Red's Kip Winger Review: Part 1

Note: I am going to break this down by band. It looks like that’s how we’ve done this in the past, and it will probably keep from there being too much repetition. I am just going down the list in order starting with first CD and then grabbing the other songs from each artist in that order.


Tubronegro – Do You Dig Destruction

The only offering from this group in the collection, there’s not much else that needs to be said other than this is a straight forward hard rock anthem with all the motifs of wild, violent fun. It’s kicks off the album well, and it never disappoints when one needs a good pick-me-up song to supply some energy. I believe this band made it into the 1,001 albums list at some point, if my memory serves right.

My Chemical Romance – Teenagers; Cancer

I can’t decide if My Chemical Romance is a great band with a catalog of great songs, or if they are just a good band with a couple great songs. I’ve sort gone both ways with the songs I’ve heard from these. These two in particular show a nice range. Teenagers is rock with a strong riff and a catchy hook. Cancer with the melodic piano and whiny voice is tender with that threat of a sharp edge. I like both tunes. Part of me wants to say this band is Green Day a generation later. Not sure though.

The Zutons – It’s the Little Things We Do; You’ve Got a Friend in Me

The Zutons are smooth. I love the lead singer’s voice. It has a rawness that doesn’t sound forced. It’s the Little Things We Do is a toe-tapper, and I can certainly relate to the lyrics (unfortunately). You’ve Got a Friend… has the nice mixture of male and female voice, and builds nicely into middle with a groovy guitar solo.

The Jimi Hendrix Experience – Day Tripper

Obviously, I know the Beatles version of this song. I believe I talked about this one earlier. There’s no reason to dislike this one, and it makes you wonder if he had live longer if Hendrix would have done covers of other songs. I think that would have been a very strong avenue for him. Sort of the guitar version of what Johnny Cash did late in his career.

Lady Gaga – Monster; Speechless

I just noticed that I only put Speechless on my MP3 player for some reason. I don’t recall having any reason for that. I do like the hook a bit more in Speechless than Monster. I suppose this shows how much of a music rock I live under, but I am not sure I had ever heard a Gaga song before this. I suppose I had and didn’t realize it. I always wonder when an artist dresses up and creates a whole persona if they are covering for a lack of actual talent. I don’t think that’s the case with Gaga, but I don’t know if she does all of her own writing. It’ll be interesting if she ever abandons some of the extra stuff if her overall output and success is the same.

Spirit in the Night: Second installment

Note: Here's the next couple sections of this tale. I got bogged down a while there and wasn't going through this as quickly as I originally hoped. As Snake knows now, I ended up putting song on CDs I made him. I have a thought with what I want to do with collection where I turned each song into a long form story like this. That will be time consuming, but I'll post things as I do. My thought is to have all stories be from Lincoln. Maybe we'll even meet some nice folks. :) This particular story has a ways to go before it's finished. Hopefully it holds attention. 

KILLER JOE

Sometime after Billy had been put away, Joe lost his nerve. Joe chewed on a toothpick thinking about this while listening to Billy wretch in the ditch. The man had no stomach for cars. Billy could kill a man – likely was planning to kill the fag at the gas station – but put him in a car for an hour and his face turned green like a sissy at the sight of blood.

Joe couldn’t kill no one. Not even a nigger, if he was being honest with himself. Maybe when he was younger, he could have stabbed a darkie, but probably not. His nerve had always been more talk than action.

When Billy left, the quiet life had suited Joe just fine. He liked working a steady job. He liked going out with Davy and G-Man at night. He even liked the cold, shithole shack that he and G-Man shared. Getting real wild just wasn’t in him anymore. Now, that ain’t saying that his mouth still didn’t get him in a brawl or two, but hell, G-Man scared most guys in Lincoln away. Joe knew G-Man was all right as long as you kept an eye on the matches. Joe learned that pretty quick when the two started to live together about nine months earlier. The big man had started a fire in his own room, setting his mattress ablaze. If Joe hadn’t come home to douse the flames with a fire extinguisher, the whole damn shack would have went up.

Since then, Joe doled out matches and liters sparingly, and he made sure that G-Man got to set big fires every now and then in the woods away from the shack. That usually suited the big man enough. All the same, the last year in Lincoln had been good. Joe wanted it to stay that way. He and G-Man were putting money away to fix up the homestead a bit, maybe even get a dog or two. G-Man loved a good dog. Things were good.

The puking in the ditch turned to spitting. A clear dark sky with just a hint of purple at the edges set the scene around the car, and Joe considered firing up the engine and leaving Billy behind.

“Coward,” Joe snickered. “I ain’t no coward.”

The car door opened and Billy dropped into the seat.  Billy’s dark bangs littered his forehead, covering his eyes. His purple lips that covered two rows of perfect teeth save one gap from a tooth the queer had knocked out the night Billy got sent away were pursed tight shut. Joe wondered how a man with such boyish looks fared in the pokey for a year. He didn’t think he should ask.

“Are you ready?” Joe asked instead. Billy’s eyes were closed, contemplating the question like it was the big teaser on one of those quiz shows on the tube.

“Just sit here a minute.”

Joe turned his attention to the dark, barren fields surrounding the car. The emptiness made him sad. The reap was over this fall, meaning the next few months would be lean for G-Man and him till planting came around. Sometimes they could get jobs hauling feed for farmers, but really only Joe could do that. G-Man didn’t have a license. The big man could drive, but no farmer would take the insurance risk.

Plus, Billy was going to be around now. He’d never kept a job in his life, so that was likely another mouth that Joe would have to find a way to feed, and he didn’t think he was up for the ways Billy came upon money. Those ways usually ended with trouble, sometimes a lot of trouble.

“I can see the hamster wheel turning, Joey boy,” Billy was smiling, the gap at the bottom clear. The worst of his carsickness was past.

“Just thinking about money, Billy.”

“Money?”

“Yeah, me and G-Man have some put away, and…”

“And your worrying that Ole Wild Billy is going to use it up?”

“No, it ain’t that.”

“It ain’t.”

“Well, we could probably get you in some place this spring.”

“Place?”

“A farm, Billy. G-Man and me do farm work for our dough.”

“Hmmph.” Billy lit a cigarette. “Work.”

“A little work ain’t so bad. Do you have a better plan?”

“A plan? Oh yeah, I got a plan. Why don’t you forget about money, and let me worry about planning things. Now, get this bitch going, I got business in Lincoln.”

Joe slipped the gear and turned on the headlamps. I was afraid you got a plan. He pushed down on the accelerator hard, splaying out gravel behind them.

CRAZY JANEY

The fluorescent lights hummed and glowed yellow above Aisle 4 in Oly’s Station. The old man behind the counter had a radio playing the broadcast of Lincoln’s varsity football game. The announcers were loud and overreacted to everything, but all that Janey heard was the hum of the light and the way it bore into her thoughts. In front of her three boxes caught her attention. One was white. One blue. One pink. One guaranteed an answer in 10 minutes, the next 15, the last didn’t give a time, but promised never to fail. The only real difference was the price.

“What ya see, baby!” Davy called from the freezers in the back of the store. “Better grab two big bags of those corn chips for G-Man. That guy loves those.”

“I know, you’ve told me three times already,” Janey yelled back. She put her hand to her belly knowing that wouldn’t tell her anything. Gods, if only it would. The old man behind the desk was staring at her, and she was sure that he shook his head at her. She stuck out her tongue in response. The man’s eyes went wide and looked away.

The freezer doors opened in the back and bottles rattled as Davy made his selections. Janey shifted her attention to the opposite side of aisle and the row of brightly colored chips. She grabbed a few without looking as Davy entered from the other end. He had one case of beer under his armpit and one in each hand.

“Babe?”

“What?”

“The corn chips?”

“Jesus.” Janey looked around, and found the corn chips pulled them off the shelf, holding two of them up for Davy to verify her selection. He put that dumb grin on his face that she loved at first but now hated. He had thinning blonde hair and a flat face. He was no prize, but he had a nice face. Not like her daddy. Her daddy’s face had always scowled, even on those late nights after a good day at the track when the lights were out and the apartment quiet. Janey shuddered.

“Hey, you got enough hands to grab a couple bottles back there? I can’t handle anymore.”

“How you paying for all this?”

“Pay day, babe! Plus, I save more since you don’t let me go out so much anymore!” He kissed her on the cheek on his way to the counter. She walked around to the next aisle, picked up a bottle of whisky, vodka and scotch. She hadn’t drank enough to know much about it, so she just grabbed the cheapest.  At the counter, the man eyed her as she dropped the chips and alcohol on the counter.

“She’s not old enough for some of this.” The man said as he put the bottles into brown bags.

“She’s ain’t buyin,” Davy shot the man a wink. “I won’t let my girl have none. I promise.” Davy winked again.

“Christ.” Jany picked up the chips and bags of booze, as Davy dropped a wad of bills on the counter. She was already in the car by the time Davy was fumbling with the front door. He put the beer in the trunk before sitting down in the passenger’s seat.

“I can’t walk by that last rack without getting the chills,” Davy said as she turned the engine.

“Not this again.”

“I was sitting right here in Joe’s car. I could see it all. It was like a slow motion movie,” he went on as she started to back away. He reached to floor and picked up the bottle of scotch, untwisting the top. “Billy pulled that boy right over the counter, and then boom, the boy hits him in the chin with that bat. Billy goes sprawling backward, knocking over that rack right there. Twinkees and snack cakes went flying everywhere.”

“I’ve heard this all before,” Janey said. Davy took a long swallow from the bottle and then held it toward her. Janey frown as she pulled out onto the interstate.

“I know you have, but it was really something. Here, have a drink of this. It’ll relax you a bit.”

“So tell me the best part,” Janey said.

“What do mean?”

“Come on, you being my knight in shinin’ armor and all. Spill it.”

“You ain’t gotta be like that.”

“What’d you do when you heard the sirens and realized that poor boy had pushed the alarm. Hunh? What you’d do then?”

“I wasn’t about to go away like Billy. Is that what you want?”

“Hey, if you’re going to tell the story, be sure to add that you got out of that car and ran like a school girl from the boogeyman. What a stud I have.”

“Hey, nothing wrong with running when things go south.”

“Yeah,” she snatched the bottle from him. She pulled a long gulp from it before handing it back. Her hand went to her stomach as the scotch burned her throat and kept going all the way down. She brushed a tear away from her left eye, mad that she broke her mascara rule. “Just don’t go making a habit of it.”