Carl Begai

By Carl Begai

When is a drummer not a drummer? When he starts his own band.

Case in point with Scorpions skinbasher of 14 years, James Kottak, who has been kicking around since the early ‘80s performing and / or recording with The Cult, Bruce Dickinson, Warrant and Kingdom Come to name a few. Originally launched in 1998 under the name Krunk with the album Greatist Hits, the band featured Kottak aka Jimmy Ratchitt up front as guitarist / vocalist calling the shots. They changed their name to Kottak in 2006 for the unintentionally low key follow-up, Therupy, and have returned four years later with the far superior Rock & Roll Forever to set things in motion once again. Properly this time, and for the long haul. (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

During my recent interview with Nevermore frontman Warrel Dane for the band’s new killer of an album, The Obsidian Conspiracy (found here) we discussed their latest round of cover songs that accompany the release as bonus tracks, ‘The Crystal Ship’ by The Doors and ‘Temptation’ by The Tea Party. The cover of ‘Temptation’ was of particular interest to me due to the fact that The Tea Party is a cult favourite in Canada and easily one of the most underrated bands in the world (in my humble opinion). Like Rush, they are revered at home to the point that Canadian citizens claiming not to like The Tea Party risk having their passports revoked.

“I would hope so,” laughs Dane. “It’s really weird that they were so fucking popular in Canada and Australia, but in the US they never hit. I have no idea why that is. Any of my friends that know me really well know that I worship that band. I’ve turned them all on to The Tea Party and they’re all like ‘Why isn’t this band fucking legendary?’ Well, they are, but they just don’t sell huge numbers of records.”

“I fucking love The Tea Party so much, but that’s actually not the song I wanted to do. I wanted to do ‘Transmission’ because that’s my favourite Tea Party song besides ‘Sister Awake’. It turned out good, though. The way we approach covers is normally deconstructing them and recreating them. That one is a little more straight ahead because the song didn’t call for something like the way we fucked up ‘The Sound Of Silence’.” (continue reading…)

Call this a public service announcement.

My close bud The Rev has been in the music business for over 15 years. He’s a veteran everyman at a major record label based at home in Toronto and knows his job inside and out. Of course, a lot of folks on the outside only see his job as paid schmooze fest with artists big and small, with exclusive swag as only one of the many perks that comes with being part of the elite. The actual truth is that he works his LBG ass off… not that he’s complaining. His job does indeed have some fringe benefits, but there is a skull-to-grindstone side to it as well. I’ve seen both sides of what he does, and it’s a pity more people don’t have that opportunity for the simple fact that it would make them think twice about hitting up label connections for free shit just because it’s supposedly part of the job description.

All that said, The Rev has posted a blog entitled A Week In The Life as a little bit of insight. An excerpt is below:

“Wednesday – to the office at 8, then to the Ozzy press conference at 11 – there till 4. The press conference consisted of making sure everything was set-up (we had a team, not just me; in fact I was just a helper), escort in press, winners and making sure all the tech stuff for recording was hooked up. Ozzy arrived and we began by playing back 3 songs from his new CD out June 22nd (plug ). Being as we were in a castle, it was a cool setting so an organist, dressed as the grim reaper, played Mr. Crowley. Haunting but not overly so given the room was pretty bright from the outside sun. (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

The folks at Nuclear Blast recently invited me to check out the new Soilwork record, The Panic Broadcast, which is due for a July release. I’ve been a fan forever so I quite naturally agreed, but in all honesty my expectations weren’t very high. I found the band’s last album, Sworn To A Great Divide, to be one of their weaker outings, largely because their trademark melodic death metal growl-to-clean vocal approach had, in my opinion, become painfully predictable. I was floored to discover that the Swedes have gone back and re-invented themselves, or at least taken a ballsier approach on new record.

“The album leaves you breathless when you’re done listening to it,” says vocalist Björn “Speed” Strid. “It’s only 10 songs, 48 minutes, but it’s definitely enough to get our point across. I think we expressed everything we had to say both musically and lyrically in those 48 minutes. It turned out to be really brutal, and even when there are softer parts are still so intense and in your face. There’s so much presence in the music that it becomes brutal. Even though ‘The Akuma Afterglow’ is a catchy song, for example, there are still progressive elements in there. It’s not just verse / chorus / verse / chorus; we tried to experiment past that.” (continue reading…)

I’m not a huge goth metal fan, even less of a goth rock supporter. On the metal end of things the vast majority of goth-ick bands seem more concerned with having a hot piece of ass on stage front and center than the music, paired up with a male counterpart who wishes he was Peter Steele (Note to Doodness: There can be only one). The black #1 rockers, meanwhile, get their yeah-yeahs off playing the same three Sisters Of Mercy chords over and over from album to album, pretending they’re rejects from an Anne Rice vampire epic. It worked for The 69 Eyes and HIM, of course it’ll work for them…

How bloody boring.

That isn’t to say that all bands out of the goth realm suck – and Jeez help me, there are some knockout women to be drooled over – but very few have bent my ear for more than a spin over the last several years. Image, it seems, takes precedence over substance. Very sad indeed, especially in light of the fact that the band who gave goth metal life beyond the underground have decided to call it quits. (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

Savatage is dead.

Seriously.

The band’s music is alive and well thanks to the existence of Jon Oliva’s Pain, Circle II Circle and guitarist Chris Caffery’s solo career, but as a recording / touring entity Savatage will only ever exist from this point on as a pipe dream. For vocalist / founder Jon Oliva it’s an ongoing battle trying to convince the diehards that the band won’t be making a return in spite of the fact he’s released four albums with Jon Oliva’s Pain in six years. The release of a Savatage compilation entitled Still The Orchestra Plays, issued earlier this year, hasn’t helped matters. So it goes that as Oliva settles in to discuss his new JOP album, Festival, he’s forced yet again to snuff the rekindled rumours of an impending Savatage comeback.

“That compilation is something Paul (O’Neill / producer, Trans-Siberian Orchestra director) helped put together, I didn’t have much control over it,” says Oliva. “I just wanted to get something out there to kind of cap things off because I’ve moved on. Those reunion rumours… some people have been saying things they probably shouldn’t have. There was talk about doing a show to kind of give Savatage a send-off but the logistics of doing so just made it impossible. The guys have the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, I have my JOP stuff, there’s a lot of other things keeping us busy. It’s pretty aggravating, though, with people always asking about when it’s going to happen and pushing to have one. I mean, Savatage hasn’t done anything in almost 10 years! It’s just a small group of people, but they just won’t let it go and I can’t figure out why. You have the Savatage guys in the Trans-Siberian Orchestra, which was spawned from the Dead Winter Dead (1995) and Wake Of Magellan (1997) era of the band, you have Jon Oliva’s Pain doing a lot of the old Savatage material, what more do you want?” (continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

One of the strongest tracks on vocalist Tobias Sammet’s new Avantasia epic, The Wicked Symphony / Angel Of Babylon, is ‘Death is Just A Feeling’ featuring Jon Oliva’s Pain / Savatage frontman Jon Oliva. During my recent interview with Sammet about the new record(s) we discussed Oliva’s performance, which is essentially a bookend to Alice Cooper’s guest appearance on ‘The Toy Master’ from the previous Avantasia album, The Scarecrow.

“And that’s exactly what it is,” says Sammet. “Jon Oliva is the reincarnation of the Toy Master in the story. The funny thing is, when I initially wrote the song I had Alice Cooper on my mind but I didn’t think it worked to have the same singer play the re-incarnation of a character. I decided to bring a new colour into it but I needed someone that would suit the song just as well as Alice Cooper. The problem was there aren’t many people that sing in that theatrical, big cinematographic way… thank you Luca Turilli for that word (laughs). Jon Oliva has that kind of theatrical, dramatic voice. I was listening to the Streets album thinking about that and Sascha (Paeth / guitars, producer) wondered if Jon sounded too neat and too beautiful. He felt the voice needed to be more broken. I pointed out that Streets was 20 years old, and present day Jon Oliva sounds epic and dramatic. He’s got something tragic in the way he sings, very deep and meaningful.”
(continue reading…)

Photo by Carl Begai. All rights reserved.

Some more fun shit with one of my homeboys…

The last time I spoke with Fraze Gang frontman / Brighton Rock guitarist Greg Fraser – check out the interview here – we discussed Brighton Rock’s rise to popularity in Canada during the ’80s. They were an important part of the Toronto scene at the time, and easily one of the heaviest hair metal bands around in spite of their commercially accessible singles in regular rotation on MuchMusic and rock radio. Leaving their shows deaf was a common occurrence. I have a vivid memory of one particular show that took place at The Diamond in 1989 or 1990, which was simulcast on Q 107.1 and featured an up-and-coming local band called Winter Rose. It makes me wish digital technology had been alive and well back then, because Winter Rose featured none other than Dream Theater vocalist James LaBrie and and guitarist-turned-producer / engineer Richard Chycki in their formative years.
(continue reading…)

By Carl Begai

Motherjane isn’t a household name in progressive rock circles, but it should be. If at some point Fate decides to play nice it will be.

Fourteen years in the trenches, two albums, and Asia Voice Independent Music Award nominees two years running – taking home Best International Rock Act in 2009, up for three in 2010 – India’s prog sensation Motherjane are slowly but surely making their existence known outside their homeland. Case in point with this interview, which is the result of a friend stumbling over the simple truth that rock and metal are very much alive and well in that part of the world. One fact-finding mission later and repeated listens to their Insane Biography (2002) and Maktub (2008) albums, and Motherjane became India’s best kept secret people should know about. How they’ve remained under the personal radar this long is still a mystery, however. So much for being an authority on metal and music…

“One of our favorite sayings is that, ‘After 10 years of slogging, one day you become an overnight success,’” says vocalist Suraj Mani . “It is rather common, so don’t be embarrassed (laughs). We released our first album in December 2002 and became a nationally recognized rock artist in India. Some international attention and radio play happened as well in 2003. By the time we released our second album India knew us well and Asia honoured us with an AVIMA for Asia’s top rock act. We are being broken into diverse countries one fan at a time, and the momentum is always surprising us.”
(continue reading…)