In the 20-some years that I've been playing music (15 on guitar), I have attempted to spend an equal amount of time both practicing/playing and listening. One of the commandments that I try to instill in my students is that listening to great players either on record or via the web (or whatever medium) is just as important as the tried-and-true "scales and chords." The key to longevity and happiness in just about any career path (or hobby) is inspiration. Personally, I'm not really inspired by my own playing. I have a tendency to try to pinpoint what I need to work on rather than enjoy listening back to a recording of myself. While this mindset is probably a blessing in disguise for most players (as we never want to be fully "happy" with our own musicianship or we might as well find something else to pursue), I do find that listening to more experienced players is the best path to both inspiration and motivation.

When I first began playing, I went to the "Mount Rushmore of guitar" for inspiration like most every other Rock fan-- Hendrix, Clapton, Page and Jeff Beck. I'm confident that anyone can learn the in's and out's of electric Rock and Blues guitar from listening to and emulating those four guys. What I love about those players is that they had one foot in the Blues before them, and the other looking toward the future and their own contribution. As the decades have wore on, guitar has arguably became the most popular musical instrument in the history of Planet Earth. You can scour the Internet and in 30 seconds find videos of people just tearing it up in just about any genre you can imagine. 

One thing you can say about our Mount Rushmore of guitar is that each of those players' styles has (rightfully so) been deconstructed, explained, deconstructed again, explained, researched, then put back together only to be deconstructed again. Of all people, Billy Corgan had an interesting take on this on the Rush documentary Beyond the Lighted Stage  we he said that we all love The Beatles and Led Zeppelin, but they have basically been over-explained while other brilliant bands and artists have tended to fall by the wayside, at least in the conscience of the general public.

This month I would like to give a shout out to 5 guitarists that I continuously go to for inspiration; ones that have helped shape my own playing throughout the years. These are players that don't always come up in the countless "100 greatest blah-blah" lists that you'll find strewn across the Internet or magazines, but I definitely consider their contributions equally as important to my own inspiration.     

Sykes went on to form supergroup Blue Murder in 1988 with Vanilla Fudge drummer Carmine Appice and The Firm bassist Tony Franklin. Their self-titled debut was released the following year, this time with Sykes handling vocal duties as well. His playing once again ascended to another level on that debut (his singing was fantastic as well) and it continues to be one of my favorite albums ever.
Moments of truth: Blue Murder- "Valley of the Kings," Whitesnake- "Looking For Love"

Can you think of other musicians that don't quite get the credit they deserve? Leave comments and video links below! Till next time :-)

k

This is killer... Having seen J.M. live both on the Continuum tour and on a recent leg in support of Paradise Valley, I can attest to the level of musicianship this guy possesses. He's one of the most versatile artists I've ever come across, and in many ways I liken him to a modern-day Clapton in that he can play with such a wide array of artists in a variety of genres, artists of so many different backgrounds, styles and ages. From David Crosby and Graham Nash, to Jay Z, to Buddy Guy, J.M. can make good music with just about anyone! Thanks to McClain Bohach for introducing me to this one.

Till next time \m/\m/

You'll be hard-pressed to find another nearly 40-year-old musical act that continues to provide the perfect combination of incendiary musicianship with cutting drama as Van Halen. Not since the glory days of the mighty Led Zeppelin have we seen a band that can keep their fans and critics alike guessing, and keep the talk happening just as much at the board room water cooler as it can at the local dive bar (NOT a guitar analogy). These days, you can scour the Internet for summer tour dates and see plenty of acts that could easily be filed under the dreaded moniker "nostalgia act," many of which are rightfully called that and tout it as their mission to take people on a time trip to simpler times or whatever. While this is not the case with Van Halen, I do feel at times that they don't help their case. If Eddie Van Halen's recent interview in Billboard  proved anything, it's that his cutting honesty and ability to (by most accounts) bend the truth to his favor haven't mellowed a bit in his 60 years. For the first time, Ed publicly made some rather controversial comments about quite a few of his former bandmates, most notably Michael Anthony, who has been on the receiving end of the VH vengeance for nearly a decade now (Anthony was unceremoniously relieved of his bass duties in 2006 with no word from the band and replaced with Eddie's son, Wolfgang, who has been in the band ever since) .

I'll preface this by saying that while I consider myself one of the biggest Van Halen fans on Earth, loving pretty much everything they have ever done, I am by no means a "fan boy." I think there are way too many people out there who think you either have to love all the decisions these guys make or you have to hate every decision they make. I think true fans can look through the smoke and mirrors that have surrounded this band for many years and see what's really going on and form logical conclusions. Just because you're a fan of a band or artist doesn't mean you have to agree with everything they say or do. To do otherwise would constitute fan boy status. Let's break it down...

Plain and simple. If you look at the history of the band from the time Hagar/VH manager extraordinaire Ed Leffler died in 1993, you will see a steady stream of bad business decisions made by a host of people that were put in that position by the brothers solely because they knew how to kiss ass just right. The Van Halen brothers were not, are not, and never will be in the mood to have someone manage them that has a clear, unbiased vision of what they are doing with their business. Why would they ever have a manager that tells them that the 14-year span from 1998 to 2012 between albums is unacceptable for any band that still considers themselves to be creatively viable and still has a strong fan base? Why would they have anyone other than the proverbial puppet on a string? The laundry list of bad decisions has run especially rampant in recent years:

- Zero press/performances for 2012's A Different Kind of Truth, their first album in 14 years (Ed did an interview in Esquire magazine of all places, and it wasn't really even about the new album)
- An advertised, then cancelled leg of  U.S. tour in 2012
- An advertised, then completely cancelled Australian tour in 2013
- A genuine disinterest in playing ANY (even slightly) smaller markets besides major cities
- The Jimmy Kimmel late-night fiasco this past spring where the band hadn't played a live show in nearly 2 years, was clearly rusty around the edges, and elected to play a live spot to a large televised audience that could just as easily put their credit cards back in their wallets after seeing Roth stammering around onstage after destroying his nose with the mic stand and the rest of the band looking clearly out of sorts (probably hoping Roth could at least pull it together to get through this train wreck of a performance/managerial decision). Speaking of Roth...   

I have a bootleg from the 1984 tour at the San Diego Sports Arena and take it from me- David Lee Roth is hardly any worse now than he was then. Granted, his voice isn't as structurally "stable" as it was 30 years ago (of course "stable" is subjective in this case), but it's not the biggest concern for me as a fan (go check out their old club recordings from the '70s- Roth hardly sang all the words even back then!). I'm more concerned with the tour actually being finished and the band playing the places they advertised! For me, the latest live album Live at Tokyo Dome (recorded in 2013) is actually okay because the set list is a killer array of Roth-era classics along with a few great tracks off 2012's Truth. I commend EVH and AVH for still having the balls to play a barn-burner of a song like "I'm the One" live today. They wrote that thing in their early 20's, young and hungry, full of fire and ready to conquer the world. Ed still tears that monster of a song up. I never thought I'd hear them play that song again, especially after I saw the '04 tour when he could barely stand. I'm beyond happy to see him healthy. But, you can't tell me Ed's not a little bummed he can't play some of that Hagar material.

Anyone who's played in a cover band can relate to this nugget: You just finished rawkin' on something badass, the vibe of the room is great and you think to yourself, man it sure would be awesome to play [insert song name here]. It's, like, literally the most perfect tune for this specific moment, and you may even hear people yelling for it either in the crowd or at least in your mind... But you can't because your vocalist literally isn't even in the same zip code as the singer on said badass song. Now imagine yourself as Eddie Van Halen encountering this same problem almost every night on tour this summer. I personally believe Ed deals with this situation way more than people think. You can't tell me they don't finish up "Ain't Talkin' 'Bout Love" or "Panama" and Ed doesn't go, "Man, I'd love to play ____________." Eddie Van Halen misses playing "Right Now," Eddie misses playing "When It's Love," Ed misses playing "Dreams." 
"To expect Roth to sing a Sammy Hagar song would be like putting Keith Richards on guitar in Dream Theater."

I've said it before, I'll say it again- those 4 studio albums they did with Sammy Hagar are masterpieces. The songwriting and production are on another planet from their early stuff (which I love just as much, but they grew with Sam in the band). I challenge you to find much of anything they recorded with Roth that matches the depth of tunes they did later with Hagar like "5150" or "Cabo Wabo." And it feels like a crime to not hear "Poundcake" or "Finish What Ya Started" at a VH show today. But alas, every VH fan knows it is both a psychotic fantasy and a grave injustice to expect Roth to ever sing a Sammy Hagar-fronted song (besides a Montrose cover back in the day). To expect Roth to sing a Sammy Hagar song would be like putting Keith Richards on guitar in Dream Theater. It's like forcing a square peg in the round hole. So, yeah, don't expect to ever hear a Sam song as long as Roth is within a 5-mile radius of a microphone. Not that Roth's ego would ever allow him to "lower" himself to sing a song by another guy that fronted VH, even if he had the ability to do so. As a fan, it bums me out that they have to ignore four #1 albums and twelve #1 hits, but it's what we have to reserve ourselves to in the present situation. But, in the interest of playing devil's advocate: If Sammy were fronting the band again, would we hear "Light Up the Sky" or "Drop Dead Legs"? Probably not, so it makes me happy that we can still hear the Roth-era stuff with VH and the Sam-era stuff with his band, The Circle (featuring Mike Anthony on bass, Vic Johnson on guitar and Jason Bonham on drums).  

As was previously stated in this prestigious (or is it long-winded?) writing, I believe you can be a huge fan of a band and still disagree with the decisions they make at times. I'd also like to go on record and say that I think it's a load of $%@# that VH never did Mike the service of, at the very least, telling him he was out of the band. It's one thing to kick a guy out of your band that has never been anything but loyal and a class act, but it's a whole other level of low to just make him find out with the rest of the world. I think Wolf is a fantastic bassist and all-around musician, but Mike brought the heart to Van Halen. He brought that thing that really made that band likable. You can't replace heart. And then there are those backing vocals... Nobody in hard rock touches it. 

Some may argue that Mike shouldn't have toured with Sammy after he split from the band after the train wreck '04 tour. C'mon... Did you see the condition Ed was in on that tour and the couple of years after that? If you need a reminder, there's an atrocious version of "Humans Being" on YouTube from that 2004 tour that should quickly remind you. It makes the "Jump" vid from the '07 tour where the keyboard track and the guitar were in totally different keys look downright sensational. If Mike is like most other musicians on this planet, he likes to play, especially live. Mike and Sam just have that connection onstage and they long to play in front of people. They know the fans love it too. So, why would Mike sit around waiting for Ed and Al to get a wild hair and want to record/tour again? For some time in the mid-2000's, it looked like Ed could turn up dead any day, much less have anything going on musically. Mike would have still been replaced by Wolf even if he would have remained "loyal" to the brothers and sat at home. I've been happy as hell to see him playing with the Wabos, Chickenfoot and now The Circle. Wolf has done a great job, but Mikey's presence is still missed in VH. It's not truly Van Halen without him. 

As far as Ed's comments about Mike in the recent Billboard interview, are we surprised? The only thing I was surprised about wasn't Ed's scathing remarks (about a guy who has had ample opportunities to bash him and chosen to take the high road, mind you), it was rather the fact that Ed even addressed those questions in the first place. He even talked about Gary Cherone a little bit, and his era in VH has been buried with Jimmy Hoffa since 1999! I guess we should be glad to know Eddie even acknowledges their existence in the Universe at this point. 

   

At the end of the day, I'm glad to see two mutually-exclusive acts that are out there still touring and playing this timeless music. Eddie Trunk recently did a fantastic segment on his weekly radio show about this very subject and you can check it out here:

Peace and love to you all! It's summer- the best time to get out there and enjoy live music in the best way possible! Stop by the blog or email me your awesome concert experiences if you get a chance. \m/v\m/ 
k


 

Hello all out there in interweb land! It’s been awhile- too long in fact. I come to you from the confines of my new practice/jam room here in West Nashville. Much of this time has been spent figuring out what the coming months are going to bring. Since my last posting, I’ve begun playing a weekly slot on Thursday nights with Derek Frank at a club just off Broadway called Big Shotz. We will be shooting our first music video for his single “John Deere Run” this weekend. I’ve also ventured out on the road with a couple of acts, in addition to some great shows with Dirt Road Rockers back home in Illinois. The Nashville School of Rock is in full swing and has been steadily gaining students since its opening last fall. We’re currently preparing for the new season which showcases a Prince vs. Michael Jackson show! What an awesome way to expose students to some truly amazing pop music, and show them that pop can have artistic merit as well as commercial success. Overall, things are moving at a steady pace here.

I’d like to address a subject that I have discussed with numerous people of differing ages, backgrounds and musical styles. It seems to come up during a car ride, having some drinks after a show, or (unfortunately) when someone actually has to deal with it. It’s something that I have, in a way, witnessed firsthand and have done my absolute best to avoid. I have begun to refer to this as the “trinity” of what will kill a musician’s career faster than admitting you sang backgrounds on a Miley Cyrus track. These three elements are ego, undependability and laziness. It’s what can make people both inside and outside of our little fishbowl develop negative perceptions about musicians as a whole. It will drive employers and consumers away from a particular person that displays one or any combination of these traits. It’s what can take an otherwise amazing musician and put them on the shelf because they either don’t play well with others (ego) and/or can’t be counted on to do the job they are hired to do (undependability/laziness).

It’s a fact of life that when you’re in a realm where people have had to work and toil to hone and develop the craft in which they make a living, most people are very proud (at least internally) of their abilities. Take a welder who has worked years to develop his/her craft, or take a salesman who started at the bottom of the food chain in his/her company and has spent years climbing to the top. Anyone who has spent years getting to where they currently are, either ability-wise and/or career-wise, is going to have a natural degree of pride.  I’ll gladly admit that I don’t want to be told I suck (even though it’s good for me to take constructive criticism when it comes along). Where things seem to get out of hand in the world of art is when people begin to think that they have somehow learned everything there is to know, and they now look down their nose at others in the same realm.

I’ve had the privilege of working with some amazing talent over the last handful of years, some have been world-famous and some are just making a living like everyone else. The degree of talent is never a concern. Some of the best players I’ve ever seen have been playing at the local watering hole on a Friday night, working to pay the rent like the rest of the world. But a pattern I’ve noticed is that sometimes the people playing that local bar have become jaded and resentful that they have this talent, yet they feel they’ve never been given a chance (or didn’t take a chance when their lives allowed them to do so). They feel the world doesn’t care about them, therefore their pride is hurt and it festers within them. Things start to get hairy when that resentment starts to come out toward others. This, by my estimation, is the essence of ego. It makes people miserable to work with and gives that particular person a bad reputation. Oftentimes it isn’t displayed with anger, but rather the fabled “delusions of grandeur,” where they feel they have become this legend in their own mind. I have literally had people tell me that they think it is better to be a “big fish in a small pond.”  Why did you start playing music? To say you’re “better” than everyone around you? Glory? Money? I have never understood that mentality.    

I faced this in my own situation last fall when I moved to Nashville. I went from a “small pond” in Illinois where I had developed (by my estimation) a good reputation and was in (once again, by my estimation) one of the top bands in the region. For the first time in my life, other musicians wanted my job. I was in a comfortable situation with a great band making good money every week. I had done just about everything a musician could ask to do playing in that region: we opened for huge artists, we played giant summer festivals and we had become a local headlining act ourselves. When I moved to Nashville, all of that was null and void. No one knew who I was. No one cared. Take it from me, that was enough to hurt anyone’s ego! It was huge for me to understand that as soon as I came to grips with the fact that no one knew or cared who I was, I was set. The world became a blank canvas. I no longer had to worry about the old cliques back home, or having the right “name,” or hanging out at the right clubs with the “in-crowd.” Everyone is a nobody well before they’re somebody in a bigger market like Nashville.         

All career fields have those people who have the skills but lack the willingness or ability to sacrifice to get to the next level. Once again, I’ve witnessed people who possess some of the greatest talents and abilities I have ever seen, but lack the essential ingredient of getting off their ass and doing something. I have met tons of musicians whose abilities far exceed my own. I don’t feel I was blessed with a natural musical ability at all. When I was growing up, I didn’t have much of a musical family or anything like that. My Grandpa Ken played acoustic guitar, but that was it. My parents both took accordion lessons at separate times and quit after the first lesson if that's any indication! (Not that I blame them). So I’ve had to figure out pretty much anything I’ve been able to do.

That in itself can be a blessing in disguise because it taught me not to take anything for granted. If I wanted to learn that Stevie Ray Vaughan lick, I had to take the time to figure it out. If I was going to learn to play and sing at the same time, I had to map out the words with the chords. If I wanted a poodle ‘do like Dee Snider, I had to get the perm and the spandex and have three cans of hairspray on hand. Wink! Guitar great Eric Johnson once said that you have to enjoy the process of learning to play music as much as you enjoy actually playing music. That is some of the best advice I’ve ever heard. I need that tattooed somewhere so I don’t forget.

In the modern world there are a lot of things that tug on a musician’s sleeve: you must possess a good skill set, you need business sense, you need marketability, you need a good look or image, you need to know your audience, and above all else you have to be a nice, dependable person. With as crazy and unpredictable as the music world can be, I am going to try to be on top of the things I can actually control.   

  

This month’s blog is about albums. Awesome ones. Ones you can’t imagine your life without. We all have those certain records that stick with us throughout the years- through life changes, through the ups and downs, through it all. I have ones on my list that date back as far as my eighth birthday. That’s not to say I haven’t encountered albums in recent times that have really made an impact on me as well, that I will continue to gather inspiration from for years to come (quite a few of those made the list as well). But before we get too far into it, we should probably discuss a good question: What makes an album great? Is it stellar songwriting and musicianship? Is it good production? Is it how it makes you feel? Is it the memories that it conjures when you hear a single track or the whole thing? To me, all of these elements play an equal role. Here, I have compiled an in-depth look at 10 of my favorite albums, along with an extended list of several others. I tried to keep my list to “one-album-per-artist,” so I didn’t end up with multiple albums by the same band/artist. Check it out!

Steve Vai- Passion and Warfare (1990)
I had already been listening to Van Halen for about a year and a half when my guitar teacher at the time asked me if I had heard of Steve Vai. I said that I thought I had a Whitesnake compilation that had him on it, and he said “you ain’t heard nothin’ yet.” So off to the record store I went to check out some Steve Vai, and Passion and Warfare was bought that day. This and Van Halen are the only two albums that I can honestly say “changed my life.” This album still confuses and boggles my mind when I listen to it. The production is dense, the orchestrations are rich and the guitar playing- forget it. This is the perfect blend of blazing chops, quarky songwriting and great production. It’s like Frank Zappa with shredding tendencies and an eye for pop songwriting, but tilted at a 45-degree angle. That’s the best way I can describe it. Unreal. Case closed.
Key track: “Blue Powder”  

Bob Seger and the Silver Bullet Band- ‘Live’ Bullet (1976)
Seger is most likely the first music I ever heard. My mom says she played Seger, and more specifically this album, to me before I was born. I couldn’t think of better music to be exposed to right off the bat! I liked Seger when I was a kid, but it took coming back to his music later down the road after I had started playing guitar to truly grasp what a genius this man is. One of the greatest, and sometimes overlooked, American songwriters of the last 40 years. ‘Live’ Bullet is Seger and his band at their very best, and for “Turn the Page” and “Jody Girl” alone this one has to get the nod. Much love.
                                                      Key track: "Turn the Page"

Ozzy Osbourne- Blizzard of Ozz (1980)
This was the first “guitar album” I ever owned. I got Blizzard as a present for my 8th birthday and I nearly wore out the cassette (yes, I grew up in the last years of cassettes- God bless analog). Of course I was drawn to this album being that young by hearing “Crazy Train” on the radio all the time. But it was later, once again after picking up the guitar, that I discovered the amazing chops and songwriting of Ozzy’s genius guitar fold Randy Rhoads. Randy will always be my go-to any time I need inspiration. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that he and Eddie Van Halen came up at the same time in the southern California scene, but what I really love about this album is that it’s heavy metal at its finest but many of the songs are in uplifting, major keys. This was something that was fairly new for heavy rock music at the time (especially with Ozzy singing). It was a complete 180 from Black Sabbath and reignited Ozzy’s career and helped bring hard rock storming back.
Key track: “Mr. Crowley”

Pink Floyd- Dark Side of the Moon (1973)
Sure, people talk about how crazy this album is and sync it up with “The Wizard of Oz,” but Dark Side of the Moon is a landmark in audio recording, let alone rock music. I believe this album will stand the test of time past just about any record put out since Sgt. Pepper’s. This is essential listening for any fan of music and if you haven’t listened to it from beginning to end, I would highly recommend it. Once again, I got this album as a gift sometime around the end of junior high (on cassette of course, CDs were out, but my parents weren’t too hip to “new technology” *insert canned laughter*). I can remember listening to this album on cold, rainy days and thinking it was the perfect soundtrack to living in the Midwest during the cold months of the year. A song like “Time” really made me start to pay attention to lyrical content. What the hell does “Hanging on in quiet desperation is the English way” mean? I still don’t quite know, and I love that.
Key track: "Us and Them"

Pearl Jam- Ten (1991)
This is such an awesome album, and another that I had on cassette when I was a kid. A lot of tracks off this album made it onto the classic rock radio station that I listened to (back before Clear Channel swallowed up so many of the once-cool stations). I think in many ways that Pearl Jam, along with the Foo Fighters, are the last great rock band. This was their debut album and it contained all of the grit and fire that fueled the “grunge” movement, but also had great production, amazing musicianship and stellar song craft. I can remember hearing that crazy fretless bass playing as the album faded in on “Once” and of course “Even Flow” and “Jeremy” further extended my interest in paying attention to the lyrics of a song. Keep in mind I was oftentimes listening to these albums on headphones, and the art of “panning” (where the sound of certain parts can be pushed from one side of the headphones to the other) became very apparent to me, especially with this album. Eddie Vedder is still one of my heroes and I think Pearl Jam’s debut is their magnum opus!
Key track: “Black”

Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble- In Step (1989)
So many people, including die-hard SRV fans, do not give this album the credit it deserves. The fact is, Stevie Ray neither played nor sang better on any album than he did on In Step. He had recently kicked his drug and alcohol addiction and was an entirely new person and thus it shows in a big way on this record. Much of the song content was dedicated to his newly-found sobriety (ie “Crossfire,” “Wall of Denial,” “Tightrope”), but there were also many party tunes on this as well (“The House is Rockin,’” “Let Me Love You Baby,” “Love Me Darlin’”). And of course what many, including myself, feel is some of his best playing ever on the incredible instrumental “Riviera Paradise,” which closes out this album. Drummer Chris Layton said they ended this track just before the tape machine ran out of tape. Fate!
Key track: “Riviera Paradise”

Led Zeppelin- Houses of the Holy (1973)
What hasn’t already been said about Zeppelin? Of course Led Zeppelin IV (or Zoso as it is often called) gets a lot of the attention as the quintessential Zep album (which it is), but I look at Houses as the first “later” Zeppelin album in which Jimmy Page began to share much of the songwriting duties with bassist/keyboardist/everything else/genius John Paul Jones. This album features more lush and dense orchestrations and even greater production by Page. Songs such as “The Song Remains the Same,” “The Rain Song” and “No Quarter” are some of my favorite Zeppelin tracks ever, and unfortunately just aren’t as well-known as some of their earlier stuff because: 1. They were longer than classic rock radio would often allow and 2. They are borderline art rock, rather than mainstream. In the mid-‘70s, I feel Led Zeppelin became damn near a progressive rock band, and Houses of the Holy is a fantastic period in the band’s existence.
Key track: “The Rain Song”

The Eagles- Hotel California (1976)
I think The Eagles perfectly captured what music represented in the ‘70s, or at least how I like to view it, as I wasn’t fortunate enough to be alive then. Hotel California is obviously widely considered their greatest work (especially the title track), but I think the back story behind the album is just as fascinating. The Eagles were in quite a bit of transition leading up to the making of Hotel California as they wanted to shed their “laid-back” “California-rock” image and bring on a more “rock n roll” sound. Thus, the introduction of already well-known rock virtuoso Joe Walsh. I feel Walsh supercharged The Eagles, but I also feel that The Eagles redefined him. They both benefited from his job in the band, as The Eagles got an edgier sound on tracks like “Life in the Fast Lane” and “Victim of Love” just by being in Walsh’s presence I think, and Walsh was showcased as being a great songwriter and more than just another blues-rock player. A perfect example is “Pretty Maids All in a Row.” You would never hear that song on a Joe Walsh solo record. He had to be in The Eagles for it to come out. Henley is of course the king on this record with “Fast Lane” and the title track alone. An edgier Henley also comes out on “Victim of Love” (perhaps a sign of things to come in his solo career). Two of my favorite Eagles tracks ever are on this album as well- “New Kid in Town” (Glenn Frey shines) and “The Last Resort” (Henley commentating on society, one of his trademarks). This has become one of those albums I can only listen to on vinyl. Feel the cool wind in your hair!
Key track: “The Last Resort”

Audioslave- Audioslave (2002)
Audioslave was truly a modern supergroup. I feel that, much like Van Halen’s debut, this was a band showing up in the studio with a hunger and desire to rock as hard as they possibly could and someone just happened to hit record. The band was comprised of the instrumental members of Rage Against the Machine (guitarist Tom Morello, bassist Tim Commerford and drummer Brad Wilk) along with Soundgarden vocal master Chris Cornell. I had already been a huge Cornell fan before I heard Audioslave, but I always felt Soundgarden somewhat lacked virtuosity and showmanship, something Morello and company were among the best at in Rage. This record is a modern classic, mixing hard-hitting riffs and deep, thought-provoking lyrics and melodies. Cornell proves once again why he is a singer’s singer, ranging from vocal-butchering onslaughts like the opener “Cochise” or “Shadow on the Sun,” to the poignant “I Am the Highway” and "Getaway Car" to the Soundgarden-esque “The Last Remaining Light,” this album packs so much into one spot and proved to me that a modern rock band could stand up with the greats that came before. Phenomenal album! 
Key track: “Bring ‘Em Back Alive”

Other amazing albums worth mentioning:

Queensryche- Empire (1990)

Eric Clapton- August (1986)

John Mayer- Continuum (2006)
 
Joe Satriani- Crystal Planet (1998)

Black Country Communion- Black Country Communion (2009)

Toto- Toto IV (1982)

Yngwie Malmsteen- Eclipse (1990)

Pantera- Cowboys From Hell (1990)

Mr. Big- Mr. Big (1989)

Tesla- Five Man Acoustical Jam (1990)

Eric Johnson- Venus Isle (1996)

Kenny Wayne Shepherd- Trouble Is (1997)

Miles Davis- Kind of Blue (1959)

Brantley Gilbert- Halfway to Heaven (2011)

ZZ Top- Deguello (1979)

Metallica- The ‘Black Album’(1991)

Sara Bareilles- Little Voice (2007)

Jonny Lang- Lie to Me (1997)

Jake Owen- Barefoot Blue Jean Night (2011)

Eric Church- Chief (2011)

Keith Urban- Get Closer (2010)

Zac Brown Band- Uncaged (2012)

Comment and share some of your favorite albums!

k