Conference napalm::heavy_metal

    
    	I've had the CD for awhile now, and although I haven't
    	listened to it for a long time I do remember that I liked
    	quite a few of the songs.
    
    	I'll have to dig it out and listen again.
    
    							GTI
    

    I saw Raging Slab at the Orpheum and I thought that the
    Lynyrd Skynyrd/Metallica analogy fit PERFECTLY. These dudes (and dudina) 
    dressed like cowboys and slammed like a speed metal band. They
    played great live, great music, they covered some Allman stuff,
    they did 'Workin' for MCA', it was great!!! 
    Good live band, I'd love to see them in a bar again someplace.
    
    /Motorbreath

    
    Re: .2
    
    	Not the Orpheum Mike.... The Channel.... 'member?
    ;^)
    
    	BTW, I agree with Mike... I liked 'em too.
    
    
    Paul

    
    	Their new one, "Dynamite Monster Boogie Concert", is out, and I
    	picked it up last Friday.  It's not bad, and after the 1st listen
    	I don't think it's as good as their debut.
    
    	It's in the car, waiting for another listen tonight.
    
    	And they're getting airplay.
    
    							GTI
    	

    I heard one of the new songs on the radio last week.  Seemed pretty
    lively for that style of thing (pop-rock).  Better then the one song
    I'd heard from the other album as I recall.
    
    Greg

    
    	Pop-rock?  I wouldn't call them pop-rock.
    
    	They're basically "progressive country/hard rock", if you can
    	believe it.  The stuff on the 1st album cranks.  I'd definitely
    	recommend it.
    
    							GTI
    

    Pop rock? Not wot i heard. I`d say something like a cross between
    Lynyrd Skynrd and Metallica.
    
    

    I could be wrong, I wasn't listening that carefully.  Didn't seem all
    that heavy to me though.  I do remember thinking that I sorta liked it
    though.
    
    Gh

    
    I wanted to give this band a shot, being a big fan of the
    Southern/Boogie rock.  Shawn suggested I get the first one, but
    Noteworthy only had "Dynamite Monster Boogie Concert," so I ordered
    that instead.
    
    Now, the first CD may be far different, but after listening to DMBC,
    all's I can say is...  "heavy metal?"...  "hard-core?".... "punk?"...
    "Lynryrd Skynyrd meets Metallica?"
    
    Not this CD, imho.  
    
    More like "Lynyrd Skynrdy meets old ZZ Top."  Sounds like straight ahead 
    Texas/Southern rock and boogie to me.  If you like those two bands, the
    Four Horsemen, Outlaws, Molly Hatchet, etc., you'll like this.
    
    I was suprised - this is great stuff!  Why aren't they more famous?
    
    Now, onto to get the first and find out about this Metallica stuff they
    did :^)
    
    - Sean
    
    P.S  Masters of Reality trivia connection.  RS had Daniel Rey as
    guitarist (but not now) - MOR had him for one tour, then dropped him.
    Also, add another Rick Rubin produced group that I like (does both).
    That man knows how to spot talent.
    

    
    	I think Raging Slab and Masters of Reality are/were both on
    	Def American records, also.
    
    	And if you listen to the 1st album trying to hear Metallica-
    	like riffs/etc. you'll be disappointed.  They borrow the time
    	changes concept from Metallica and combine it with a southern
    	sound.
    
    							GTI

    
    	I found another Raging Slab album.  Happened to look through their
    	section at Newbury Comics and came across "Slabbage/True Death",
    	which came out sometime in 1991, making it their 2nd album.
    
    	Included is another cover of Cheech and Chong's "Earache My Eye"
    	[Scatterbrain did one on "Here Comes Trouble"].
    
    	After 1 listen, it's not too bad.  I'll have to give it at least
    	1 more listen.
    
    							GTI
    

    I saw their video to "anywhere but here" and they've caught the
    "retro-bug"...very 70's influenced but very good after a few listens.
    
    re-1
    
    Shawn,listen to it a few times before hiding it away forever.You may
    begin to like it.]
    
    
    
    					ian

    
    What Shawn, no review of the show? :^)  All right, I'll say a few
    words...
    
    Raging Slab, the-band-whose-name-most-sounds-like-music-they-don't-play,
    did a show at Axis the other night.
    
    It was pretty good.  I was glad to see them do a fair amount off
    Dynamite Monster Boogie Concert, since that's the only CD I own.  I
    was disappointed to not hear "Don't Have to Worry About the Bomb,"
    but they covered all the other ones I like - even "Lynne" the only
    slow song of the night, which is a *great* song.  On everything else
    they rocked pretty hard.  And were *loud*.  The loud was okay, but you
    really missed a lot of nice harmonies and subtleties the band has on
    record.
    
    They are a a bunch of characters, sorta looking like Lynyrd Skynyrd,
    but playing much louder!  Some joker even called out for "Working for
    MCA!"  The woman on slide was pretty good, and they like the Buffalo
    Bills, which is a bonus in my book.
    
    - Sean

    
    	I was going to, but I wasn't even here for 1/2 of yesterday [got
    	home at about 3:30 yesterday morning and slept until 11:00, and
    	came in for 1:00], so I had to get some work done.  But here goes:
    
    	Since I have all 3 albums of theirs [that I'm aware of ... sounds
    	like they might have had another album ready but wasn't released
    	for one reason or another], I knew alot more of the material than
    	Sean did.  They did pretty close to a 50/50 mix of the 1st and last
    	albums, and threw in maybe 3 songs from the 2nd released album.
    
    	"Dig a Hole"
    	"Geronimo"
    	"Anywhere the Wind Blows"
    	"Shiver"
    	"Pearly" [they f****** JAMMED on this song]
    	"Don't Dog Me"
    	"Down, Down, Down" - Mountain cover
    
    	etc.
    
    	Like Sean said, they were LOUD.  The vocals really got lost in
    	the mix, which is too bad because he's got a good voice for the
    	music they play.  But they cranked ... the whole band was up
    	there slamming for almost every song.  If you like timing changes,
    	you'll really get into them.
    
    							GTI
    

    Was Gary Coleman there?
    

    
    Caught Beavis and Butthead channel-surfing till they hit the video for
    "Anywhere But Here"...  classic line...
    
    "heh hehh heh.. is this Lynyrd Skynyrd?  heh he"
    
    - Sean

    
    	Sean, have you found their debut album yet?
    
    	If not, do you want me to pick it up if I ever find it?
    
    
    	I sent a message to american@american.recordings.com to see if
    	they had any information on a new album, but it's been 1-2 weeks
    	and I haven't heard anything from them yet.  I might change my
    	mindset for the follow-up letter:
    
    	"Hi, I'm a 25-year old big-breasted blonde and am willing to
    	 satisfy your every desire if you'll give me some information
    	 about an upcoming release."
    
    	8^)
    

    
    	New album coming out in August ... "Sing Monkey Sing".
    
    	Finally!!
    

Raging Slab: Biography

[Image] Click here for the Raging Slab home page or for other american
artists.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                  [Image]

New Noise - The Aquarian Weekly

A few years back, Raging Slab were invited by the Red Hot Chili Peppers to
be the opening act on a three-month leg of their Mother's Milk U.S. tour.
Although the pairing of the L. A. sexfunksters with rip-snortin',
fringe-and-cowboy- hat-wearin' guitar-slingers initially seemed
miscalculated, it proved to be more logical, and more successful, than
anyone could have thought. Well, actually, there was one unfortunate show
where the crowd's reaction to the Slab ranged from caustic heckling to
bottle-hurling. Ironically, that show took place at the Ritz in New York
City, the band's own, loving home town.

Alas, being dissed in the city of their origin was nothing new for Raging
Slab. Since their formation in the unforgiving Lower East Side in 1983,
every one of the band's many incarnations (they're literally on their 14th
drummer, and past members have included Warrior Soul's Kory Clarke
and--from the "fact is stranger than fiction" dept., Deee-Lite's Super DJ
Dmitry) were ostracized for their dabbling in '70s retro fashion and
musical traditions by Mannattan's art-minded majority.

Slide guitarist Elyse Steinman-who, along with songwriter/frontman Greg
Strzempka (the "z" is silent), form the nucleus of Raging Slab--say, "There
wasn't any rock'n' roll going on in Manhattan in the early '80s. Brooklyn
had metal, but it was pretty much avant garde music in Manhattan. We were
the greasy rock'n' roll band, and that was fine because we like looking
that way. We distance ourselves from the 'scenes' in New York. We've always
thought of ourselves as unique, and it's always been important to us to
maintain our individuality."

The band's first two recording for the Jersy-based Buy Our Records--1987's
Assmaster and 1988's True Death EP --were sloppy but attention-worthy
introductions to Raging Slab's rural soundscape of rough-hewn riffs, deep
soul grooves and black-lite-illuminated atmosphere, a place where even the
most jaded "new-waver" is reminded what was truly great about The Outlaws,
Foghat and Grand Funk. A deal with RCA followed, and the band's 1989,
eponymous major label debut, hilighted by the quasi-hit single "Don't Dog
Me," demonstrated how years of touring the country can contribute to a
band's musicanship and conviction.

Every attempt Raging Slab made to follow up that album was rejected by
their record company, but Rick Rubin of Def American Recordings fame had
been eyeing the band with intent. After some legal wranglings, Slab joined
the Black Crowes, The Jayhawks, and Dan Baird in Rubin's stable of
magnificent, roadhouse-jukebox-compatible rock 'n' roll artists. By this
time, the band's lineup had changed once again (now, Stzempka and Steinman
were joined by bassist Alex Morton, guitarist Mark Middleton and drummer
Paul Sheehan), their home base had moved to a farm in North Central
Pennsylvania where the nearest neighbor was considerably more than a
bottle's throw away, and the very '70s-isms which had always been the
backbone of Raging Slab's misunderstood vision were suddenly in vogue among
the alternative elite.

Brendan O'Brien, the King Midas of rock production, and a 48-track mobile
studio were wheeled out to the Slab farm where work commenced on what would
prove to be the band's uncontestable tour de force . The just-released
Dynamite Monster Boogie Concert , an almost flawless 12-song collection
named after a '70s trash detective novel, may be just the best, most
genuine straight-up rock 'n' roll album to come out all year.

I'm very proud of our last records, but you grow and you get better at,"
says Steinman, who seems confident that the world is finally ready for
Raging Slab. "I really feel like we made an amazing record this time
around. Now we're at the right place, and it's the right time for us. We've
been doing it for so long, that it's not some kind of stupid, forced,
bandwagon-type of thing. We're the real item."

Stzempka, good-natured but hardened by a decade of neglect from critis and
peers, is equally confident that Slab will have the last laugh. "There's
certainly little or no justice in this business, and believe me, I think
there's plenty of room in a record store for everyone's records," he says,
"but we were doing a cover of 'Earache My Eye' by Cheech & Chong three
years before Soundgarden were, and when you open up a newspaper and it says
Soundgarden are geniuses for covering 'Earache My Eye,' you get a little
cranky. You feel glossed over."

Regarding the current, fashionable bumper crop of '70s-influenced bands,
Stzempka says, "If you didn't even live through it, you're not really
particularly clued in to what's cool to rip off. When I look at retro
attempts by people who weren't really children of the '70s, it's like, 'I
hate to tell you this guys, but I went through that and that wasn't cool
then, and it's not cool now,' I knew what was cool about Blue Oyster Cult
15 years before Kim Gordon had a Blue Oyster Cult sticker on her bass."

The point isn't the sticker," Steinman chimes in. "in any town or city
where there's a music scene, there's always two different gangs, if you
will, and when we were covering Blue Oyster Cult songs and stuff, that
whole snot-rock scene used to make fun of us for doing that. And now she's
got the sticker on her bass, and now it's cool.

"We grew up in the '70s, It's just who we are, and that's the difference
between us and other '70s 'retro' bands. A lot of them don't even have a
clue what they are doing. We're not consciously trying to be '70s, it's
just who we are. We can't get away from it."

- John Reynolds
---------------------------------------------------------------------------

[Image]Contact us at american@american.recordings.com.

Blame these people for it all.

    
    .... Blue Oyster Cult !  They're way cool....  :^)
    

    
    	You'll NEVER guess who I just got mail from ... OK, maybe you
    	will, but I'll tell you anyways.
    
    	Greg Strzempka, the guitarist/singer from Raging Slab, sent me
    	a message asking if I've gotten any of his mail.
    
    	8^)
    
    	[Reminder ... the new album comes out tomorrow!!]
    

    Hey!  You're supposed to be on vacation!!

    Not from notes, certainly

    Shawn, Yea right !

    
    Did ya ask him if he could turn down the volume at his next
    gig?
    
    - Sean

    
    	RE: April
    
    	I had a softball game last Monday, right down the road from
    	MRO, so I stopped in and checked in for a few minutes.
    
    
    	RE: Sean
    
    	I was going to say something like "A friend and I saw you at
    	Axis in Boston a couple years ago, and it was a great show,
    	but it was way too loud", but I didn't want to sound like a
    	wimp.  8^)
    
    
    	RE: Sue
    
    	OK, Sue honey, I'll post his and my messages for you.  8^)
    

From:	US4RMC::"slabbage@penn.com" "Gregory Strzempka" 23-AUG-1996 23:17:51.40
To:	busy::slabounty
CC:	
Subj:	SLAB?

Are you , by any chance getting any of My E-Mail?

just curious...
(nice ACII logo)

BOOGIE!
greg form raging slab

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% Message-Id: <321E71BE.425F@penn.com>
% Date: Sat, 24 Aug 1996 03:06:47 +0000
% From: Gregory Strzempka <slabbage@penn.com>
% Organization: Raging Slab /Junior Exploders
% X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0b6aGold (Macintosh; I; PPC)
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% Subject: SLAB?
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From:	BUSY::SLAB "Raging Slab  26-Aug-1996 1708" 26-AUG-1996 17:17:03.12
To:	US4RMC::"slabbage@penn.com"
CC:	SLAB
Subj:	Hey, fancy meeting you here.  8^)


	No, no strange mail that I can't identify as of yet.

	I hope you don't mind that I use "Raging Slab" as a personal
	name ... SLAB has been my nickname since I started here al-
	most 10 years ago and was given a username of ::SLABOUNTY,
	and I've been using "Raging Slab" as a personal name since I
	saw [and bought] your debut album in the music store about 7
	years ago.  And I'm not just saying this, but it is 1 of the
	best albums I have, IMO.

	Another reason that I use "Raging Slab" is that I'm trying to
	get your name out there a little more than it is.  Yeah, you
	had a video for the last album, but I probably never would
	have even bought the album if I hadn't happened upon it and
	bought it based on the band's name.  Unless, of course, a
	trusted friend and musical fan had recommended it to me.

	So if anyone asks me "What's a Raging Slab?", I tell them.

	But of course I'll stop using it if you think it'll cause
	any confusion ... just let me know.  Where'd you see my name?

	And of course I'm looking forward to the new album's release
	tomorrow.

	Keep up the good work, and tell the band that I think you're
	all doing a great job.

							Shawn L.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

From:	US4RMC::"slabbage@penn.com" "Gregory Strzempka" 23-AUG-1996 23:17:51.40
To:	busy::slabounty
CC:	
Subj:	SLAB?

Are you , by any chance getting any of My E-Mail?

just curious...
(nice ACII logo)

BOOGIE!
greg form raging slab

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% Message-Id: <321E71BE.425F@penn.com>
% Date: Sat, 24 Aug 1996 03:06:47 +0000
% From: Gregory Strzempka <slabbage@penn.com>
% Organization: Raging Slab /Junior Exploders
% X-Mailer: Mozilla 3.0b6aGold (Macintosh; I; PPC)
% Mime-Version: 1.0
% To: busy::slabounty
% Subject: SLAB?
% Content-Type: text/plain; charset=us-ascii
% Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit

    
    	I was at Newbury Comics at about 12:30 last Tuesday, and there
    	was no new Raging Slab album.
    
    	I copied over last week's new releases from the Newbury Comics
    	web site and it's not listed there as being released last week,
    	nor was it part of the "Upcoming releases" list.
    

    
    Shawn, for some reason that last reply reminded me of an old Monty 
    Python skit:
    
         "It was much like any other summer's day in Petersburg, and Ralph 
         Melish, a file clerk at an insurance company, was on his way to work 
         as usual when....  nothing happened.
    
         Scarcly able to believe his eyes, Ralph Melish looked down.  But
         one glance confirmed his suspicions.  Behind a bush on the side
         of the road, there was no severed arm, no dismembered trunk of a
         man in his late fifties, no head in a bag, nothing...
    
         For Ralph Melish, this was not to be the start of any trail of
         events which would not, in no time at all, involve him in neither
         a tangled knot of suspicion nor any web of lies, which would, had
         he been not uninvolved, surely have led to no other place than
         the central criminal court of the old baliff.
    
         But it was not to be.  Ralph Melish reached his office in
         Dallezll Street, Petersburg, at 9:05 am.  Exactly the same time
         as he usually got in...."
    
         etc., etc...  :^)
    
    - Sean
    

    
    	Well, it's good to see that you can make light of this situation,
    	in my moment of turmoil.
    
    
    
    	8^)
    

    
    No new CD at Newbury Comics in Nashua either...
    
    - Sean

    
    	And nothing at Strawberries in Shrewsbury.
    

    
    Strawberries?  :^)  Cripes, when do they have anything but the 
    latest CD by the hottest bands.  I don't think you could
    go in and find "Sticky Fingers" in a Strawberries (remember their
    old slogan "where the tape never costs more than the album"...
    I never understood that one).
    
    HMV/Cambridge will be the first to have any new CD if the band is
    is at all obscure.
    
    - Sean

    
    	Yeah, I know, but it was right down the road so I figured it
    	wouldn't hurt to check.  They did have 1 copy of "Dynamite
    	Monster Boogie Concert" there, believe it or not.
    

From:	BUSY::SLAB "Raging Slab  05-Sep-1996 1633"  5-SEP-1996 16:34:30.01
To:	US4RMC::"slabbage@penn.com"
CC:	SLAB
Subj:	Hey, so what's the deal with the new album?


	I've tried 2 of the biggest music stores in MA and it doesn't
	seem to be out yet ... and it was scheduled to be out 2 weeks
	ago.  Has it been delayed?

	Thanks for any info.

							Shawn L.

    
    I believe CDNow has it up for pre-order along with R.E.M, and several
    other bands....just thought I'd let ya know.
    
    

    
    	Pre-order?  For an album that's already 2 weeks overdue??
    
    	8^)
    
    	Thanks ... I'll check it out.
    

    
    	CDNow says it'll be out on 09/10 [next Tuesday].
    
    	Pretty neat ... looks like Raging Slab is saying "Happy Birthday"
    	to me without even knowing it.  8^)
    

    
    	Well, I just got a reply from the band [Greg, specifically].
    
    	The release date has been moved to 09/24.