Pat's Chili Dogs - Cinderella 1983

A friend sent me this today via email, I cannot believe I have never seen or heard of this before.  This is great on so many levels.   This almost made me forget that the first Cinderella album is actually a great record, but at least it looks like they are taking the whole thing with a sense of humour as they seem to be having a lot of fun with this.  I used to consider their first album a guilty pleasure, the kind of thing to put on when your Slayer hating girlfriend was over, but I am too old to care what people think now and I must admit their debut is a pretty kick ass record.  I wonder how many months of free dogs they got for this, I also wonder if they considered the homoerotic implications of stuffing their faces with wieners at the end of the video?  

From The Attic: Robot Death Figure Derek Riggs Poster

Today's post features an amazing poster I received in the mail about a month ago from Mr Riggs himself.   I felt like a kid again when this arrived in the mail the other day and I stared at the poster for far longer than I care to admit.  This poster is an old painting he did around the time of the Killers album, but it was never used by Maiden.  However, despite this fact, the Maiden vibe is prevalent and it would have made a nice cover for any Maiden release in my opinion.

I must admit that I think I like Derek Riggs artwork more than any Iron Maiden albums that came out after Live After Death (though they still pump out great music when they are not busy with greatest hits comps and live cd's), it is a pity that this artwork was not used instead of the shoddy artwork used on the last few Maiden releases in particular.  It was because of Rigg's sinister artwork that I got into Maiden in the first place.  To some of you out there that might sound shallow, but you have to remember this was before everything was spoon fed to the youth, sometimes you had little more to go on other than a cover when investigating new bands.  The Killers LP sleeve seemed genuinely evil and the music was absolutely stunning as well when I first heard it (and still is!) I remember when I hung the flag on the ceiling over my bed, my parents were worried to say the least.

Unfortunately, Mr. Riggs does not seem to get the respect from Maiden and their management that he deserves, so please support him and buy his posters and/or book (which is great by the way).  Remember, there are countless imitators, but only one Derek Riggs.  You can acquire this poster via Derek Riggs for a very reasonable price at his website here. He is also nice enough to sign it for you if you wish and you can also see on my poster that he has hand drawn a couple of sketches, one of which bears a striking resemblance to ol' Ed!   Hopefully, if you buy this poster, it will do for you what it did for me, it almost made me forget about that terrible Dance of Death cover or the newest abortion of a cover that graces their most recent release, The Final Frontier.  Still, Iron Maiden are and will probably always be the greatest live band out there though.  They put bands half their age to absolute shame.

From the Attic: 30 years ago today

It was 30 years ago today that Metallica played their first show. Well, actually it is not the 14th for a few hours, but close enough I think! I don't want to get in the habit of reposting photos already posted, but I think given the significance of this day certainly it warrants a repost of their first flyer ever and the holy grail of my personal collection. This is the real deal and was formerly owned by KJ Doughton.  Enjoy!

From the Attic: Aardschokdag 1987

With February coming to a close, it would be a shame if I did not find an excuse to post what is one of my favourite posters. The date of the show was February 8th, 1987, 25 years ago and the poster featured a pretty amazing lineup, made extra special by the appearance of the mighty and great Celtic Frost (I believe the only time they opened for Metallica, but I could be wrong). It is a beautiful poster adorned by one of the best Pushead designs (the Damage Inc. artwork), and also features one of the best designed logos in metal (Celtic Frost). In addition, it also features a great lineup with Crimson Glory being the only weak act on the bill.  With Metallica, Metal Church, Celtic Frost, Anthrax and Laaz Rockit all together on one bill, I am still jealous of the very lucky dutch folk that went to this show in 1987.

From the Attic: Metallica Promo Poster circa 1986 and cancelled dates poster 1986, RIP Cliff Burton.

Cliff Burton would have been 50 years old today. Amazing how time flies. I still remember the day I found out he died, I was walking to school and a metal friend called out at me from his window with the bad news as I walked by his house.  It was a shock, my heroes seemed immortal and the news that one had fallen seemed unreal.

The following promo poster hung up in the local record store around the time of Cliff's unfortunate death and it is the holy grail of Metallica promo posters and quite hard to find. I had asked for it from two different record stores in 1986 and was rejected as someone else had asked first. In an effort to help me, my mother even asked a record store that was next to her work, but still no go. It took me over 20 years to finally get this poster in excellent condition and I must thank my friend Aaron for helping me end my search. It is a great poster, but I never understood why they did not include Kill 'em All. I suppose that Elektra did not have everything sorted out with Megaforce yet, I don't know. Anyway, I think this is a great shot of the band during what I still think was their best era, enjoy!

Also from my collection is this nice poster with the German cancelled dates for the shows Cliff never had a chance to play due to his untimely death. A nice poster, but a sad reminder of the dates that never happened.Both of these posters will go for framing soon.

I never met the "major rager on the four string motherfucker", but I did manage to meet his father which is the next best thing. Ray Burton is a very kind man and great guy. I really enjoyed talking to him about his son and I am very grateful to have had the experience. I also should thank Mike Bordin for taking the following photo.  He took the extra effort to make sure the photo turned out right which was very kind of him.  It was one of those moments where you are incredibly happy, but also too stunned by the excitement to smile.  Oh well, I was smiling inside.

R.I.P. Mark Reale, June 7th 1955 - January 25th 2012

More sad news in the metal/hard rock world. Mark Reale the founding guitarist of the great band RIOT has passed away. The band's stated through their website at www.riotcity.com yesterday that they are "deeply saddened to confirm that Mark has lost his battle with a lifelong illness" Mark had been Crohn's disease for most of his life and was "working and performing while enduring almost constant pain and the side effects of treatment for his illness" . Mark was only 57 years old.

Mark is seen on the far right in this promo photo

Riot were basically the closest thing to NWOBHM that came out of America. Anyone out there who does not know about Riot, please go out there and find a copy of Fire Down Under. In addition, the albums Narita and Rock City are also under appreciated gems that are more in the rock vein. The album Thundersteel is also a heavy metal classic that deserves a listen and I have noticed that recently this album in particular is getting the respect it deserves in the metal record trading community.

I am saddened not only as a Riot fan, but also because this disease hits close to home, my wife was also diagnosed with this disease last month, though treatment has advanced a bit since Mark was first diagnosed with this disease. 

Here is a killer track off of their first album