1. Nazareth, Just To Get Into It . . . Getting into tonight’s show with this rocker, in honor of original Nazareth lead singer Dan McCafferty, who died three weeks ago to, sadly, little fanfare. I’ll have a mini Nazareth set, as a tribute, in the middle of my overall set list. 
2. Nash The Slash, Dopes On The Water . . . Nash’s take, with altered lyrics, on the Deep Purple classic Smoke On The Water. It came out on 1981’s Children of The Night album which also featured covers of Jan and Dean’s Dead Man’s Curve and The Rolling Stones’ 19^th Nervous Breakdown.

3. Cheap Trick, Need Your Love (live, from At Budokan album) . . . Not a huge Cheap Trick fan but I like hypnotic, extended cuts like this one. 
4. XTC, Dear God . . . A friend mentioned this tune as coming to mind after last Saturday’s Jesus Christ Superstar and a few other somewhat related songs show, although I didn’t include Dear God. Forgot about it/didn’t have room. So, here it is.

5. The Tragically Hip, Trickle Down . . . From Up To Here, the 1989 release that was the Hip’s first full studio album (there was an earlier EP) and contained what became standards like Blow at High Dough and New Orleans Is Sinking. I remember reading a review of the record, bought it sight unseen and heard in those days before technology put everything just a keystroke or voice command away, and was happily rewarded.

6. Robbie Robertson, Hell’s Half Acre . . . From The Band man’s first, self-titled solo album, in 1987.

7. Nick Lowe, The Gee and the Rick and the Three Card Trick . . . Country-ish tune from Lowe’s 1984 album Nick Lowe and His Cowboy Outfit.

8. Aerosmith, Kings and Queens . . . Was a single but not a hit from the Draw The Line album in 1977. It’s a good one, though, and the band obviously liked it enough that it was put on their first greatest hits album.

9. John Mayall, Room To Move . . . I got talking Mayall with an old friend dating to high school the other day. Turns out we attended, separately, the same Mayall show, with former Rolling Stone and Bluesbreaker Mick Taylor opening, during the 1980s at the old Ontario Place Forum, which featured a rotating stage. He mentioned the excellent Jazz Blues Fusion album so I dug it out and intended to play something from it. But I also pulled out The Turning Point and decided on this fairly famous, at least to Mayall aficionados, harmonica workout. I’m aiming to get back to Jazz Blues Fusion at some point.

10. Van Morrison, Angelou . . . From 1979’s Into The Music, yet another of those songs where Morrison’s great voice is, I’d argue more so than with most artists, an instrument in itself.

11. Faces, Ooh La La . . . A rare instance where Ron Wood took lead vocals on a Faces song. Nicely done. Versions were recorded with lead singer Rod Stewart and bassist Ronnie Lane taking vocal turns but neither liked their own efforts, so the band went with Woody’s for official release as the title cut from the band’s 1973 album.

12. Nazareth, Light Comes Down . . . And off we go into our main Nazareth set with this one from 1998’s Boogaloo album. By this point, after a period in the wilderness of exploring some slightly different styles, Nazareth had returned to its hard-rocking roots and for a time opened shows with this song.

13. Nazareth, Vigilante Man . . . Slow blues cover of the Woody Guthrie tune, from 1973’s Razamanaz album, one of the foundations of Nazareth’s 1970s output.

14. Nazareth, Steamroller . . . Appropriate title for this cut from 1994’s Move Me album.

15. Nazareth, Hire and Fire . . . Few but band die-hards were listening by this point, 1991. As a result, much great music was missed, like this perhaps a touch overproduced but nevertheless great cut from the No Jive album.

16. Nazareth, Crazy (A Suitable Case For Treatment) . . . Nice hard rocking groove on this one. It appeared on the 1981 Heavy Metal movie soundtrack and later expanded re-releases of The Fool Circle album.

17. Nazareth, Expect No Mercy . . . Scorcher of a title cut from the band’s 1977 album.

18. Nazareth, Big Dog’s Gonna Howl . . . Latter-day Nazareth, still kicking butt on this one from 2011’s Big Dogz album. Yes, Dogz, with a ‘z’.

19. The Boomtown Rats, Up All Night . . . Well, what would you expect, after Big Dog’s been howling? I actually decided on this one after some recent insomnia kept me, well, up all night.

20. Queen, Sleeping On The Sidewalk . . . Maybe this would have worked. Yet another winner written and sung by guitarist Brian May, from 1977’s News Of The World album.

21. The Kinks, Holloway Jail . . . From the brilliant, and inexplicable to me commercial failure that was 1971’s Muswell Hillbillies album. It’s a Kinks’ masterpiece.

22. Nazareth, Silver Dollar Forger (Parts 1 & 2) . . . Back to Nazareth we go, one more time, to set up a ‘silver’ set. I’m shameless in my contrived creativity.

23. The Rolling Stones, You Got The Silver . . . Keith Richards sings this one, from Let It Bleed and it often forms part of his usual 2-3 song mini-set within Stones concerts.

24. Steve Miller Band, Quicksilver Girl . . . From the pre-hit, psychedelic era and a nice intro for our next band.

25. Quicksilver Messenger Service, Pride Of Man . . . Cover of the Hamilton Camp tune, from Quicksilver’s debut album in 1968. Canada’s Gordon Lightfoot, among many others, also covered the song as did Gram Parsons, each of them taking varied and interesting approaches.

26. Santana, Blue Skies . . . Extended cut from Santana’s excellent 2019 album Africa Speaks, A beautiful ballad before some fierce Santana fretwork takes over the tune halfway through. It’s sung by Buika, a Spaniard who did lead vocals on the album, with help, on just this track, from British singer Laura Mvula.

Every time I play a track from what I think is the brilliant 1970 soundtrack version of Jesus Christ Superstar, I say that one of these days, I’ll play the entire album because that’s how the songs are best heard, in my view. That day has come. It’s a terrific album I’ve enjoyed since my older brother and sister got it as members of the old Columbia Record Club back in the mail order days. It’s the best version of the show, in my opinion, featuring such artists as Deep Purple’s Ian Gillan (Jesus), Murray Head (Judas in a brilliant performance), Yvonne Elliman as Mary Magdalene and Mike D’Abo of Handbags and Gladrags song fame (interpreted wonderfully by Rod Stewart) as King Herod. And among those in the band is guitarist Henry McCulloch, who played with Paul McCartney & Wings, Joe Cocker and Spooky Tooth, among others.

So, here it is. I’ve filled in the remaining time in my two-hour slot with somewhat related material from various artists before wrapping with The Who’s Underture, from Tommy, to bracket JC Superstar’s opening Overture.

Set list:

1. Overture
2. Heaven On Their Minds
3. What’s The Buzz/Strange Thing Mystifying
4. Everything’s Alright
5. This Jesus Must Die
6. Hosanna
7. Simon Zealotes/Poor Jerusalem
8. Pilate’s Dream
9. The Temple
10. Everything’s Alright (reprise)
11. I Don’t Know How To Love Him
12. Damned For All Time/Blood Money
13. The Last Supper
14. Gethsemane (I Only Want To Say)
15. The Arrest
16. Peter’s Denial
17. Pilate and Christ
18. King Herod’s Song (Try It And See)
19. Judas’ Death
20. Trial Before Pilate (including the 39 Lashes)
21. Superstar
22. Crucifixion
23. John Nineteen Forty-One
24. Bob Dylan, Man Gave Names To All The Animals
25. Jethro Tull, When Jesus Came To Play
26. John Lennon, God
27. Motorhead, (Don’t Need) Religion
28. The Rolling Stones, I Just Want To See His Face
29. The Who, Underture

1. Madness, One Step Beyond . . . Lead and title cut from the UK ska band’s debut album, 1979. It’s a cover of a tune by Jamaican ska singer Prince Buster, recorded in 1964. Madness hooked me with this particular tune, although I’m not a huge fan of the band. I first saw/heard it as a video on Toronto TV station CITY-TVs old The New Music show – predating the more celebrated US MTV. The spoken-word intro makes you sit up and take notice, then off you go riding the main riff and simple lyrics – just the title, shouted occasionally – the rest of the way. Some people I know didn’t get it. To quote one of my younger brothers, used to me mostly listening to raunch and roll stuff like the Stones: “What’s happened to you?” Nothing. It’s called having an open mind.

2. Doug and The Slugs, To Be Laughing . . . I like Doug and The Slugs anyway but was prompted to play them after watching a terrific documentary, released this year, Doug and The Slugs and Me, on the Documentary Channel in Canada. It’s well worth a look.

3. The Rolling Stones, Let It Loose . . . We’re about to, er, let loose, via this great gospelish Stones’ tune from Exile On Main St., with the kick-butt tunes that follow.

4. MC5, Kick Out The Jams (live) . . . What kind of band issues a live album as their first release? The MC5 did. Great intro, to all mothereffers. Listen to it and you’ll hear what I mean, if you don’t already.

5. The Stooges, 1969 . . . The MC5 album was released in 1969 so I figured I’d play one from their punk-ish brothers, Stooges.

6. Lou Reed, Vicious . . . From his most commercial album, Transformer, the one with Walk On The Wild Side on it. Vicious was a B-side and then later a single on its own. Didn’t chart. Ridiculous.

7. Neil Young & Crazy Horse, T-Bone . . . Got mashed potatoes. Ain’t got no T-bone. Seven words. Repeated, around grungy guitars and other assorted instruments, for 9-plus minutes. That takes talent, in my book. Hypnotic.

8. Argent, Thunder and Lightning . . . Former Zombie Rod Argent, singer-guitarist songwriter Russ Ballard and friends did far more than their well-known song Hold Your Head Up. Here’s an example. This pulsating track reminds me of some of the work of the one-off Deep Purple late 1970s offshoot, Paice Ashton Lord, which reminds me to get back to playing some of their work. So much music, so little time.

9. Delaney and Bonnie, Soul Shake . . . Funky tune from the then-married singer-songwriter duo of Delaney and Bonnie Bramlett, who famously toured with Eric Clapton and other music friends and released a live album from it. Duane Allman guests on guitar, on this one.

10. Johnny Jenkins, Down Along The Cove . . . Another one featuring Duane Allman I pulled from one of two outstanding Anthology double-disc CD compilations – An Anthology and An Anthology Volume II – that feature his session work and Allman Brothers Band material. This one’s a cover of the Bob Dylan tune, from the 1967 John Wesley Harding album, released by blues master Jenkins on his 1970 record Ton-Ton Macoute!

11. The Allman Brothers Band, Melissa . . . A single from the Eat A Peach album, didn’t chart. Absurd. One of my younger son’s favorite songs. Good taste.

12. Eric Burdon & War, Gun . . . An amazing combination of rock, funk, soul and R & B, Burdon and War. This tune is yet another example, from The Black-Man’s Burdon, the second of the two albums (the other, Eric Burdon Declares War) from their collaboration.

13. Tim Curry, Paradise Garage . . . From the Rocky Horror Picture Show’s Dr. Frank N. Furter’s Fearless album, released in 1979. I was into the movie and its attendant activities at the time and remember being in Toronto’s downtown Sam The Record Man, just browsing one day, and the album was playing on the sound system. It turned into a worthwhile impulse buy.

14. Bruce Cockburn, Burn . . . “Never mind what the government said, they’re either lying or they’ve been misled.” Great lyric, pretty much applicable to any government and circumstance.

15. Murray McLauchlan, Out Past The Timberline . . . I only came to this song some years ago via a compilation album. But to me, lyrically, musically, it’s arguably MM’s best song. It rings so true, as McLauchlan cuts to the bone about elites vs ‘real’ people in terms of who and what truly represents a country.

16. Syd Barrett, Octopus . . . Solo, weird-ish work from the onetime, late great, Pink Floyd leader.

17. The Hollies, King Midas In Reverse . . . A song that, apparently, was the impetus for Graham Nash’s eventual departure from The Hollies. He wrote the tune, which was different than most Hollies’ more pop-ish stuff to that point, 1967. It was a hit, but didn’t match their previous chart success and soon enough, Nash had moved on to collaborations with David Crosby, Stephen Stills and Neil Young.

18. Arlo Guthrie, City Of New Orleans . . . Cover of the Steve Goodman-penned well-known tune was the son of Woody Guthrie’s lone top 40 hit, although he issued much quality music including Alice’s Restaurant.

19. April Wine, Juvenile Delinquent (live) . . . From April Wine’s Live at the El Mocambo album, recorded the weekend they played there in support of The Rolling Stones’ famous club gigs. It’s written by Bob Segarini, an American singer-songwriter who had some success in Canada in the late 1970s and 80s. He performed at a pub during my college days. As far as I can tell, April Wine never recorded a studio version of it.

20. Camel, Slow Yourself Down . . . One of those prog songs that neatly wraps up so much, including various time signature changes, all within just under five minutes.

21. Elton John, Mellow . . . Haven’t played EJ in a while. Overdue. So I threw darts at my Honky Chateau album board and hit this one, not that one could go wrong picking any 1970s Elton John tune.

22. Jethro Tull, No Lullaby . . . Great drumming by Barriemore Barlow introduces this epic from Tull’s Heavy Horses album.

23. Wishbone Ash, Time Was . . . An old friend of mine tells me I’ve turned him into a Wishbone Ash fan by my occasional playing of that progressive/hard rock/guitar-oriented band’s stuff. Cool.

24. The Guess Who, So Long, Bannatyne . . . Title cut story song from the band’s 1971 album. Bannatyne is a common name for streets, schools and other landmarks in Winnipeg, The Guess Who’s hometown, honoring one of the city’s leading citizens.

A new thing, perhaps for a while; we’ll see how it goes. I’ll be playing classic albums, and others among my favorites, from my own collection. It’s inspired by the commercial FM radio of my youth, where stations, often overnight, would play full album sides or whole albums. The format often introduced me to some albums and artists I may otherwise not have investigated. I may do this every Saturday, or mix and match with ‘single song’ shows, in addition to my Monday 8-10 pm ET show, but in any event here’s ‘album replay’ show 1: Van Morrison’s Moondance, Medusa by Trapeze, a band which featured future Deep Purple bassist/singer Glenn Hughes and the one and only Blind Faith studio album by the late 1960s supergroup of guitarist Eric Clapton and drummer Ginger Baker of Cream fame, singer Steve Winwood from Traffic and bass player Ric Grech of Family.

Van Morrison – Moondance

1. And It Stoned Me
2. Moondance
3. Crazy Love
4. Into The Mystic
5. Come Running
6. These Dreams Of You
7. Brand New Day
8. Everyone
9. Glad Tidings

Trapeze – Medusa

1. Black Cloud
2. Jury
3. Your Love Is Alright
4. Touch My Life
5. Seafull
6. Makes You Wanna Cry
7. Medusa

Blind Faith – Blind Faith

1. Had To Cry Today
2. Can’t Find My Way Home
3. Well All Right
4. Presence Of The Lord
5. Sea Of Joy
6. Do What You Like

1. Ten Years After, The Sounds . . . Spooky single that, as was the UK tradition at least back then, wasn’t issued on TYA’s 1967 debut album but came out on later compilations and expanded reissues.

2. Spooky Tooth, I Am The Walrus . . . A Vanilla Fudge-type reinterpretation of The Beatles’ hit. Great stuff.

3. Vanilla Fudge, Season Of The Witch . . . Speaking of Vanilla Fudge. . . . One of many covers of Donovan’s great song.

    

4. Savoy Brown, Money Can’t Save Your Soul . . . Love the wah wah guitar, general vibe and lyrics on this one, from 1970’s Looking In album. It was the sixth Savoy Brown album and last one before three of the four members – guitarist ‘Lonesome’ Dave Peverett, drummer Roger Earl and bassist Tone Stevens – left to form Foghat. That left lead guitarist Kim Simmonds to carry the Savoy Brown torch, which he’s doing to this day, sometimes billed as Kim Simmonds and Savoy Brown and usually now a trio. I saw them at the Kitchener Blues Festival some years back. Good show.

5. Paul McCartney/Wings, Old Siam Sir . . . This was the first single, in the UK anyway, from 1979’s Back To The Egg. It was the B-side, in North America, to Arrow Through Me. While I’d say it’s a a pretty well-known track, and one of the best on the album (along with Arrow Through Me), it just scraped into the Top 40, making No. 35 in the UK.

6. Blackfoot, Highway Song . . . A lead-in to some, er, highway type songs. Blackfoot, a southern US rock band led by current Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Rickey Medlocke, like seemingly most such groups has their Freebird-like epic. Medlocke was the drummer in very early versions of Skynyrd, before they released an album although some of his work has long since been available on various archival releases.

7. Commander Cody and His Lost Planet Airmen, Truck Drivin’ Man . . . It wasn’t used, but this one, released in 1972, could easily have fit as part of the soundtrack to Smokey and the Bandit, the movie that came out in 1977.

8. Little Feat, Truck Stop Girl . . . Continuing the life on the road/trucker theme. From the first, self-titled, Little Feat album, released in 1971.

9. Linda Ronstadt, Willin’ . . . Cover of the Feat classic, from Ronstadt’s 1974 album Heart Like A Wheel.

10. Outlaws, Green Grass and High Tides . . . Back to the Freebird-ish tunes we go. Likely the Outlaws’ signature song, the epic track closed the band’s self-titled debut album in 1975, and most of their concerts. The late Hughie Thomasson, the Outlaws’ lead guitarist and singer, was in post-plane crash incarnations of Lynyrd Skynyrd before leaving to reform the Outlaws. He died of a heart attack, at age 55, in 2007. The song title is a play on the 1966 Rolling Stones compilation Big Hits (High Tide and Green Grass).

11. Molly Hatchet, Fall Of The Peacemakers . . . One more time with the southern rock epics.

12. Thin Lizzy, Killer Without A Cause . . . Bad Reputation might be my favorite of Lizzy’s studio albums. Full of great tracks, like this one, the title cut, Dancing In the Moonlight, etc. Maybe that’s why I mine it for my show quite a bit. Either that or, besides compilations, it’s I think the only Lizzy album I’ve gotten off my lazy butt and made time to download into our station’s computer system. It is a great album, though. Really. And I will get cracking on more downloads.

13. Van Morrison, And It Stoned Me . . . Speaking of great albums . . . Sometimes you know an album so well you rarely play it, because you can essentially call it up in your mind. Then when you actually do play it, it’s like, wow. Moondance is one of those. I had it on in the car last week. This well-known, amazing track wasn’t even a single. I love the way it kicks in, one little lick and then the vocals. I’ve been thinking of doing an ‘album replay’ show at some point, either on a Monday or my still new Saturday (7-9 am ET) morning show. If so, Moondance will definitely be up for consideration.

14. Queen, Tie Your Mother Down . . . Another of those classic, well-known songs by a great band that was a single, yet perhaps surprisingly, didn’t burn up the charts. It was No. 31 in the UK, 49 in the US and 68 in Canada. The Dutch obviously have more discerning tastes – it made No. 10 there and No. 18 in the primarly Dutch-speaking Flanders region of Belgium. The French in Belgium’s Wallonia region? They were less receptive, with the song hitting No. 42 there. Great opener to the A Day At The Races album, in any event.

15. The Rolling Stones, Out Of Time . . . This one – and its ‘you’re obsolete, my baby’ – came up during a recent chat with a friend about ‘eff you’ lines in songs. This is the full-length, 5:36 cut from the UK version of the Aftermath album. It didn’t hit the North American colonies until the 1967 Flowers compilation, in abridged form, which is where I first heard it via my older sister’s disc.

16. The Doors, When The Music’s Over . . . Not quite yet, we have one more, zany, epic to go.

17. Pink Floyd, Atom Heart Mother Suite . . . I wanted to play a long Pink Floyd track but couldn’t decide between this and Echoes, from Meddle. I’ve played them both, over time. This time, Atom Heart Mother’s cow album cover proved decisive in my thought process.

1. Bobby Keys, Command Performance . . . Longtime Rolling Stones’ saxophone player Bobby Keys kicks us off with a funky tune from his 1972 all-instrumental solo album. It featured a who’s who of players including George Harrison and Ringo Starr, Dave Mason of Traffic and solo fame, Leslie West, Corky Laing and Felix Pappalardi of Mountain, Beatles’ solo album collaborator and bassist Klaus Voorman, Stones’ session and 1970s tour trumpet player Jim Price, Cream’s Jack Bruce and session star to the Stones and other artists, pianist Nicky Hopkins.

2. Tim Ries, Paint It Black . . . From the first of two “Tim Ries Rolling Stones Project’ albums, released in 2005. The album is made up of jazz and jazz-rock reinventions of Stones songs, put together by Ries, a latter-day tenor saxophonist in the Stones’ touring band. Paint It Black is a 10-minute instrumental jazz take on the Stones’ classic. It starts with the 1966 hit’s recognizable riff, takes flight with a long middle section before closing with the original riff. It’s one of the few of the album’s 11 tracks not to feature any members of The Rolling Stones or their various recent collaborators/touring band members. Backup singers Lisa Fischer and Bernard Fowler, bassist Darryl Jones plus Stones members Keith Richards, Ron Wood and Charlie Watts all appear, together and individually, on various selections.

3. Charlie Watts and Jim Keltner, Art Blakey . . . From the Charlie Watts-Jim Keltner Project, a collaboration between the late Stones drummer and session ace drummer/percussionist Keltner, released in 2000. Each of the album’s tracks are named after famous jazz-oriented drummers.

4. Quicksilver Messenger Service, Edward, The Mad Shirt Grinder (featuring Nicky Hopkins) . . . From Quicksilver’s 1969 Shady Grove album on which session man to the stars, including the Stones, Hopkins was actually a full-fledged Quicksilver band member. This epic track showcases “Edward’s” keyboard talents, Edward being a nickname bestowed on Hopkins by original Rolling Stone Brian Jones. Jones, the story goes, was tuning his guitar and wanted an ‘E’ note from Hopkins, on piano, during a 1967 recording session. But due to other studio noise, Hopkins couldn’t hear Jones properly so the guitarist yelled out “Give me an E, like in Edward!”

5. Bill Wyman, Nuclear Reactions . . . A buddy of mine, after I played Wyman rcently, called him ‘a barnacle on the Stones’. So I thought I’d torture my pal, again. This one’s from Wyman’s self-titled 1982 synth-pop/new wave album that featured Si Si (Je Suis un Rock Star), which made the top 10 singles lists in various countries.

6. Hopkins/Cooder/Jagger/Wyman/Watts, Highland Fling . . . From Jamming With Edward, “a nice piece of bullshit’ according to Mick Jagger’s liner notes, that the assembled musicians – Nicky Hopkins (Edward), Ry Cooder, Jagger, Bill Wyman and Charlie Watts – put together while waiting for Keith Richards to return to the studio during 1969’s Let It Bleed sessions. Richards and Cooder didn’t get along, at least at the time, which apparently accounted for Richards’ absence. Cooder, meantime, accused the Stones of stealing some of his licks, calling them “a reptilian bunch of people.” Richards has been up front about Cooder teaching him open-G guitar tuning, a prominent feature of the subsequent Stones sound on such tracks as Gimme Shelter, Brown Sugar and Start Me Up. Jamming With Edward didn’t see the light of day until its release in 1972.

7. Billy Preston, That’s The Way God Planned It . . Live version from George Harrison’s 1971 Concert for Bangladesh show and album. Preston, of course, played with The Beatles on their Let It Be album, on several of their post-breakup solo albums and was essentially a member of the Stones from Sticky Fingers through the Black and Blue album, both in studio and on tour.

8. Mick Taylor, Spanish/A Minor . . . Long, bluesy instrumental cut, with a nod to one of Taylor’s finest Stones’ moments, Time Waits For No One. The track appeared on Taylor’s self-titled 1979 debut solo album, five years after he left the Stones.

9. Keith Richards, Whip It Up . . . From Richards’ solo debut album, Talk Is Cheap, 1988.

10. Mick Jagger with The Red Devils, Checkin’ Up On My Baby . . . A Sonny Boy Williamson II (Rice Miller) tune Jagger did with the California blues band. While working on what became his 1993 solo album Wandering Spirit, Jagger recorded several blues standards with The Red Devils, ostensibly for a possible album but only Checkin’ Up On My Baby eventually was released, on The Very Best of Mick Jagger compilation that came out in 2007. The seeds of a great blues covers album were obviously there.

11. Ron Wood, Sure The One You Need . . . Mick and Keith wrote and gave this one to Ronnie before he was even in the band. It appeared on Wood’s first solo effort, I’ve Got My Own Album To Do. The album features various members of the Faces and the Stones, including Mick Taylor, who was soon replaced by Wood. For my money, it’s tied with 1992’s check Slide On This as Woody’s best solo record.

12. New Barbarians (Ron Wood, Keith Richards and friends), Sweet Little Rock ‘n’ Roller (live) . . . Chuck Berry tune that opened most Barbarians shows during the band’s short but spirited life and 1979 tour that included the combined Keith Richards/Stones benefit for the blind concert in Oshawa, Ontario, Richards’ penance for his 1977 drug bust in Toronto. Still amazed that I managed to get tickets and attend the first of the two shows that April afternoon in Oshawa’s 5,000-seat hockey arena.

13. Keith Richards, Will But You Won’t . . . He is, after all, known as the riff master. From Richards’ second solo album, Main Offender, released in 1992.

14. Mick Jagger, Evening Gown . . . Jagger is great at ballads like these, whether in the Stones or solo. I’ve selected a series of them, as you’ll see/hear. This one’s from 1993’s Wandering Spirit album, the most Stones-like of his solo releases.

15. Keith Richards, Yap Yap . . . You talk too much, the lyric goes. Probably talking about Mick.

16. Mick Jagger, Hang On To Me Tonight . . . Another of those great ballads. I like ’em, anyway. From Wandering Spirit.

17. Ron Wood & Bo Diddley, They Don’t Make Outlaws Like They Used To (live) . . . From a 1987 show at the Ritz, New York that came out on Live At The Ritz in 1988. A mixture of Bo Diddley, Faces, Stones and solo songs, it made No. 40 in Japan.

18. Mick Jagger, Party Doll . . . Best song, to me, this ballad from Jagger’s critically-panned 1987 Primitive Cool album. The thing with Jagger solo albums is that, aside from Wandering Spirit, they’re not like Stones albums – because they’re solo albums – so if that’s what people are expecting, going in, chances are their judgments are going to be based on that with the risk being perhaps not granting the work an open-minded listen. I, too, prefer Stones-like material, but repeat listens reveal Primitive Cool, for all its 1980s overly slick production and so on, to be not nearly as bad as the savaging it took upon release. Songs like War Baby, Kow Tow, Peace For The Wicked, the title cut, among others, are pretty good. But Jagger didn’t help himself by releasing Let’s Work, likely the album’s weakest cut, as the lead single.

19. Ron Wood, Must Be Love . . . From Slide On This, Wood’s excellent 1992 album. It came during a fertile period 1992-93 period, solo-wise, from the Stones. Wood had this album, Keith Richards released Main Offender, also in 1992 and Mick Jagger followed with Wandering Spirit in 1993. All were released once the band realized that solo albums needn’t be a source of friction between them, especially Jagger and Richards, but possible fuel for future band collaborations. The result was 1994’s Voodoo Lounge, one of the group’s best latter-day albums.

20. Marianne Faithfull, Sister Morphine . . . Twelve-inch single version of the song she co-wrote with Mick Jagger and Keith Richards and released as a Faithfull single, produced by Jagger, in 1969. The Stones’ own version, featuring slide guitar from Ry Cooder, was recorded during the Let It Bleed album sessions in 1969 but didn’t appear until 1971’s Sticky Fingers album. This Faithfull version appeared on expanded editions of her 1979 album, Broken English.

21. Marianne Faithfull, Why D’Ya Do It? . . . My pick for the most vitriolic, hell hath no fury like a woman scorned songs/lyrics ever. It was absolutely jarring to hear on first listen. From the Broken English album.

22. Keith Richards, You Don’t Move Me . . . Well, that’s why I did it, you don’t move me anymore. Actually, it’s a shot at Mick Jagger, during the so-called mid-1980s World War III between the Stones’ leaders, and appeared on Richards’ first solo album, Talk Is Cheap, in 1988.

1. Heart, Rock and Roll (live) . . . Fun intro from Ann Wilson channelling John Lennon’s “thank you on behalf of the group’ , from the Beatles’ rooftop concert, before Heart rips into covering one of their favorite bands, and inspirations, Led Zeppelin. The live cut appeared on Heart’s Greatest Hits/Live compilation release in 1980.

2. Rory Gallagher, Big Guns . . . Fast cuts only today, like this one from the late great Gallagher.

3. Bob Dylan, Neighborhood Bully . . . Dylan is not generally known for rockers but he kicks butt on this defiant defence of Israel. It’s from 1983’s Infidels album as he broke from his Christian-born again album trilogy (Slow Train, Saved and Shot Of Love) on a terrific record which featured Mick Taylor, Mark Knopfler and the Jamaican rhythm section team of Sly Dunbar and Robbie Shakespeare.

    

4. Aerosmith, My Fist Your Face . . . From, in many ways, the last ‘original’ Aerosmith album, Done With Mirrors, 1985. It was their last album before they started using outside writers, ascended to greater commercial mainstream heights, but lost much of their earlier raunch and roll edge.

5. Jethro Tull, Cross-Eyed Mary . . . I wanted to play a Tull rocker, settled on this one, from 1971’s Aqualung album. Iron Maiden covered it in 1983. Ian Anderson’s reaction: “A spirited rendition by a young Bruce (Dickinson) testing out his vocal range in a key not really suited to him!”

6. The Rolling Stones, Bitch . . . One of my favorite Stones’ songs, great guitar tandem work by Mick Taylor and Keith Richards including what Taylor described as one of Richards’ best solos, mid song. The story goes that during the recording of the Sticky Fingers album, the band, at first without Richards who was late to the studio, was struggling with the track. He walks in, goes to the studio kitchen, starts eating a bowl of cereal, sits and listens for a bit, gets increasingly frustrated at what he hears as an aimless racket, asks for a guitar, and the song we know is born. It reminds me of another story I’ve read about Richards, and Taylor. It was long after Taylor left the Stones, mid-1980s he’s doing a club tour. I saw one of the shows; he was the opening act to John Mayall at Ontario Place in Toronto and sat in with his old mentor Mayall on some tunes. Due to his contributions to the tune, Taylor generally includes at least the long instrumental passage from Can’t You Hear Me Knocking in his sets. But on this particular night, Richards is in the audience, Taylor calls him up on stage and an intoxicating jam performance of the song results. I have it on bootleg, from a New York state club show, Dec. 28, 1986.

7. Santana, Hope You’re Feeling Better . . . Nice rocker, outside of Black Magic Woman likely my favorite track from the Abraxas album.

8. The J. Geils Band, First I Look At The Purse (live) . . . One of my favorite songs, by anyone, done the way Geils ought to be heard, live from Full House. The band was from the Boston area but their second home, due their popularity there, was Detroit, where this was recorded.

9. Ted Nugent, Motor City Madhouse . . . Speaking of the motor city, and the Motor City Madman . . .

10. Blue Oyster Cult, Cities On Flame With Rock and Roll . . . All one generally hears of BOC on commercial radio is (Don’t Fear) The Reaper or Burnin’ For You. Excellent songs, obviously, but so is this one, well known to BOC fans and, as a deep cut, a reason why my show exists.

11. Bob Seger, Heavy Music/Katmandu (Live Bullet version) . . . Speaking, again, of Detroit . . . Michigan guy, Seger, Michigan venue, Detroit’s Cobo Hall, great live album that upon its early 1976 release broke the then-journeyman artist to a wider audience and deservedly so.

12. Black Sabbath, Heaven and Hell . . . Heavy music, indeed…Title cut from one of those albums, like AC/DC’s Back in Black, where a new singer (Ronnie James Dio) comes in to replace an icon like Ozzy Osbourne as Brian Johnson did Bon Scott, the fan base wonders how things will go . . . and all is well.

13. AC/DC, Evil Walks . . . Speaking of AC/DC, as our songs/titles delve into dark realms.

14. Atomic Rooster, Death Walks Behind You . . . An old buddy from early in my newspaper career was major into Atomic Rooster who, at the time, early 1980s, I had heard of but not heard. Thanks to him, got into them, and the rest is history.

15. Budgie, Homicidal Suicidal . . . Not that I’m on a death or downer kick but again, look at the last few song titles. Just coincidence, really, picking out hard rock songs.

16. Van Halen, D.O.A. . . . I like both the David Lee Roth and Sammy (Van Hagar) versions of Van Halen but this is the type of vocal performance, not to mention the insistent Eddie Van Halen riff, that proponents of the ‘Van Halen is only Van Halen when Roth is singing school’ might point to. Unless, that is, they listened to the Tokyo Dome Live In Concert album, recorded on the reunited band’s 2013 tour and released in 2015. I took it back. It’s terrible. The playing is fine, but Roth can’t sing anymore; if he ever really could, although he sang his way – being more an entertaining and effective ad-libber talk-singer. On the Tokyo album it’s just embarrassing.

17. Headstones, Headlight Holds A Deer . . . Another good one from the just released Flight Risk album from the take-no-prisoners Canadian rockers. I played Hotel Room from the same album last Saturday on my early morning show. It’s a great record, but no surprise, the Headstones I find are pretty consistent.

18. Accept, Fast As A Shark . . . Fun intro with the Germanic beer/dance hall stuff, then the needle scratching the vinyl, the scream, the riff and we’re into some speed/heavy metal.

19. Motorhead, The Chase Is Better Than The Catch . . . Often true. Then comes the actual relationship, the compromises, etc. What a concept.

20. Megadeth, Peace Sells . . . But, as the lyrics go, who’s buying? Nobody, really, ever, if human history is a judge. We humans tend to talk about it a lot, though. Wasted words, apparently, to quote an Allman Brothers Band song title.

21. Metallica, Better Than You . . . The Load and Reload albums totally split the Metallica fan base, which started splintering an album earlier upon release of the more mainstream monster sales album Metallica, aka The Black Album, 1991. So the band changed their look, got haircuts, changed their sound a bit, so what? The music’s still good, just maybe different, and they’ve since largely returned to their thrash metal roots. All a matter of preference and taste, of course. This one’s from Reload.

22. Judas Priest, One For The Road . . . Likely largely forgotten track from Rocka Rolla, the band’s debut release in 1974. It was a different Priest, then, heavy, but more progressive and pscychedelic, quite good, to me, although the album stiffed and the band’s future was in question. Still, this song, in spots, could be seen as a precursor to the full hard rock/metal the band later regularly issued, even as soon as the very next album, Sad Wings Of Destiny. That title cut and other songs like The Ripper set Priest on the road to mass popularity.

23. Deep Purple, Comin’ Home . . . Love this rocker from the very diverseCome Taste The Band album, the one and only record featuring the late great Tommy Bolin, who replaced iconic original guitarist Ritchie Blackmore. Reviews were mixed, even some band members like Jon Lord didn’t consider it truly a Purple album, but its merits have become more appreciated over time since it came out in 1975. I’ve liked it from first listen, upon release.