Neil Turbin
Neil Turbin is an American thrash metal vocalist known for being the first full-time vocalist for American band Anthrax and current lead vocalist and songwriter of the heavy metal band DeathRiders. and hard rock band Bleed The Hunger At the time Turbin was first contacted by Anthrax he was in a band called "AMRA", but left after a few months, prompting him to answer Anthrax's advertisement. He attended the same high school as Scott Ian and Danny Lilker, Bayside High School in New York, was in a class with Ian in his freshman year. Turbin earned the position as the first official band vocalist in August 1982. Turbin's first performance with Anthrax was at Great Gildersleeves on September 12, 1982, he performed and recorded with the band on the original demo recordings and their first studio album, Fistful of Metal. Turbin wrote the lyrics to all songs on that album. Turbin has writing credits on five of the seven songs on the band's Armed and Dangerous EP, as well as two songs on Spreading the Disease, both of which were recorded by third Anthrax vocalist Joey Belladonna who replaced second Anthrax vocalist Matt Fallon.
In 2009 the video game Brütal Legend was released featuring the Anthrax song "Metal Thrashing Mad" in its soundtrack with Turbin's vocals. Today, many of the songs Turbin wrote and recorded with the band have been re-recorded with different vocalists and appear on multiple albums and DVD's including the double platinum certified'Big 4' Live from Sofia, Bulgaria. Turbin's exit from Anthrax came two weeks after the band's first North American'Anthrax US Attack Tour 1984' ending with a show at Roseland Ballroom on August 3. DeathRiders is named after one of Turbin's songs and was formed in 2001 to support Turbin's debut solo album "Threatcon Delta". Deathriders toured Monterrey Metalfest, Mexico in 2005. Sweden Rock 2006, Tokyo and the US in 2008, Rocktower 2009 Germany, Nightmare on St. Pauli Festival Germany 2009, Headbangers Open Air Germany 2009, Expo Rock Tijuana 2010 as well as performing eight shows at the world-famous Whisky A Go Go in Hollywood in 2010. DeathRiders Stay Screamin 2011 European Tour took them to Metal Bash 2011 in Germany, Highway To Dokk'em Open Air Festival 2011 as well as other venues throughout Tilburg, Vienna and Berlin, Germany.
DeathRiders was featured alongside Michael Angelo Batio, Faster Pussycat, Phil Lewis of LA Guns at Rainbow Bar & Grill 41st anniversary outdoor party on April 21, 2013. DeathRiders performed at NAMM Metal Jam at Whisky a Go-Go in West Hollywood, California on January 23, 2013, which featured many well-known metal artists including current and past members of Queensrÿche, Dio's Disciples, Racer X and Michael Schenker Group. In 2015 the band performed at NAMM Metal Jam 2015 Neil And Michael's Metal Jam with Michael Angelo Batio joining the band on guitar at The Slidebar in Fullerton, California. In 2014 the band toured Europe Headbangers Open Air Brande-Hoernerkirchen, Germany 2014, the Headbangers Open Air 2014 warm-up show at Lauschbar in Itzehoe, Germany on DeathRiders Fistful Of Metal Alive 2014 European tour which included numerous dates in Netherlands including Dynamo Eindhoven, Netherlands with an all Dutch touring lineup. Bleed The Hunger was formed by DeathRiders vocalist Neil Turbin and DeathRiders recording guitarist Jonas Hornqvist in January 2015.
The band is recording their debut album and has released rough mixes of songs on their reverbnation.com/bleedthehunger The debut album will be completed and released after DeathRiders The Metal Beast is released. Sticky Wicked is a side project band that includes Neil Turbin, Rowan Robertson, Jay Singh and Clackers Kay; the band has been touring numerous dates in California in 2015 The NAMM Convention for 2013 took place in Anaheim, California from January 24–27. NAMM Metal Jam kicked things off the night before, on January 23, 2013 at the Whiskey A-Go Go in West Hollywood, CA; the concert was organized by Turbin with Shredding The Envelope's Dave Reffett. Turbin’s band co-headlined the show along with Micheal Angelo Batio, Nitro and the Metal All-Star Jam, featuring members of: Queensrÿche, Rising Force, Lizzy Borden, Lynch Mob and Hurricane. Neil Turbin has been included in a regular lineup rotation at Ultimate Jam Night at Lucky Strike Live Hollywood in February, March and May 2015. Performing onstage on a regular weekly basis with Billy Sheehan, Monte Pittman, Chuck Wright, Jason Sutter, Jonathan "Sugarfoot" Moffett, Mitch Perry, Ira Black, Debby Holiday, Reinhold Schwarzwald, Howie Simon, Mayuko Okai, Tzusumi Okai, Rowan Robertson, Francesco DiCosmo, Anthony "Tiny" Biuso, Louis Metoyer, Sam Bam Koltun, Sean McNabb, Jeff Duncan, Shawn Duncan, Matt Duncan, Joe Lester, The Atomic Punks In 2003 Neil Turbin released his first solo album "Threatcon Delta" on American record label "Metal Mayhem Music".
The album contains fourteen songs and includes a cover of a Jimi Hendrix song as well as an AC/DC cover. Prominent guest musicians on the album include Claude Schnell, Jeff Scott Soto, Paul Shortino. Turbin is known for his high pitched screams in his natural voice up to C6. Turbin is the only early'Big 4' vocalist to sing in this range as demonstrated on the songs "Death From Above", "Deathrider" and "Metal Thrashing Mad" on Fistful Of Metal. Turbin cites heavy metal and NWOBHM vocalists from bands such as Judas Priest, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, AC/DC, Motörhead, Accept and Saxon as influences of his vocal style, although he was heavily influenced by the New York punk scene of the 1970s-1980s including bands such as Generation X, Niki Buzz, The Bullets, Mayday, Steve Johnstad, Sun, Wayne County
Record producer
A record producer or music producer oversees and manages the sound recording and production of a band or performer's music, which may range from recording one song to recording a lengthy concept album. A producer has varying roles during the recording process, they may gather musical ideas for the project, collaborate with the artists to select cover tunes or original songs by the artist/group, work with artists and help them to improve their songs, lyrics or arrangements. A producer may also: Select session musicians to play rhythm section accompaniment parts or solos Co-write Propose changes to the song arrangements Coach the singers and musicians in the studioThe producer supervises the entire process from preproduction, through to the sound recording and mixing stages, and, in some cases, all the way to the audio mastering stage; the producer may perform these roles themselves, or help select the engineer, provide suggestions to the engineer. The producer may pay session musicians and engineers and ensure that the entire project is completed within the record label's budget.
A record producer or music producer has a broad role in overseeing and managing the recording and production of a band or performer's music. A producer has many roles that may include, but are not limited to, gathering ideas for the project, composing the music for the project, selecting songs or session musicians, proposing changes to the song arrangements, coaching the artist and musicians in the studio, controlling the recording sessions, supervising the entire process through audio mixing and, in some cases, to the audio mastering stage. Producers often take on a wider entrepreneurial role, with responsibility for the budget, schedules and negotiations. Writer Chris Deville explains it, "Sometimes a producer functions like a creative consultant — someone who helps a band achieve a certain aesthetic, or who comes up with the perfect violin part to complement the vocal melody, or who insists that a chorus should be a bridge. Other times a producer will build a complete piece of music from the ground up and present the finished product to a vocalist, like Metro Boomin supplying Future with readymade beats or Jack Antonoff letting Taylor Swift add lyrics and melody to an otherwise-finished “Out Of The Woods.”The artist of an album may not be a record producer or music producer for his/her album.
While both contribute creatively, the official credit of "record producer" may depend on the record contract. Christina Aguilera, for example, did not receive record producer credits until many albums into her career. In the 2010s, the producer role is sometimes divided among up to three different individuals: executive producer, vocal producer and music producer. An executive producer oversees project finances, a vocal producers oversees the vocal production, a music producer oversees the creative process of recording and mixings; the music producer is often a competent arranger, musician or songwriter who can bring fresh ideas to a project. As well as making any songwriting and arrangement adjustments, the producer selects and/or collaborates with the mixing engineer, who takes the raw recorded tracks and edits and modifies them with hardware and software tools to create a stereo or surround sound "mix" of all the individual voices sounds and instruments, in turn given further adjustment by a mastering engineer for the various distribution media.
The producer oversees the recording engineer who concentrates on the technical aspects of recording. Noted producer Phil Ek described his role as "the person who creatively guides or directs the process of making a record", like a director would a movie. Indeed, in Bollywood music, the designation is music director; the music producer's job is to create and mold a piece of music. The scope of responsibility may be one or two songs or an artist's entire album – in which case the producer will develop an overall vision for the album and how the various songs may interrelate. At the beginning of record industry, the producer role was technically limited to record, in one shot, artists performing live; the immediate predecessors to record producers were the artists and repertoire executives of the late 1920s and 1930s who oversaw the "pop" product and led session orchestras. That was the case of Ben Selvin at Columbia Records, Nathaniel Shilkret at Victor Records and Bob Haring at Brunswick Records.
By the end of the 1930s, the first professional recording studios not owned by the major companies were established separating the roles of A&R man and producer, although it wouldn't be until the late 1940s when the term "producer" became used in the industry. The role of producers changed progressively over the 1960s due to technology; the development of multitrack recording caused a major change in the recording process. Before multitracking, all the elements of a song had to be performed simultaneously. All of these singers and musicians had to be assembled in a large studio where the performance was recorded. With multitrack recording, the "bed tracks" (rhythm section accompaniment parts such as the bassline and rhythm guitar could be recorded first, the vocals and solos could be added using as many "takes" as necessary, it was no longer necessary to get all the players in the studio at the same time. A pop band could record their backing tracks one week, a horn section could be brought in a week to add horn shots and punches, a string section could be brought in a week after that.
Multitrack recording had another pro
Colin Larkin (writer)
Colin Larkin is a British writer and entrepreneur. He founded, was the editor in chief of, the Encyclopedia of Popular Music, described by The Times as "the standard against which all others must be judged". Along with the ten-volume encyclopedia, Larkin wrote the book All Time Top 1000 Albums, edited the Guinness Who's Who Of Jazz, the Guinness Who's Who Of Blues, the Virgin Encyclopedia Of Heavy Rock The compiler of the most extensive database of popular music in Europe and the US, a writer and book designer by trade, Larkin has over 650,000 copies in print to date; as an authority on popular music, Larkin has been interviewed on radio, had a regular slot on BBC GLR for two years in the 1990s. Colin Larkin was born in Dagenham in 1949 in an area of Essex, populated by workers in the car industry. Although the post-war years proved lucrative for the Ford motor company, Larkin was raised in relative poverty in the largest area of council housing in the United Kingdom, in the suburbs that surrounded the Ford plant.
The Becontree estate in Dagenham began as a conglomeration of 27,000 "homes for heroes", had no recognisable town centre. Larkin spent much of his early childhood attending the travelling fair where his father, who worked by day as a plumber for the council, moonlighted on the waltzers to make ends meet, it was in the fairground, against a background of Little Richard on the wind-up 78 rpm turntables, that Larkin acquired his passion for the world of popular music, a taste for exotic pattern and vivid colour, which would re-surface in years in books on Islamic art and architecture, oriental rugs. In the 1960s Larkin attended the South East Essex County Technical High School following which, under his own initiative he obtained an apprenticeship as a commercial artist, enabling him to take a sandwich course at the London College of Printing. There he studied book design, and was influenced by the typeface designer Eric Gill, associated with the arts and crafts movement. Larkin began his working life in commercial art, advertising studios and design groups and for the book publisher Pearson Longmans.
In 1967 he began writing for music magazines. At Longmans he became senior book designer, but he soon tired of working for the publishing house and by 1976 had co-founded his own book publishing company, Scorpion Publishing. From the outset Larkin was intent upon reaching areas of the book reading public that other publishers felt it unnecessary or unprofitable to reach. Scorpion Publishing published art books on Islamic Art, they designed and published John Gorman's trilogy of Labour history, Banner Bright, To Build Jerusalem and Images of Labour. Notable music books at this time included Timeless Flight: The Definitive Story of The Byrds and Bob Dylan's Unreleased Recordings. In the 1980s Larkin, who read music magazines avidly and was acquiring a considerable personal library of singles and albums, began to consider the idea of "an encyclopedia of popular music", his passion for an encyclopedia that would do for Bob Dylan and the Beatles what the Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians had done for more classical subjects, moreover do it better took over when in 1989 he sold his half of Scorpion Books to fund the project and founded Square One Books.
In 1989 Larkin formed Square One Books to create a multi-volume Encyclopedia of Popular Music, to publish music related books. He published additional music biographies including those on Graham Bond, R. E. M. Eric Clapton, The Byrds and Frank Zappa, a further book on Bob Dylan, Oh No, Not Another Bob Dylan Book. In a pre-internet age, the work required to create an encyclopedia of popular music was considerable. Aided by a team of contributors, a fast-growing library of music magazines and the music itself, an eventual 3000 vinyl singles, 3500 vinyl albums, 4500 music biographies and 38,000 CDs, Larkin began compiling the Encyclopedia. In 1992 the first edition of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music went into print, it was recognised as monumental: Rolling Stone described the work as "musical history in the making", in The Times they called it "a work of frightening completeness". Musician Jools Holland called it "without question the most useful reference work on popular music". In May 2011 Omnibus Press released the Amazon Kindle edition of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music, using the text of the 2007 edition.
Square One developed their own in-house software using 4th Dimension. Over 50 separate titles followed the creation of the Encyclopedia's database, in 1997 Larkin sold Square One Books to American data company Muze. Larkin became full-time editor-in-chief and ran the encyclopedia as a cottage industry, with a team of fewer than ten contributors, who in terms of wordcount were "producing an Agatha Christie novel a month". From September 2008 Larkin ceased all involvement with Muze Inc. or any of its related companies following the closure of the Encyclopedia of Popular Music as a stand-alone product and his subsequent redundancy. On 15 April 2009, it was announced that most of the assets of Muze Inc. were purchased by Macrovision. In 2008, Larkin launched a new website whose original inspiration had come from the All Time Top 1000 Albums called 1000Greatest.com. This would change its name to become the multi-media rating site and iPhone app, btoe.com.. Larkin re-directed the content to Musopedia.com.
He is editor-in-chief of Musopedia Ltd.. From 2013 to 2017 he was the main contributor of music biographies and album reviews for Quantone Music, an in depth music data company. In 2018 he was commissioned by BMG
Dan Spitz
Daniel Alan Spitz is an American musician and watchmaker best known for his work as the lead guitarist of the American heavy metal band Anthrax from 1983 to 1995 and from 2005 to 2008. With Anthrax, Spitz earned several platinum albums. Spitz founded the Christian music group Red Lamb, known for lyrics on autism awareness. Spitz has earned Swiss and American degrees in luxury mechanical watchmaking and micro-mechanical engineering, certified as watchmaker instructor for the North American operations of Swiss watch company Chopard. Dan Spitz was an early member of Overkill in 1981 and joined Anthrax in 1983. From 1983 to 1995, he was lead guitarist and backing vocalist on the Anthrax albums Fistful of Metal and Dangerous, Spreading the Disease, Among the Living, State of Euphoria, Persistence of Time, Sound of White Noise, earning him multiple RIAA-certified gold and platinum records. Anthrax sold more than 30 million albums worldwide during this period. In 1995, Spitz left Anthrax to pursue a career in luxury Swiss watchmaking, attending the Swiss watchmaking school WOSTEP on a full scholarship.
He was certified a Mechanical Complications Specialist, earning Swiss degrees in micro-mechanical engineering, opened his own luxury watch service. In 2012 Spitz was voted the number 1 interview of the year for the watchmaking magazine Hodinkee. In 2016, the production company Great Big Story produced a documentary on Spitz's work as a watchmaker. Spitz reunited with Anthrax for a classic lineup reunion tour in 2005, appearing on the tour DVD Alive 2, he left the band again in 2008 to return to his watchmaking career. In 2010 Spitz formed a new Christian rock/metal band Red Lamb, which included singer Don Chaffin from Voices of Extreme and keyboardist Chris Vrenna. Dave Mustaine was an early member but stepped back into a songwriting role with Spitz. Mustaine and Spitz wrote the song "Puzzle Box", claimed to be the first heavy metal song to deal with autism. In 2017, Spitz formed another Christian metal band with former Journey drummer Deen Castronovo. Spitz was born in a small town in Rockland County, New York as the second son of a lawyer and a high school substitute teacher.
Spitz comes from an orthodox Levite tribe Jewish family and converted to Christianity / Messianic Judaism in 1993. His older brother is heavy metal bassist/guitarist Dave Spitz. Spitz has two daughters from his first marriage. Spitz has identical twin sons who were born in 2007; the Spitz twins were in numerous movies and television commercials before their autism diagnosis, including the film Away We Go. In June 2009, Spitz had a massive heart attack, he recovered but required stents in many arteries. Spitz divorced his second wife in 2014. Spitz was known for his use of Jackson Guitars, he collaborated on guitar designs with Grover Jackson. During the Anthrax Reunion tour, Spitz endorsed Paul Reed Smith Guitars, using a custom model with a "Spitz" head stock; this guitar was painted with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles by tattoo artist and painter JR Linton. Spitz terminated his endorsement with PRS after leaving Anthrax in 2007. In the early days of Anthrax, Spitz used Marshall amplifiers, using one of the first incarnations of a pre JCM800 derived from a collaboration with Jim Marshall.
Around the time of "Among the Living," Spitz switched to Mesa/Boogie, using many Mark IIC heads modified by Spitz. During the Anthrax Reunion in 2005–2007, Spitz used Matchless heads and Marshall point-to-point wired 2203 modded heads he hand-built himself that were pushed by a Keeley-modded Boss DS-1. Fistful of Metal Armed and Dangerous Spreading the Disease Among the Living State of Euphoria Persistence of Time Sound of White Noise Alive 2 Red Lamb
Glen Buxton
Glen Edward Buxton was an American musician and composer, best known as lead guitarist for the original Alice Cooper group. In 2003, Rolling Stone ranked Buxton number 90 on its list of the 100 greatest guitarists of all time. In 2011, he was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of the original Alice Cooper group. Born in Akron, Buxton moved to Phoenix, Arizona and in 1964, while attending Cortez High School, made his debut in a rock band called The Earwigs, it was composed of fellow high school students Dennis Dunaway, Vincent Furnier, John Tatum and John Speer. At the onset, Buxton was the only member who could play an instrument, thus taught some of the other members to play after the group decided to take a shot at becoming a real band, they became popular locally, changed their name to The Spiders in 1965 and to The Nazz in 1967. In 1966-67, guitarist John Tatum and drummer John Speer left the group, rhythm guitarist/keyboardist Michael Bruce and drummer Neal Smith joined.
In 1968, to avoid legal entanglements with the Todd Rundgren-led Nazz the group changed their name to Alice Cooper, premiering their new name at their performance at the Santa Barbara County Fairgrounds on March 20, 1968, Michael Bruce's 20th birthday. Buxton was the co-writer of hit songs like "School's Out", "I'm Eighteen", "Elected," and "10 Minutes Before the Worm", he is credited as lead guitarist on seven albums by Alice Cooper, including the chart-topping Billion Dollar Babies. However, he was "not invited" to play on 1973's Muscle of Love and does not appear, although he is credited due to management's concerns about band image with the fans. According to drummer Neal Smith, the absence was due to "problems that Glen was having with the demons of rock and roll at that particular time...really, Billion Dollar Babies and Muscle of Love, Glen didn't play on the album. By hook or by crook, the albums had to be put out." The band sought out other guitar players to fill in, including Dick Wagner and fellow Cortez High School alum Mick Mashbir.
In an interview with Marc Maron, according to Alice Cooper, "Glen ended up being one of the great rock guitar players of all time. He created'School's Out', he created all that stuff. He was the only guy that could jam with Syd Barrett." In a separate interview, Cooper stated, "Glen was not a songwriter. He would write riffs, though, they would show up on the album, great guitar players would say,'What is that line? It's so weird, but it's catchy.' Mike was much more into chord structure. So, Glen was always sort of our icing on the cake." Throughout the late 1970s and 1980s, Buxton maintained a low profile, playing only occasional club gigs with bands like Shrapnel and Virgin. In the 1990s, Buxton lived in Clarion, performing with local artists. In 1994 Buxton founded the band Buxton-Flynn with Michael Flynn; the band played shows through out southern north Iowa. A few weeks before his 50th birthday November 10, Buxton died of complications from pneumonia at a hospital in nearby Mason City, Iowa, on October 19, 1997, age 49.
He had spent time visiting and playing music with two of his Alice Cooper bandmates and longtime friends, Michael Bruce and Neal Smith. With bassist Richie Scarlet filling in for Buxton's longtime friend and Alice Cooper bandmate Dennis Dunaway, John Glenn on keyboards, Buxton and Bruce performed on a morning radio show in Houston on October 10, 1997, performed a concert at nightclub Area 51 in Houston on October 12, 1997. Buxton mentioned having some pain at the nightclub and his friends urged him to see a doctor, but Buxton replied he would wait until he got home. On October 19 his fiancée drove him to the hospital near his home in Clarion, where he passed away of viral pneumonia, he is buried in Evergreen Cemetery in Iowa. With Alice CooperPretties for You Easy Action Love It to Death Killer School's Out Billion Dollar Babies Muscle of Love 1969 Live at the Whisky A Go-Go With Ant-BeeLunar Muzik Official website Glen Buxton at Find a Grave
Double album
A double album is an audio album which spans two units of the primary medium in which it is sold records and compact disc. A double album is though not always, released as such because the recording is longer than the capacity of the medium. Recording artists think of double albums as comprising a single piece artistically. Another example of this approach is Works Volume 1 by Emerson Lake and Palmer, where side one featured Keith Emerson, side two Greg Lake, side three Carl Palmer, side four was by the entire group. Since the advent of the compact disc, albums are sometimes released with a bonus disc featuring additional material as a supplement to the main album, with live tracks, studio out-takes, cut songs, or older unreleased material. One innovation was the inclusion of DVD of related material with a compact disc, such as video related to the album or DVD-Audio versions of the same recordings; some such discs were released on a two-sided format called DualDisc. Due to the limitations of the gramophone record, many albums released on the format were under 40 minutes long.
This has led to record labels re-releasing two of these albums on one CD, thus making a double album. The same principles apply to the triple album. Packages with more units than three are packaged as a box set; the first double album was recordings from the Carnegie Hall Concert headlined by Benny Goodman, released in 1950 on Columbia Records, that label having introduced the LP two years earlier. Studio recordings of operas have been released as double, triple and quintuple albums since the 1950s; the first rock double album was Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde released on May 16, 1966. It was soon followed by Frank Zappa & the Mothers Of Invention's debut record, Freak Out!, released on June 27, 1966. The best-selling double album of all time is Michael Jackson's HIStory: Past and Future, Book I with over 33 million copies sold worldwide; the second best-selling double album and best-selling concept double album is Pink Floyd's The Wall with over 30 million copies worldwide. Other best-selling double albums are The Beatles' White Album, The Rolling Stones' Exile on Main St.
Billy Joel's Greatest Hits I & II, Bob Dylan's Blonde on Blonde, The Smashing Pumpkins' Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness. The double album has become less common since the decline of the vinyl LP and the advent of compact discs. A single LP had two sides, each of which had a capacity of up to 30 minutes, for a maximum of 60 minutes per record. A single CD has a capacity of 80 minutes: accordingly, many old double albums on LP have been re-released as single albums on CD. However, other double albums on LP are re-released as double albums on CD, either because they are too large for a single CD, or to retain the structure of the original. There are double-LP albums, such as Mike Oldfield's Incantations and Chick Corea's My Spanish Heart, for which some tracks were removed or shortened for a single 74-minute CD release, though both were re-released in their entirety when 80-minute CDs were developed. Though the average album length has increased since the days of LPs, it remains rare for an artist to produce more than 80 minutes of studio material for one album.
Thus, the double album is now more seen in formats other than studio albums. Live albums that either present all or most of a single concert, or material from several concerts, are released as double albums. Compilations such as greatest hits records can often comprise double albums. Soundtracks and scores are commonly released on two CDs; the double album format is frequently used for concept albums. The double album is not obsolete when it comes to studio albums, however; some artists still produce a large enough quantity of material to justify a double album. For example, progressive rock band The Flower Kings have released four double albums out of eleven studio albums. Barenaked Ladies recorded 29 songs for their first original album following the completion of their contract with Reprise Records, including several songs that were cut from past albums under that contract. Without needing to get a label's approval, they were able to release a 25-track "deluxe edition" double album Barenaked Ladies Are Me, as well as releasing the album as two separate single albums, as well as a variety of other formats.
Guns N' Roses famously insisted on releasing their Use Your Illusion I & II albums but separately so as not to burden their fans with the expense of having to buy a double CD set. Nellie McKay fought with her label to get her debut album, Get Away from Me released as a double album though the material would have fit on a single disc, she has been said to be the first female artist to have a double album as a debut. A recent development is the release of a double studio album in which the two discs contain different mixes of the sam
Michael Bruce (musician)
Michael Owen Bruce is an American rock musician, best known as a member of Alice Cooper. Michael Owen Bruce was born to Ruth Bruce; the Bruce and Owen families had moved to Arizona from Kansas. The family ancestry includes Cherokee, Irish and Norman French. Ruth's father, Clarence Glenn Owen, was a veteran of World War I and a professional baseball player: "Blacky" Owen. "Al" was in the military during the 1940s and Ruth played piano on the radio and performed for many U. S. O. Functions. After the military, "Al" worked for The Coca-Cola Company. Michael and his brothers and Paul, attended North High School in Phoenix, Arizona. Bruce began his professional music career in the mid-1960s. Like so many young people of that time, he found a fiery inspiration in The Beatles and The Rolling Stones. After playing with The Trolls, Michael became part of Mick Mashbir's band The Wildflowers and started taking lessons. Four songs were recorded by this group. Mick had a place in the desert where they rehearsed but it was a party place and the Alice Cooper gang would hang out and party.
According to Bruce, the masters were bought from a man in Phoenix by Bear Family Records. There was another short-lived group, they made no known recordings. In 1966, Michael replaced John Tatum in a Phoenix band called The Spiders, featuring Glen Buxton, Dennis Dunaway, John Speer, Vince Furnier, all from area high schools. One of their top venues was the VIP Club in Phoenix. In 1967 they changed the band's name to The Nazz but had to change it again in 1968 after a legal issue over Todd Rungren's band, Nazz; the group's new name was Alice Cooper. They premiered the name at a performance in Santa Barbara, California, on March 16, 1968, Michael's 20th birthday. Bruce was a founding member, rhythm guitarist and keyboard player, singer of lead and backing vocals in the original Alice Cooper group, he co-wrote many of the group's hit songs, with all of the other members of the group. Michael composed music and lyrics for songs. Two examples of this process are "Halo of Flies" and "No More Mr. Nice Guy".
There are several Bruce-only credited songs including "Caught In A Dream" and "Long Way To Go" from Love It To Death, "Be My Lover" from Killer. Bruce sang lead vocals on the majority of "Sing Low, Sweet Cheerio" on the group's first album Pretties For You and all of "Below Your Means" and "Beautiful Flyaway" on their second album Easy Action, prior to the band's breakthrough album Love It to Death, released in 1971 on the Warner Bros. label. Love It to Death was the first Alice Cooper album produced by Bob Ezrin, their debut album Pretties For You, released in 1969, was produced by Ian Underwood. It turned out Briggs was not a fan of the group Alice Cooper's music, Warner Brothers chose that the album released was the rehearsal tapes of the group, preparing for the studio recording with Briggs; the Alice Cooper group released five more albums after Love It to Death, in 1971 to 1974, before taking what was intended to be a one-year time off for the group to rest and relax from their years of non-stop touring and recording together.
Three of the group members - Michael and Vince/Alice - wanted to record their own solo albums, reflecting their individual musical tastes. Alice's Welcome to My Nightmare was the most successful of these three solo ventures. A full-length feature film of the original group was released to the American cinema in 1974: Good to See You Again, Alice Cooper; the concert footage was shot on the Billion Dollar Babies Tour in 1973 and included a fictional story about an angry director seeking revenge against the band, shot at Universal Studios in Los Angeles. The live concert portion of the movie was filmed in Texas, between the Dallas-Fort Worth area and Houston. Appearing in Good to See You Again, Alice Cooper were Bob Dolin, Mick Mashbir, magician The Amazing Randi. Dolin performed on keyboards, Mashbir on guitar, Randi as the dentist and Alice's executioner. Around 1973–1974, Bruce began working on his own recordings with a group of musicians that included: Mick Mashbir, Bob Dolin, Frank Crandall, Don Lindley.
Mashbir and Dolin had performed as members of the touring band with the Alice Cooper "Billion Dollar Babies" tour. This line-up produced four songs that producer Jack Douglas mixed; when Bruce decided to leave Connecticut in 1974 and move to Lake Tahoe and Lindley did not follow. Bruce and Mashbir were then
