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JIM MORRISON AND THE FBI

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 4, 2019…TODAY IS THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE DAY JIM MORRISON TURNED HIMSELF IN TO THE FBI IN LOS ANGELES, AFTER BEING SOUGHT ON 6 CHARGES OF LEWD BEHAVIOR AND PUBLIC EXPOSURE IN MIAMI. THE CHARGES STEMMED FROM A SHOW ON MARCH 2, 1969 IN MIAMI.

FOR HIS PART, MORRISON VEHEMENTLY DENIED THE CHARGES, AS DID BANDMATE ROBBY KRIEGER WHO SAID:

“They were complaining about Jim whipping it out onstage, which he didn’t do: 500 photos were entered as evidence at the trial and not one showed anything of the sort. … I think it was all very politically motivated. People were running for office, so we were a good target.”

HOWEVER, LARRY MAHONEY A REPORTER FOR THE MIAMI HERALD HAD A DIFFERENT TAKE. IN AN ARTICLE FOR THE HERALD, MAHONEY WROTE:

“Many of the nearly twelve thousand youths said they found the bearded singer’s exhibition disgusting. Included in the audience were hundreds of unescorted junior and senior high school girls. … Morrison appeared to masturbate in full view of the audience, screamed obscenities, and exposed himself.”

MORRISON APPEALED HIS SENTENCE AND THE CASE WAS UNRESOLVED WHEN MORRISON DIED ON JULY 3,1971 AT THE AGE OF 27

THIS IS CLASSIC DOORS

buyprint@https://www.wolfgangs.com/photography/jim-morrison/fine-art-print/NHR671209-01-5A.html

SEBASTIAN BACH’S BIRTHDAY

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 3, 2019…HAPPY 51ST BIRTHDAY TO SEBASTIAN BACH (real name Sebastian Bierk) SEBASTIAN WAS BORN ON THIS DATE IN 1968 IN FREEPORT, THE BAHAMAS, AND RAISED IN CANADA.

BACH IS BEST KNOWN FOR FRONTING THE BAND SKID ROW. THE GROUP ENJOYED HUGE COMMERCIAL SUCCESS IN THE LATE 80’S AND EARLY NINETIES WITH THEIR FIRST 2 ALBUMS ‘SKID ROW’ AND ‘SLAVE TO GRIND’

HERE’S BACH AND SKID ROW WITH THEIR BIGGEST HIT ‘18 AND LIFE’

photo https://twitter.com/sebastianbach/media

ROGER WATERS IN OAKLAND

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 3, 2019…THIRTY FOUR YEARS AGO, ROGER WATERS PLAYED THE OAKLAND ARENA. IT WAS HIS “PROS AND CONS OF HITCHHIKING” TOUR. THIS WAS THE FIRST SOLO CONCERT TOUR BY ROGER WATERS. IT INCLUDED A FULL PERFORMANCE OF HIS FIRST SOLO ALBUM, ‘THE PROS AND CONS OF HITCHHIKING’ AND A MIX OF PINK FLOYD SONGS. THE SHOW IN OAKLAND WAS ONE OF 15 TOUR STOPS FOR HIS U.S. TOUR.

FAST FORWARD TO JUNE OF 2017. HERE’S ROGER WATERS PERFORMING ‘COMFORTABLY NUMB’,AGAIN, IN OAKLAND

CREDIT MARY https://www.flickr.com/people/swimfinfan/

SEPARATED AT BIRTH

Thanks to 23andme these two long lost cousins have been reunited.

Photo credit Jeff Moshin.

OLD TIME ROCK AND ROLL

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 2, 2019…IT WAS APRIL 2ND 1979 THAT BOB SEGER RELEASED THE SONG THAT HAD TOM CRUISE DANCING IN HIS UNDERWEAR ! FORTY YEARS AGO BOB SEGER AND THE SILVER BULLET BAND RELEASED THE SINGLE ‘OLD TIME ROCK AND ROLL’.

THIS IS ONE OF THE FEW SONGS SEGER RECORDED THAT HE DIDN’T WRITE. IT WAS WRITTEN BY THE SONGWRITERS GEORGE JACKSON AND THOMAS JONES WHO WORKED AT THE STUDIO WERE THE SONG WAS RECORDED. SEGER DID WORK ON THE LYRICS, ALTHOUGH HE DIDN’T TAKE ANY OF THE CREDIT. ACCORDING TO SEGER HE WAS FEELING GENEROUS THAT DAY AND DIDN’T TAKE ANY OF THE CREDIT. THIS MEANS SEGER DOESN’T CONTROL THE PUBLISHING RIGHTS TO THE SONG, AND JACKSON AND JONES CONTROL WHEN IT’S USED IN COMMERCIALS AND MOVIES. ACCORDING TO SEGER, HIS GENEROSITY WAS “THE DUMBEST THING I EVER DID.”

JERRY MASTERS WHO WAS THE RECORDING ENGINEER AT THE MUSCLE SHOALS RECORDING STUDIO AT THE TIME OF THE RECORDING REMEMBERS THE MAKING OF THE SONG IN AN INTERVIEW:

“We cut a demo on the writer of the song, George Jackson, there at the studio when we didn’t have anything else to do. It was a great demo, along with some others we cut that day. Seger liked the song so much he tried to cut it himself, but after numerous tries, with the Swampers and with his band, he finally gave up. He and Punch Andrews decided to buy the demo track from us and put his vocal on it, and that ended up being the record. It’s a classic. We also did ‘Night Moves,’ ‘Katmandu,’ and several more that were on the Silver Bullet Band LP. So the classic ‘Old Time’ was in reality a demo we cut on the writer a couple of years earlier. We had been recording with Bob for some time by then. We knew that Bob didn’t really cut other people’s stuff very much, but we thought, well, there’s a chance. So we sent it to Bob. He liked it, wanted to make a couple of changes to make it suit him a little bit more. So he came back in and re-recorded the song with us and also recorded it with his band, the Silver Bullet Band, and it just never came off. And so he ended up putting his voice on our demo, the demo that we had done at our Studio B with George Jackson. They just took George’s voice off, put Bob’s voice on there, and that’s the hit record.”

THE SONG TOOK OFF AFTER IT WAS FEATURED IN THE MOVIE RISKY BUSINESS. AS FOR SEGER’S FEELING ON HIS SONG BEING CLOSELY ASSOCIATED WITH AN UNDERWEAR CLAD TOM CRUISE, SEGERE SAYS HE “GETS A KICK OUT OF IT”

HERE’S SEGER PERFORMING THE SONG FOR A HOMETOWN CROWD IN DETROIT IN 1983.

OH SHERRIE FROM STEVE PERRY

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 2, 2019…ON THIS DATE 35 YEARS AGO STEVE PERRY THE FORMER LEAD SINGER OF JOURNEY RELEASED HIS

FIRST SOLO SINGLE ‘OH SHERRIE’.

THE SONG WAS ABOUT PERRY’S REAL LIFE GIRLFRIEND SHERRIE SWAFFORD, WHO ALSO APPEARED IN THE VIDEO.

SO THE QUESTION IS, WHATEVER HAPPENED TO PERRY’S REAL LIFE GIRLFRIEND SHERRIE?

SHERRIE AND PERRY’S LOVE DID HOLD ON FOR A WHILE, BUT THEY EVENTUALLY SPLIT. LONG AFTER, PERRY SPOKE WELL OF HER, SAYING THEY WERE “CRAZY IN LOVE” AND THAT DATING A ROCK STAR WAS NO EASY TASK. SHERRIE SWAFFORD HAS KEPT A LOW PROFILE TO KEEP HER PRIVACY. HOWEVER, SHE DID GIVE A BRIEF STATEMENT TO A BLOGGER ABOUT WHAT SHE’S BEEN UP TO:

“MTV, VH1 [contacted me and] I did nothing and hoped they thought it was the wrong number! I am an esthetician, teach yoga, never married, no children. Love my animals, planting flowers and life. Cherish my friends (including Steve) and my privacy. It was so different for us! It was just Love, nothing else!”

HERE’S THE OFFICIAL VIDEO FOR ‘OH SHERRIE’ FROM STEVE PERRY

ROCK AND ROLL ALL NITE

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 2, 2019…FORTY FOUR YEARS AGO KISS RELEASED THEIR FIRST SINGLE FROM THE ALBUM ‘DRESSED TO KILL’.

GENE SIMMONS AND PAUL STANLEY CO-WROTE THIS SONG, WHICH BECAME THE GROUP’S SIGNATURE SONG. IN AN INTERVIEW, PAUL STANLEY TOLD OF THE PROCESS OF WRITING THE SONG:

“Originally Gene and I would tend to help each other fill in the gaps.

‘Rock and Roll All Night’ came about because we felt we needed an anthem, a song that could be the rallying cry for all of our fans. So I went back to the hotel and came up with the chorus and the melody. Then I went down to see Gene and he came up with the verses. We used to write a lot like that. As Gene and I became better writers we became either less willing to bend on our individual ideas, or it may have been that we both figured our songs would be stronger if developed by the person who wrote them”.

WHEN THE SONG WAS ISSUED AS A SINGLE, THE SONG DID NOT STORM UP THE CHARTS. HOWEVER, A FEW MONTHS LATER, KISS RE-ISSUED THE SONG AS A LIVE

TRACK IN OCTOBER OF 1975 AND THE SONG TOOK OFF. IN 2008 IT WAS NAMED AS THE 16TH GREATEST HARD ROCK SONG OF ALL-TIME BY VH1.

HERE’S THE OFFICIAL LIVE VERSION FROM KISS

LOOK AT THIS MAN’S MUGSHOT WITH A LARGE HEAD

Reports surfaced noting that a California man whose mug shot is going viral was arrested for a street fight that involved a metal rod and a bat.

The 61-year-old homeless man, Phillip Lester was arrested for knocking a man unconscious with a bat. The man he was fighting was holding a metal rod, and witnesses on the scene said the second man was knocked out then taken to a local hospital. The second man’s condition was unknown.

Phillip Lester was charged with assault with a deadly weapon other than a firearm.

THE DAY DLR AND VAN HALEN PARTED WAYS

(photo courtesy Jimmy O’Sheehan Photography https://www.facebook.com/jimmyosheehan/ )

LAMONT’S MUSIC NOTES-APRIL 1, 2019…Today’s the day in 1985 David Lee Roth committed career suicide and quit Van Halen ! The way the story goes Roth and Eddie Van Halen met to discuss plans for the band after the widely successful 1984 album and tour. Eddie wanted to scale things back a bit and he and Roth disagreed on this strategy. Then Roth had proposed that he wanted to do a movie “Crazy From The Heat” and asked Eddie if he’d score the movie. Eddie said No, and then they started arguing and decided to part ways. In an interview later on that year in “Rolling Stone” Eddie Van Halen had this to say:

“The band as you know it is over,” he said. “Dave left to be a movie star.” Confirming that Roth had suggested to Eddie that the guitarist should compose music for Crazy From the Heat, Eddie added, “He even had the balls to ask if I’d write the score for him.” Eddie then made clear that he’d moved on. “I’m looking for a new lead singer … it’s weird that it’s over. Twelve years of my life putting up with his bulls–.”

Roth was on his own to embark on a solo career. He released his version of “California Girls”. Roth’s record actually sold slightly better than the original. He then released a couple of moderately successful albums, nothing came close to his VH success. He worked his way back with the band in 2007 for a world tour, and again in 2012. Both drew well, but without Michael Anthony it wasn’t the same. Rumour has it there is a new tour in the works with the original Van Halen line-up for later this year.

Here’s DLR and California Girls