Motivational Posters

These guys are Frickin HIGH!!!!

See all of them HERE.

The National Association of Recording Merchandisers (NARM) and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame have put together a list of 200 albums that should be in every music collection. As NARM president Jim Donio puts it, they are “albums that have consistently excited record buyers over the years and those that have the potential for continued success based on enduring popularity…. The inevitable debate about the 200 must-own albums will underscore just how much the music and the art form mean to everyone.” Take a look at the list below, presented in ranked order, and enjoy videos from a number of artists whose work made the cut. From Sgt. Pepper to We’re an American Band: these are the 200 definitive albums of the rock era.

Below is a sampling of the insanity…..

1:
Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band
Beatles, The

2:
Dark Side Of The Moon
Pink Floyd

3:
Thriller
Jackson, Michael

4:
Led Zeppelin IV (aka ZOSO)
Led Zeppelin

5:
The Joshua Tree
U2

6:
Exile on Main St.
Rolling Stones, The

7:
Tapestry
Carole King

8:
Highway 61 Revisited
Dylan, Bob

9:
Pet Sounds
Beach Boys, The

10:
Nevermind
Nirvana

11:
Ten
Pearl Jam

12:
Abbey Road
Beatles, The

13:
Supernatural
Santana

14:
Metallica
Metallica

15:
Born to Run
Springsteen, Bruce

16:
Music from the Motion Picture “Purple Rain”
Prince

17:
Back in Black (Deluxe Digipak)
AC/DC

18:
Let It Bleed [DSD]
Rolling Stones, The

19:
Doors
Doors

20:
American Beauty
Grateful Dead

34:
Kind of Blue
Davis, Miles

38:
What’s Going on
Gaye, Marvin

41:
Are You Experienced
Hendrix, Jimi

42:
Revolver [UK]
Beatles, The

62:
Paranoid
Black Sabbath

66:
Bat out of Hell
Meat Loaf

72:
Moondance
Morrison, Van

77:
At Folsom Prison
Cash, Johnny

78:
A Love Supreme
Coltrane, John

96:
London Calling
Clash, The

98:
Harvest
Young, Neil

140:
In the Wee Small Hours
Frank Sinatra

143:
Red Headed Stranger
Nelson, Willie

144:
Imagine
Lennon, John

162:
Led Zeppelin 1
Led Zeppelin

171:
The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust
Bowie, David

192:
Stardust
Nelson, Willie

200:
We’re an American Band
Grand Funk Railroad

Top 25 South Park Moments

See them HERE.

SAMMY…

Sammy Hagar gets no respect.

Listen to the Red Rocker HERE.

The self-styled Red Rocker is a blue-collar, workingman’s rock star from decidedly down-market Fontana, a hardscrabble old Southern California steel town that makes Asbury Park look like the beach resort it once was. He does not summer in the Hamptons visiting the Spielbergs or make the jet-set scene with Mick or Elton. But as of Monday, he will belong to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

“Would you have ever guessed?” he says. “I wouldn’t have either. I think I carved out a real stupid career in the sense that I was never loved by the press. I’ve received some awards with Van Halen. We got a Grammy, an American Music Award, MTV Awards and all that stuff. But Sammy Hagar is not the Bruce Springsteen kind of guy.

“I don’t know how I screwed up. I haven’t screwed up actually. I always had the reputation as a goofball, no respect as an artist, things like that. I never earned that,” he continues. “I told my band when I left Van Halen: ‘I’m going to warn you guys about one thing — the venture we are going into now, this party we are throwing, we are never going to get respect from anyone. But the fans are going to love us. The fans are going to flock to us. We’re going to be as big as anyone, but no one is going to respect us for doing it.’ And, sure enough, I was right.”

It is pouring rain outside Hagar’s Mill Valley mountaintop home, where he has lived for more than 30 years, and his wife, Kari, is building a fire. But Hagar is wearing shorts and a T-shirt from the cantina he owns in Cabo San Lucas, Cabo Wabo, with a tattoo of the Mexican cantina’s logo peeking out under his rolled-up sleeves. “I’m in denial,” he says, glaring at the downpour outside.

Tanned, trim and sporting dyed-blond shoulder-length hair and a shaggy goatee, Hagar, 59, speaks in staccato bursts, punctuated by laughter. He radiates maniacal energy and talks quickly, as if he can’t quite keep up with his own thoughts.

He only recently returned to the Bay Area after spending a year living in Mexico with his wife and their two young daughters (he has two grown sons from a previous marriage). In May, he celebrates the third anniversary of his second Cabo Wabo at Harrah’s in Lake Tahoe. He is building another in Fresno — Fresno? “I’ve been to Fresno. There’s nothing to do. I’m opening a Cabo Wabo. They’re going to have something to do.” — and is looking at other possible locations, especially beach resort towns. He is also planning a resort of his own in Cabo.

“If I was ever a genius at anything,” he says, “I found everything I like to do and where I want to live and I rolled it all together. I got a business. I can play music at my business. I love tequila and that whole lifestyle, the Mexican food. I’ve got a Mexican restaurant. I have the tequila that goes with it. I have the whole lifestyle rolled into one. I love that Cabo Wabo lifestyle, which is beach all day, party all night.”

His Cabo Wabo brand tequila is the No. 2 best-selling premium tequila in the United States. He has made, he says, “way more” in the liquor business than he ever did in music. But Hagar went into the tequila business more an enthusiastic fan than anything. He first tasted the nectar of pure agave during his first visit to the sleepy Baja California fishing village in 1982. He began producing handmade tequila for his bar, which he opened 10 years later, and started importing in 1999. He sold 140,000 cases last year. But tequila is more than booze to Hagar.

“I swear by it,” he says. “Tequila’s a great high. Every booze has got a different trip. Beer’s got a thing. Wine’s got a thing. Champagne has a nice bubbly thing, but it’s a short window. It’s a quick up and down. Tequila, if you maintain it when you’re drinking it and you don’t get too plastered, get over that crazy edge, and you just keep that good buzz going — wait in between shots, do a couple shots, wait awhile, just sip — you can last the night. It’s really an up high. It makes you want to have fun. It makes you want to jump on the table and start dancing.

“And when you play for an audience of 10,000 people that are all on the same drug like the old Fillmore days — where everybody was on acid and smoking dope and they were all in tune; the band would go up and play, everybody went up with them and came down with them — you get on that emotional ride. Tequila is the only one that I think does that and because my brand is so strong with my fans, I get to experience that. So when we play, especially in Cabo, everybody’s drunk on tequila, including my band, and it’s an awesome experience. It’s like wow.”

Hagar’s tequila got something he never had — good reviews. Cabo Wabo consistently wins awards and blind taste tests, Hagar says. This month, he will introduce a limited edition, Cabo Uno, made from only the heart of the agave plant that will come in a crystal decanter and sell for more than $200.

“No one can do what I do because to everyone else, it’s a business,” he says. “For me, it’s become a business, but originally rock ‘n’ roll was my business. And so when I made tequila, I could do everything the right way. I could waste product. I could throw a lot away. You drain off the barrel. The bottom of the barrel is worse. You want the middle cut. We’ve always done it that way.

“For me, it was like a hobby. I had rock ‘n’ roll money. So I did it as a luxury and that’s half the reason why Cabo Wabo is so good and pure because, like I said, I never had to make any money with it. I just got lucky. I didn’t have to. I just wanted to make the best tequila in the world — big ego trip. It’s like the Rothchilds of wine. Like the Rothchilds need money. They try to make the best frigging wine in the planet. They raised the bar is what they did.”

For all his business expansion plans and aspirations to start a charitable foundation for children’s charities, Hagar is still all rock ‘n’ roll. He returned the night before from performing in front of 87,000 NASCAR fans at the California Speedway in Fontana. He played a brief set before NASCAR’s Auto Club 500 and Fox TV broadcast him playing “I Can’t Drive 55” live before the race. The speedway stands on the site of the former Kaiser Steel plant where Hagar’s father worked, the stage right about where the open hearth was, reckoned his brother-in-law, whose father also worked at the plant.

Hagar made it a family day, entertained many nieces and nephews and spent the night in the guest room of a niece in nearby Riverside. He got a thunderous roar from the hometown crowd, larger than either race car driver Dale Earnhardt Jr. or grand marshal Kevin Costner (or any of the other TV and movie stars also appearing, whose names he could not remember the next day).

He keeps a band on salary year-round and rehearses two or three days a week. But he is bowing out of the record wars, after putting a year’s work into last year’s “Livin’ It Up,” which lofted three Top 10 radio hits, but still sold only a paltry 57,000 copies. “The record industry sales for a guy like me are over even though my records are as good as they’ve ever been,” he says.

Instead Hagar thinks he’ll give away new recordings to fans on the Internet and just keep touring. He envisions a world dotted with Cabo Wabos scattered across his favorite places — Atlantic City, Orlando, Hawaii — where he plays extended runs. Fans already flock from all over the world to cram into his 1,000-capacity club in Mexico for his notorious annual birthday parties, which last for days, where there is never any admission charge. The city of Cabo San Lucas gave Hagar an award for his contribution to tourism.

“I want more of them, so I can go play those places,” he says. “Wouldn’t it be great? I can play any of these places as many nights as I want. I can go to town, stay there and play every night until I’m tired of that town and then go back home and then go to another one. That’s my concept. That’s my retirement instead of playing golf.”

Retirement is a long way away; enshrinement comes next week. Hagar will be inducted in the Hall of Fame as a vocalist for Van Halen, who were the most awesome Top of the Pops heavy metal heroes going in 1985 when the group jettisoned vocalist David Lee Roth in favor of Hagar, who had already established a successful solo career following his spell as lead vocalist of ’70s heavy metal prototype Montrose. Hagar rode that juggernaut down the backside of the bell curve for 11 years, including four multiplatinum albums. He returned to the fold for one eventful 2004 tour. Otherwise, Van Halen after Hagar has not amounted to much. There was talk of a reunion tour this summer with Roth, who hasn’t exactly prospered since leaving the band, but Hagar says that has fallen apart already. He doesn’t know if erstwhile band mates Eddie and Alex Van Halen will even attend, but Hagar says he will go to the ceremony with former Van Halen bassist Michael Anthony.

“He’s my good buddy,” Hagar says. “It’s not him and us against the others. He got thrown out of the band, too. I don’t think Ed and Al are going. The word I got from our management is that now they said they’re not going. Roth’ll be there. S — , he’s there right now. He’s already got a room. I’m fine with him. I’m fine with Ed and Al. I don’t talk to Eddie. I’m not mad at Eddie. I still love the guy. He’s just hard to get along with.

“When we were all going, when they were gonna do their tour with Roth that just blew out — I could have told you that; I bet money that would never happen. I would love to see it. They owe it to the fans. They should do it. I believe it’s the right thing for Van Halen to do is to do a David Lee Roth reunion. Look how long it’s been. It’s never worked. This is the fourth abortion. There’s a lot of fans out there and they’ve been waiting a long time for this. And it’s gotta happen someday. We did it — they should do it. Before it blew out, everybody was going. But the word now was, from Ed and Al, ‘we’re not playing.’ ”

The band will be inducted by Velvet Revolver (after Red Hot Chili Peppers were unavailable), who will perform a medley of Van Halen music.

Hagar praised the other 2007 inductees. “I’m really happy about Patti Smith,” he says. “That’s one thing I like about the Hall of Fame. I never expected to be inducted. I really didn’t. I knew Van Halen would eventually somehow, someway, but it was still hard for me to imagine Sammy Hagar being part of it. But it is. I’m so honored. But someone like Patti Smith, who really had such a short, intense career. She did it so cool. She really deserves it for being such a rebel and being a girl at that time. She was cool. I think it’s cool that they honor those kinds of people. Some awards shows don’t. They go with the most commercial. Half the people don’t know who Patti Smith is, but I think it’s awesome. She was a true artist, a Neil Young kind of artist, where, s — , man, you do it my way or forget it. I like that. I’m almost that kind of artist. For some reason, my art doesn’t project that. But I’m that kind of person. I never cop out. I never sell out. I never endorse things. It’s so funny. What did I do wrong? Or right?

“R.E.M. — another artsy band. I like R.E.M., they’re not my kind of band, but they made some great records. Grandmaster Flash. I don’t own a Grandmaster Flash record, but he was really the innovator. I like who they’re recognizing this year. The Ronettes. How long have they been waiting? For Sammy Hagar to be a part of that crazy, eclectic group, I like that part of it. If it was Bruce Springsteen, U2 and Sammy Hagar, I’d be this thin, little guy — oh, man, I’m going to get no respect at this thing. But with this eclectic group, I kinda fit in, quirky-wise.”

For Hagar, this is a happy ending, unequivocal and undeniable recognition and acknowledgment, permanent vindication, a Get Out of Jail Free card that trumps a lifetime of naysayers and petty bourgeois critics. At long last … respect.

“This is something that is so etched in stone that when you say I’m a Hall of Famer,” Hagar says, “you have to live up to it. I think that every time I step up to a microphone from that day on, I have to live up to it. I think I’m going to have to be a f — Hall of Famer.”

A Little Math…

This is a strictly mathematical viewpoint… it goes like this:

What Makes 100 percent?

What does it mean to give MORE than 100 percent?

Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100%?

We have all been to those meetings where someone wants you to give over 100 percent.

How about achieving 103 percent?

What makes up 100 percent in life?

Here’s a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these
questions:

If:
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O
P Q R S T U V W X Y Z

is represented as:
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15
16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26.

Then:

H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K
8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11 = 98%

and

K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E
11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5 = 96%

But,

A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E
1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5 = 100%

And,
B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T
2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20 = 103%

AND, look how far ass kissing will takeyou.
A-S-S-K-I-S-S-I-N-G
1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7 = 118%

So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that while hard work
and knowledge will get you close, and attitude will get you there, it’s
the bullshit and ass kissing that will put you over the top.

Miami Ink loses Cast Member…

KATS ANNOUNCEMENT ABOUT NEW STUDIO AND LEAVING MIAMI INK

To all my friends on here… I am so happy to announce i will be opening my own tattoo shop in Hollwood, California! Since Im done filming out in Miami, i will be able to be back at home in Los Angeles FULL TIME again FOR GOOD!! The new shop is called HIGH VOLTAGE TATTOO, and PLEASE ADD IT! its in my top 8! www.myspace.com/highvoltagetattoo Within the next few months, we will have an amazing grand opening, and I’ll make sure to let all of you guys know about it first! So far, we have gotten a huge amount of support, from tons of great bands who have donated some RAD stuff! All of which you’ll see once we open the shop! Until we open, I will still be at True Tattoo Im unable to give you guys all the details about why I left miami ink right now, but in time I will definately fill you guys in! for now, make sure to watch and enjoy the rest of season 2 of miami ink, which i will still be a part of… and we will see perhaps about maybe doing something NEW in LA! I just wanna make sure you all know how much i have always appreciated your guys’ support in everything I do and everything i have gone through! and hopefully youll continue to support me in all my new adventures, especially with this new tattoo shop! Love ya guys so much! IMPORTANT and JUICY UPDATES WILL BE COMING SOON! xoxox, Kat Von D www.katvond.net

John Popper POPPED…

Blues Traveler singer and harmonica player John Popper was arrested near Ritzville after the vehicle he was riding in was clocked going 111 mph, the Washington State Patrol said Wednesday.

Popper, 39, was arrested Tuesday afternoon on Interstate 90 near the Spokane/Lincoln county line, the Washington State Patrol said.

Inside the black Mercedes SUV, officers found a cache of weapons and a small amount of marijuana, the Patrol said.

Popper, who lives in Snohomish, Wash., is the owner of the vehicle, which was being driven by Brian Gourgeois, 34, of Austin, Texas, said state patrol Trooper Jeff Sevigney.

Sevigney confirmed that Popper was a member of the popular band and that the pair was traveling from Texas to Washington

While the two men were administratively booked into the Adams County Jail in Ritzville, they were released on their own recognizance, Sevigney said. That’s because Popper lives in the state and the crimes involved are misdemeanors, Sevigney said.

Gourgeois was placed under arrest for reckless driving and, after troopers reportedly smelled marijuana, Popper was arrested for drug possession, the Patrol said.

A police dog searched the vehicle, finding numerous hidden compartments. Inside those compartments were four rifles, nine handguns and a switchblade knife. They also found a Taser and night vision goggles.

Popper told officers he collected weapons, the Patrol said.

The vehicle also had flashing emergency headlights, a siren and a public address system, the Patrol said.

“Popper indicated to troopers that he had installed these items in his vehicle because (in the event of a natural disaster) he didn’t want to be left behind,” the Patrol said.

Officers also recovered a small amount of marijuana and a marijuana pipe. The vehicle was seized.

Popper achieved fame as a harmonica player and frontman for Blues Traveler. The band won a Grammy award in 1996 for the song “Run-around,” which Popper composed.

Popper recently formed a group called The John Popper Project with DJ Logic, which released an album in 2006 and is scheduled to go on the road later this month.

Orsen Welles Drunk…

Belushi: 25 years and a day….

Since I didn’t spend enough time on John Belushi yesterday, here is a tad more:

– Here’s Belushi’s memorable performance with Joe Cocker on Saturday Night Live and one of many classic moments from Animal House for which John was paid $25,000.

– Here’s the original story Variety ran the day Belushi died.

– The Smoking Gun links to the nine-page coroner’s report, while here’s a photo of Belushi’s tombstone.

Godfather of Soul’s last encore

James Brown never let others sample his work – until he made an exception…

WHEN an unknown Sydney hip-hop artist recorded a remix of James Brown’s I Feel Good early last year he never expected the song to make it out of the studio.

Brown, one of the most heavily sampled artists in music history, was notorious in the industry for protecting his recordings.

The late Godfather of Soul, who died at age 73 on Christmas Day, had never allowed a commercial sample or remix of I Feel Good, one of his signature tracks.

But after nine months of persistence and concessions by the independent hip-hop artist FiggKidd, also known as Lee Monro, Brown said yes.

This month, the FiggKidd single, appropriately titled Feel Good, will be released on the airwaves, featuring new vocals from the King of R’n’B.

“It is James Brown, you know how hard it is going to be,” Monro says of the initial approach. “But a no answer is always conditional and [Monro’s manager] Lui would go back to them and say ‘why?’ and we would make the changes. We changed the lyrics three or four times.”

Brown, who was sentenced to six years’ jail in 1988 for assault with intent to kill, drink-driving and other traffic offences, asked for references to drunken behaviour to be removed from the lyrics and typical rap lines deemed too rude such as “bumping and grinding” were changed to “singing and dancing”.

“He really rewrote a lot of it. The man’s a legend so what am I going to do, be proud and say, ‘Listen here, James Brown’? I had to be flexible,” Monro says.

Although he has been making hip-hop music for a decade, FiggKidd received mainstream attention only last year when he won best new talent at the Urban Music Awards.

Once the lyrics were approved Brown had one final condition: FiggKidd must also include remastered vocals for I Feel Good, recorded by Brown himself only last year.

“He was adamant about having his fresh vocals on the track,” Monro says.

Brown was due to sign off on the final remastered version on December 28, three days after he died from pneumonia in an Atlanta hospital.

“When I heard the news I was in shock,” Monro says.

“There were reports that the lawyers had put a freeze on his estate. I thought, where does that leave us?”

By the following day Brown’s wife had been locked out of the singer’s home and Brown’s lawyers and management were negotiating funeral arrangements and paternity tests.

Despite the chaos, Monro’s manager succeeded in having the final version signed off by Brown’s senior management.

“In a way they honoured it because it was something that had come out of his mouth, something he had wanted to happen,” he says.

But Monro still feels a sense of disbelief that his track includes one of the last vocal recordings by Brown.”Everyone wants to sample James Brown. For a small artist like me to get a track that has never been sampled legally for a recording is amazing.”

In a mark of respect to the late soul singer, Monro has held off releasing the single until the end of this month, three months after Brown’s death.

Brown’s management will receive royalties from sales of the single and, following the track’s Australian release, Monro’s management also plans to release the song in the United States and Europe.