Last Thursday night, twelve people have been arrested after firing fireworks at each other and also at sheriff’s deputies during a “fireworks war” in College Station, which is a small central Arkansas town. Authorities confirm five civilians injured (fingers, hands blown off).

#BREAKING: Cell phone video shows fireworks being shot at @PCSOARSheriff deputies, patrol cars during ‘fireworks war’ in College Station Thursday night. Authorities confirm five civilians injured (fingers, hands blown off) and 12 people arrested. #ARNews pic.twitter.com/MDYIrrbSiS

— Mitchell McCoy (@MitchellMcCoy) July 5, 2019

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-JULY 8, 2019…THIRTY EIGHT YEARS AGO STEVIE NICKS RELEASED ‘STOP DRAGGIN’ MY HEART AROUND’ THE FIRST SINGLE FROM HER DEBUT SOLO ALBUM ‘BELLA DONNA.’ IT’S THE ONLY TRACK ON ‘BELLA DONNA’ THAT WAS NEITHER WRITTEN OR CO-WRITTEN BY STEVIE NICKS. THE SONG WAS COMPOSED BY TOM PETTY AND MIKE CAMPBELL AND WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT AS A TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS SONG.

THE SONG WAS COMPOSED BY TOM PETTY AND MIKE CAMPBELL AND WAS ORIGINALLY MEANT AS A TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS SONG.

HOWEVER, FATE DICTATED THAT STEVIE NICKS SING ON THE SONG THANKS TO PRODUCER JIMMY IOVINE NOT ONLY WORKING WITH STEVIE NICKS ON HER SOLO DEBUT, BUT ALSO WORKING WITH TOM PETTY. HE ARRANGED FOR HER TO SING ON THE TUNE. THE SONG IS ABOUT A COUPLE WITH A COMPLICATED RELATIONSHIP. SHE WANTS TO GET RID OF HIM, BUT HE HAS A HOLD ON HER HEART. WHEN SHE TELLS HIM TO STOP DRAGGING THAT HEART AROUND, HE EXPLAINS HE’S TRYING TO PROTECT HER, WITH “YOU NEED SOMEONE LOOKING AFTER YOU.”

A PERFORMANCE OF THE SONG IN THE STUDIO WAS USED AS THE VIDEO.

THE VIDEO HAD THE GOOD FORTUNE OF BEING AROUND THE TIME MTV WENT ON THE AIR. THEY DIDN’T HAVE MANY VIDEOS AT THE TIME ( THIS VIDEO WAS THE 25TH VIDEO TO BE PLAYED ON MTV’S LAUNCH DATE OF AUGUST 1ST 1981), SO IT GOT A TON OF AIRPLAY AND INTRODUCED A YOUNGER AUDIENCE TO STEVIE NICKS AND TOM PETTY.

‘STOP DRAGGIN’ MY HEART AROUND’ WAS THE BIGGEST HIT FOR EITHER STEVIE NICKS (AS A SOLO ARTIST) OR FOR TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS.

HERE’S THE OFFICIAL VIDEO THAT WAS ALL OVER MTV IN 1981

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-JULY 7, 2019…HAPPY 78TH BIRTHDAY RINGO STARR.

EVERY JULY 7TH, RINGO TRIES TO SPREAD THE MESSAGE PEACE AND LOVE.

IT ALL STARTED IN 2007 WHEN RINGO JOINED FANS ON THE STREETS IN FRONT OF THE HARD ROCK CAFE IN CHICAGO WITH A CALL TO ACTION: INVITE EVERYONE EVERYWHERE TO SAY, THINK, OR POST #PEACEANDLOVE AT NOON, THEIR LOCAL TIME. LAST YEAR HE CELEBRATED AT THE ROCK ROCK CAFE IN NICE FRANCE. THIS YEAR RINGO WILL TAKE HIS CELEBRATION TO THE CAPITOL RECORDS TOWER IN LOS ANGELES. HIS DREAM IS TO CREATE A WAVE OF PEACE AND LOVE ALL OVER THE PLANET. THIS YEAR ALREADY HAS OVER 30 EVENTS IN 22 COUNTRIES. HERE’S RINGO AND HIS THOUGHTS ON ON HIS PEACE AND LOVE BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION:

“I’ve said it before but I really can’t think of a better way to celebrate my birthday, or a better gift I could ask for, than peace and love. It’s so great how every year it keeps growing, with the wave of peace and love starting in the morning on July 7 in Australia and ending in Hawaii, with celebrations in all the time zones in between. I am so happy to be back at Capitol Records, and for our great sponsors who are carrying the message of peace and love around the world,like the David Lynch Foundation, Life is Good, SiriusXM, Modern Drummer and Starbucks. I also want to thank each and everyone of you for continuing to help spread peace and love, Ringo.”

HERE’S HIS ANNUAL BDAY WISH FROM 2016 ! REMEMBER TO DO IT TODAY AT NOON.

HERE’S LAST YEAR’S MESSAGE.

photo thanks-Schröder+Schömbs PR _ Brands | Media | Lifestyle

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-JULY 6, 2019…THIRTY EIGHT YEARS AGO TODAY AC/DC HEADED BACK INTO THE STUDIO TO START WORK ON THE FOLLOW UP ALBUM TO ‘BACK IN BLACK’ . HERE’S WHAT YOU HAVE TO UNDERSTAND GOING INTO THE RECORDING OF THIS RECORD. ANYTHING THE BAND DID COMMERCIALLY WAS GOING TO PALE TO ‘BACK IN BLACK’. ‘B.I.B.’ WAS MONUMENTAL IN SALES ( 50 MILLION COPIES SOLD WORLDWIDE) AND MORE IMPORTANTLY, MONUMENTAL IN ESTABLISHING BRIAN JOHNSON AS THE GROUP’S LEAD SINGER AFTER THE DEATH OF BON SCOTT. EVERYTHING WAS PERFECT IN THE WORLD OF AC/DC. THEN THE RECORD COMPANY DID SOMETHING THAT WAS INCREDIBLY GREEDY AND STUPID. THE RECORD COMPANY WENT FOR A MONEY GRAB THAT CONFUSED FANS ABOUT THE TRANSITION FROM SCOTT TO JOHNSON. THE RECORD COMPANY REISSUED THE ALBUM ‘DIRTY DEEDS DONE DIRT CHEAP’. THE BAND WAS PISSED !!! ACCORDING TO THE BOOK “HELL AIN’T A BAD PLACE TO BE”:

“The band, who were apoplectic with rage but didn’t have the power to stop the release, did their best to cover their record company’s tracks, claiming the release of Dirty Deeds was essentially to counter U.S. bootlegs of the album,”

AC/DC WANTED TO HEAD INTO THE STUDIO AND RECORD AN ALBUM QUICKLY. HOWEVER, PRODUCER MUTT LANGE IS NOTORIOUS FOR TAKING FOREVER TO RECORD A PROJECT. LANGE PUT THE SESSIONS ON HOLD WHILE TESTING DIFFERENT STUDIOS LOOKING FOR CERTAIN SOUNDS.

AC/DC WAS GETTING ANTSY. ACCORDING TO ANGUS YOUNG:

“We are always well prepared, We go in the studio with completed songs and we know what we want. We don’t f— around much — unlike Mutt Lange. But that guy has always been slow. Real slow. He’d need forever to get anything done. Otherwise it would have been in and out in a week.”

THE END RESULT? ‘FOR THOSE ABOUT TO ROCK’ WAS THE THIRD AND FINAL AC/DC ALBUM PRODUCED BY MUTT LANGE. AC/DC ENDED UP GOING TO 3 DIFFERENT SET UPS WITH LANGE BEFORE FINALLY RECORDING THE ALBUM IN THEIR ORIGINAL REHEARSAL SPOT WITH A MOBILE RECORDING UNIT.

ACCORDING TO MALCOLM YOUNG IN AN INTERVIEW FROM 1992:

“By the time we’d completed the album, I don’t think anyone, neither the band or the producer, could tell whether it sounded right or wrong. Everyone was fed up with the whole album.”

HERE’S THE OFFICIAL VIDEO OF THE ALBUM’S TITLE TRACK

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-JULY 6, 2019…46 YEARS AGO TODAY QUEEN RELEASED THEIR FIRST SINGLE ‘KEEP YOURSELF ALIVE’. THE SONG WAS LARGELY IGNORED WHEN IT WAS FIRST RELEASED. THE MESSAGE OF THE SONG: STAYING ALIVE IS MORE IMPORTANT THAN BEING RICH OR FAMOUS. IT BOILS DOWN TO “BEING YOURSELF” INSTEAD OF WHAT EVERYONE WANTS YOU TO BE.

THIS SONG HIGHLIGHTED WHAT WOULD BE A COMMON DENOMINATOR OF QUEEN’S STUDIO WORK: BRIAN MAY’S PERFECTIONISM.

ACCORDING TO BRIAN MAY IN AN INTERVIEW IN 1983:

“The first recording of it ever was in De Lane Lea when we did it ourselves and I’ve still got that recording and I think it’s very good and has something which the single never had. But THEY pressurized us very strongly to redo all the tracks and we redid ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ with Roy and it was pretty awful, actually. I thought it was terrible and I was very unhappy about it and I thought the De Lane Lea one was better and I eventually managed to persuade Roy that it was better as well. So, we went back in and did it again in a way that was a bit more true to the original. But there is no way that you can ever really repeat something. I have this great belief that the magic of the moment can never be recaptured and, although we ended up with something that was technically in the playing and perhaps even in the recording a bit better than the De Lane Lea thing. I still think that the De Lane Lea one had that certain sort of magic, so I was never really happy. As it turned out no one else was ever really happy either and we kept remixing it. We thought that it’s the mix that’s wrong, we kept remixing and there must have been, at least, seven or eight different mixes by different groups of people. Eventually we went in and did a mix with Mike Stone, our engineer, and that’s the one that we were in the end happiest with. That’s the one we put out.

But, to my mind ‘Keep Yourself Alive’ was never really satisfactory. Never had that magic that it should have had.”

IN 2008 ROLLING STONE MAGAZINE RATED ‘KEEP YOURSELF ALIVE’ # 31 ON IT’S LIST OF “THE 100 GREATEST GUITAR SONGS OF ALL-TIME”

HERE’S THE OFFICIAL VIDEO FROM QUEEN FOR ‘KEEP YOURSELF ALIVE’