that Honey Honey was the one that sounded like a type of country indie rock act of some sort, that was the weakest one I thought. I assume that James was the band with the bald guys who look like they are some legit veteran rockers or something. They were the better of the bunch since the song writing was more concentrative and melodies more focused. Strangely enough they were the most intense too even though they were an older band, I guess that just explains why the other bands are so weak in my opinion. The Givers fell under the long line of indie rock bands that just sound too damn playful and redundant. It's the sound that I call the "white kids got bored and made a band" sound.

 Neon Indian- I heard a lot about this band and how they are supposed to be good and what not. But damn, this band is way too effeminate for my taste. I'm just not into it, sorry.  Too gimmicky and too damn effeminate for a guy who grew up with old school rock. This is one of those bands that indie people go apeshit over for only god knows what reason.

Gary Clark Jr. - This guy was pretty impressive. Nothing original or anything, but damn he could sing. He had a great smooth voice and his guitar work was intense. He had these really intense solos and he even covered Third Stone from the Sun which is a Hendrix jam. There were some moments when he would experiment with his guitar too. Like I told myself before, this guy is the absolute superior form of John Mayor. If John Mayor didn't do that whispering in the year crap where he is just trying to get you in bed with him and instead concentrated on guitar techniques and then all of a sudden he wasn't a Jewish upscale white boy? Ok never mind this guy is nothing like John Mayor but the reason I make the connection is because he does fall a little bit into the generic rock realm. But he is as good as generic rock singer/songwriter types get in my opinion. He gets my full respect and I am officially a small fan.

Grouplove- Don't see that much difference between this band and the Givers. They just sound like more really lame white people rock. I just don't understand it. It makes me feel like I am skipping through a field with skittles in my hand.........and I don't like that feeling.

Jimmy Cliff & Tim Armstrong - They did their thing. Jimmy Cliff is an indisputable legend of course and I must admit that for his age the guy still has some soul. The music was pretty lively and respectable. Did not see much of it though, but what I saw wasn't bad.

Yuck- wish I would have caught more of this. I only saw the ending song and very much liked it. Thought it ended on a cool shoe gazer note.

Dawes - Totally missed this band, no comment.

Arctic Monkeys - First of all, I remember when this band tried to blow up like seven years ago.... well they did sort of. I remember hearing "You look good on the dance floor" song and I thought that song was cool. Some of their stuff was alright, I won't deny that. But man, I can't tell you how over this band I am. I remember playing a show in Pomona and my band couldn't find parking because the parking lot was completely packed. It was packed because of these guys? I couldn't believe that people were still into them. Which leads to my analysis of their performance. They have little moments where they might sound good every now and then but damn.......these guys are extremely overrated. I cannot stand how the singer just talks throughout every song hardly letting any melody peek through. To me, it just sounds like some English arrogant bloke chattering away into oblivion over some mediocre new wave type of rock music. That song that mentions the Macarena and other dances was so corny and awful. Not to mention how lame as hell they look now, the drummer (pretty impressive drumming though) looks like some kind of English mob goon with his gym pants, and the rest of the band looks like they are going for some kind of rockabilly look or something. Terrible.

Wu Lyf - Not much could be said. The singer is pretty awful. He sounds like a wannabe Tom Waits or something and not in a good way.

Madness - Didn't catch them sorry.

Pulp - They have some classic dance tunes. They are not my cup of tea or anything, but I'm not going to dis them or anything. They did what they did in the 90's and the singer's voice aged a bit, nuff said.

Frank Ocean - Not bad, pretty impressive actually. The guy has a great voice and his music isn't totally corny. For an RnB act he is actually pretty damn entertaining and Tyler the Creator came out for a song. The girls would not shut up with their screaming for this guy either, that was kind of refreshing in a weird way, since it didn't happen in any other moment in the festival up till that point. He actually had a live band playing with live instruments too. I'll say that this was a surprisingly respectable performance.

Ximena Sarinana - Kind of sucks that she is a Mexican artist who sadly falls into the wave of playful indie nonsense. There are some songs of hers that sound like they could be in one of those cheesy as hell ipad commercials, which I hate with a passion. Those damn playful piano chords that try to sound magical while Apple tries to tell you what life is about. Yeah that shit. It's too bad too because she is really adorable. It also seems like she is one of those girls trying to be a pop star but fails to go beyond this playful indie crowd.

M83 - Another electronic indie darling. I did not catch very much, but from what I did see I could only say they were just a slightly better version of Neon Indian? 

Mazzy Star - never heard of this band before. I was sort of impressed by them. The singer especially was  the most impressive aspect. Overall they have a really chill sound. There are moments where they sound like a knock off of The Doors with a girl singer instead. However I really enjoyed their sound more than most of the bands on the festival and Hope Sandoval has become a new found favorite singer for me. I know that they are old and from the '80s and '90s but hearing them for the first time in Coachella was a good experience for me. Much respect.

Refused- This band I have a little bit of personal respect for. I kind of grew up with The Shape of Punk to Come album and remember being blown away by the New Noise song and music video. Later I got into The Hives (similar swedes) and then the revival rock era was born leaving the broken up Refused a distant memory. Dennis Lyxzen is of course an underground legend and I personally met him once at the Amoeba store in Hollywood. He is a totally cool guy. I had to refresh my memory of this band and catch the first song. It was a pretty cool jam but I knew by memory from listening to their two albums that they would pretty much sound the same through out. I got my fix but I also forgot how boring hardcore punk gets at times. 

Explosions in the Sky- Another very respectable band and they are '90s guitar heros in my opinion. They brought what they do well to the table which is that cerebral noise rock. Must say though, at times it was almost too much guitar for me to handle. It was like a buffet of guitar and they even had some metal guy jamming out in the back with them, what was that about? I thought only big '90s bands like Nirvana do that to cover up the front man's mistake. Why are you going to have some extra guitarist in the back and jamming outside of the spotlight in the back of the amps not to be seen? You have three guitarist and need yet another one? I can't tell you how much I hate how big acts do that to make you know who the "real" show is. Let that guy get some spot light too, he is the only one with cool long ass hair making that ten minute jam seem intense instead of boring. 

The Black Keys - The last of the revival rock era. They have survived this long and for good reason, cause they are not that bad. Yes, that is all it takes to survive in the music scene, well that and a crap load of connections with millions of dollars. I kind of hyped myself up for this because I never truly got knee deep into the Keys but after seeing this show I remembered why. If there is anything that the consumer wants more is to get what they expect. Black Keys delivered some of that ultra generic rock shit that is commercial friendly in all standards. After a while I of course got bored. Gold on the Ceiling and Howling for You are practically the same song. And the most boring thing about the Keys live is Dan Auerbach's vocals. Well actually the music in itself is very repetitive. He seems to sing the same notes in every single song, I swear it's almost like he sings the same song over and over again. I also wanted to ask, did Patrick Carney put on some weight? I could swear less than month ago he did not look like that. Well anyway, to analyze this rock giant a little bit more, I noticed that Auerbach decided to abandon his Creedence look and go for the cartoonish motorcycle driving rock star look. His jacket looked like something from a Tarantino/Rodriguez movie. His hysterical jacket made it seem like he had a bunch of knives inside of it. How much metal wear could a leather jacket have? And then his jeans...... oh man, I cannot believe he thinks those are cool. His jeans had the tears to his upper thighs, you know those ones that girls wear to be sexy..... yeah those. Okay but of course it's not about what the performer is wearing; the only reason I criticize is because it's what the Keys are trying sell. They want you to believe that they drank a pint of whiskey in the morning and killed a rattlesnake and ate it before they came on stage, evidently that's what Coachella thinks with their grainy rugged road clips on the screen as Auerbach rips through another Zeppelin style plastic blues rift. Now listen, I am not saying the Keys are bad at all, if anything they are pretty good. It's just that the music they play I've seen played a hundred times better since the 1960's and I'm already bored to death with it. They also don't try to hide their desire to be this soulful 60's style band.  Ultimately I am saying they are obviously overrated, however I wouldn't consider them a threat in anyway to the music world. Carney said that their mission is to save the mainstream masses from thinking that rock music sounds like Nickelback, and all power to you on that mission, but the mainstream has already seen great rock bands on top of the world. Getting huge in the mainstream does not save rock music, it only helps you buy a bigger house. 

The Black Angels - I had in mind two bands to be hyped up for tonight, The Black Keys and The Black Angels. One sort of disappointed me and the other blew me away. It took this long for my blood to finally start circulating. This is a band in their rising peak. After seeing a bunch of bands that are in a downward slope or see bands just to remember them, I finally saw a band that is in their best form. No bullshit, no backup guitarists in the back of the amps or no members that are not official (with no names) but instead they came in full form with all members playing an important role. This is the reason why our garage rock era is important and people need to start paying more attention. They started with one of my favorite songs of theirs Bad Vibrations. I came in just as the vocalist sang "we made love in June, I heard it from you" which always sends good vibrations down my spine. Then they followed up with Young Men Dead which is a bad ass song you might of heard on the Broc Lesnar vs Alistair Overeem promo. They dished out their two popular numbers and continued to rock throughout the night. The Black Angles sound like what The Warlocks could have been if they weren't based solely on an arrogant douche bag. The guitarist is hilarious, he looks like a dead hippie zombie or something. The singer of course kept his mystique going with his trademark hat and did pull some exaggerated unnecessary vibratos. The girl drummer kept it real throughout by keeping the heavy drone beats alive with some help at times by an extra tomb player. They ended on a great sitar jam to close the night, I haven't seen a sick ass sitar solo in a long while. They were easily the best performance of day 1 in my opinion and brought some organic shit to eat on the table. You should enjoy this band while they last, because these big psych bands don't last long together. Usually some crap happens and members drop out or the whole order changes, hopefully not but you never know. Now I am not totally on my knees over them or anything, I think they are a little repetitive too. The singer is also one of many in a long line of Jim Morrison wannabe voices. But what are you going to do? it's insanely hard to try to be original and good at the same time. Which might explain why there is so much crap in the indie world now. 

That was my review of day 1 and will also review bits of the next two days.  This task was a bit too much screen watching and left my eyes feeling sore, so the next two reviews will not be nearly as long.