I’m currently listening to what most consider the worst Black Sabbath album, 1987’s The Eternal Idol. Maybe this isn’t the worst of the worst — I haven’t listened to Forbidden or Tyr in a long time, don’t have copies, and they’re probably not streaming anywhere. Not sure why I’m listening to it. It sounds like when older heavy metal bands tried to make pop-rock albums in that era, like the Whitesnake one with Steve Vai on it. Ray Gillen originally sang on this album, but was replaced or fired or quit or whatever the hell, and Tony Martin re-recorded his vocal tracks, meaning Gillen’s Sabbath tenure only involved filling in at the end of the tour before this album, and I guess there are bootlegs of his recording sessions. I can’t write much more about this era of Black Sabbath without a copy of Visio to create the complicated flowchart I’d need to keep track of lineup changes. All I can say is this album probably rhymes “fire” and “desire” on it somewhere.
I need to get ready for Vegas — I leave a week from today — but I’ve been too busy to even think about it. Bill and Marc will be there for Sun-Tue, which will be cool. I can’t remember the last time I was there with them. 2011 I think? I’ve been looking for anything interesting to do, shows or comedy or whatnot, and a whole lot of nothing is going on. I guess I already wrote about this, but I’m getting even more bunchy about it, because aside from one dinner reservation, I’ve made zero plans, and I’m almost sure my next week will be far too busy to even think about it.
I’m still occasionally editing old posts, trying to get them tidied up and remove any obvious problems, etc. I occasionally find bits in there that are wonderful, long essays about New York that are fun, bits of trip reports I’ve forgotten. No, I’m not writing a book about any of this. I already wrote it; it’s here. Go read it. I wish I had a better way to drive traffic into those old entries. Maybe I should start posting the links on Facebook, not that the future of Facebook is that cheery.
Fell down a long k-hole reading about the Russian remake of Married… With Children. I’ll let you do your own homework on that one. There are a few episodes on YouTube, and a wikipedia article. See also my old article here Current Obsession: Pole Chudes on the Russian version of Wheel of Fortune.
Something I have no time to research or write about is that Concord Mall got sold recently. The new ownership group has a few dozen strip malls in the greater Chicagoland area, and some office buildings in Michiana. They’ve said they are looking to get some new tenants, and use some vacant space for offices. I’d imagine the former Carson store is going to get split up, like they did with the old Wards store. Not sure how they’re going to find takers for office space in Elkhart, but we’ll see. I’m probably going to be in Indiana in December, so maybe it will still be standing when I come back.
Had to punch out on this Sabbath album. It was sounding too much like a supergroup with the worst members of Mr. Big and Dokken in it.
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