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Remembering Keith Moon, The Who’s drummer

Octave Shaper — Wed, 26 Jan 2011 21:10:44 +0000

Finally I managed to find the time and read the biography of Keith Moon. I knew who he was before, but never exactly knew why he was so famous, even more than his other band mates and front man from the English rock band, The Who.

As you can see in the video below, Keith was an exceptional, exuberant and innovative drummer. His unique drumming style reflects his ego and also his hyper activity. It is thanks to his drumming style that The Who became so popular, a band different from the rest, a band which stole the limelight from everyone else.

But Keith, was not just a drummer, he was a real rock star. Those type of rock stars everyone dreamt of becoming when he was younger, or better, a pizza face teenager. Forget about Maroon 5, Nickelback and all these rock bands we have nowadays. I would not even dare to call them rock bands. Just to give you an idea of who Keith was, one of his hobbies was blowing up toilets with dynamites, in every hotel he was. No toilet was at mercy when Keith was around! This obviously resulted in getting kicked out of a number of hotels. His flamboyant yet crazy behaviour, unfortunately led Keith into a myriad of social problems, until his death, at the young age of 32. He passed away, but definitely his drumming and memories remain, a true wild rock star.

So if you want to know more about his interesting, flamboyant and wild life, don’t just base yourself on what I said above. Trust me that is nothing, compared to what he did in his life, both socially and musically. I would suggest reading his biography. The book is called “Dear Boy: the life of Keith Moon” written by Tony Fletcher.

Cover versions… and some do it really wrong!

Octave Shaper — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 14:40:54 +0000

So, after my last post Cover Versions… some do it right!, obviously I had to post the worst cover versions I’ve ever heard of. I’ve also received a number of emails from people giving me ideas, and I appreciate that. Thank you very much. Well, after studying a long long list, I managed to shorten it down to four songs, I couldn’t make it to three songs, sorry. And here they are;

4th Place: Limp Bizkit – Behind Blue Eyes

Behind Blue Eyes was released by The Who, in their 1971 album ‘Who’s Next’. First of all, Fred Durst’s voice in this song is really out of place and blowed up. Secondly, Limp Bizkit removed the best part from the original song and replaced it with a stupid robotic sound and voice. Come on guys, screwing a 70′s song is already bad enough, removing the best parts from it is totally unacceptable!

3rd Place: Eminem – Sing for the Moment

Sing for the moment is a cover version of the song Dream On, which Aerosmith released in 1973, as a single and as a track in their first album ‘Aerosmith’. Apart from changing the musical style (a drastic switch to rap) and feel of this song, Eminem even changed the lyrics and used only the chorus. With all the respect towards rap and its followers, we’re fed up of listening to anger and society problems which gangs bring around. Please move on and grow up!

And the top 2…

I was very confused which should be the first placed song, i.e. worse cover version ever. I am sure there are many other out there, but these particular two, deserve both 1st place, therefore there is no second place!

1st Place: The Braids – Bohemian Rhapsody

Bohemian Rhapsody was released by Queen, in their 1975 album A Night at the Opera. It is considered to be one of the greatest songs ever, because of its unique and diverse style. I don’t want to comment much about the cover version, since there isn’t much to say. But how can you change a rock anthem, one of the greatest songs of the last decade into a hip-hop song? It’s unbelievable how the copyright owners even gave the go ahead for this massacre!

1st Place: Scissor Sisters – Comfortably Numb

Comfortably Numb was released by Pink Floyd, in their 1979 album The Wall. Like Bohemian Rhapsody, Comfortably Numb and the whole The Wall album, are considered master pieces, rock anthems and greatest songs of all times! One can never dream, or even try to imagine how such a song could have been better, since there is no place for improvement. But thanks to the Scissor Sisters, it seems that the world was longing for a electronic Bee Gees version of this song. What a shame!!!

Who are The Who?

Octave Shaper — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 21:44:14 +0000

Lately I decided that I should start listening to 60′s – 70′s rock bands, real rock bands who back then made history by being adventurous in their musical style and who wrote Rock Anthems. Yesterday I was seeing a documentary about an English rock band called The Who.

I’ve heard about them before, but never knew that in the rock scene, they were as big as Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan etc. From my first search on YouTube, I automatically got to know who is the original author of the song Behind Blue Eyes, which a couple of years ago was covered by Limp Bizkit. The Who had many other rock anthems, not just this one. Their vast musical repertoire varies from psychedelic rock, heavy rock and also soft rock.

Back in the 60′s they lived the high live, and are the pioneers of spectacle of instrument destruction during their live and energetic live performance. The first time Pete Townshend (The Who guitarist) smashed his guitar in a London pub, is one of Rolling Stone magazine’s “50 moments that changed the history of Rock’n'Roll”. As a matter of fact, nowadays a number of rock bands try to follow the Who by destroying their instruments during live performances.

What is most notable as well in The Who’s first albums is Keith Moon’s aggressive drumming style, quite impressive I must say. Although Moon was a hyperactive problematic person in the band, Daltrey (The Who vocalist) said that Moon’s drumming style held the band together; that Entwistle and Townshend “were like knitting needles… and Keith was the ball of wool.” Keith Moon had also a huge appetite for destruction, which turned into an obsession to detonate toilets everywhere he went, in hotels, friends’ houses etc. Unfortunately, on the 6th of September 1978, Moon was found dead from his girl friend. The cause of his death was an overdose of clomethiazole pills.

Well, while writing the above I’ve managed to listen to a number of tracks from The Who on YouTube, and can confirm that they are one of those 60′s – 70′s bands that changed Rock’n'Roll. Another band in my wish list.