The Michigan Daily - Thursday, November 17, 1994-9 *Galas, Jones make us believe in living dead By JENNIFER BUCKLEY "Do you believe in the living dead?" demanded Diamanda Galas during Tuesday night's concert with John Paul Jones. Well, that depends. By many estimates, the former Led Zeppelin bassist should have been dead long ago (plenty of people thought he was), and in the cheerful words of one Daily editor, "Diamanda Galas looks like she needs about a quart more blood in her." So if these two are the living dead, then we Diamanda believe, we believe! Galas with It was a truly bizarre pairing, which was reflected in the crowd facing them. John Paul Jones Halfleather-clad,heavily eyelinedcol- Michigan Theater lege kids, half balding, graying November 15, 1994 boomers, they listened attentively while Galas shrieked, howled, moaned and thrashed her way through an hour and half of intense, amazing psycho blues. Resembling Trent Reznor in drag with her black leather pants and bra, Galas opened the show with the totally unintelligible rant "Skotoseme."While no one could determine that Galas actually sang the song in English, Greek and Spanish, itculminated in one hellaciousjam. The hilarity ofthe recent single "Do You Take This Man?" was played down in favor of a bitter, fiercer version. A cover of"At the Dark End of the Street" showed off Galas' gospelly growl as well as her Hammond organ playing. On the wild "Hex," Galas leaped from octave to octave with incredible ease, reveling in her almost operatic vocal style. "The Sporting Life" revealed why she end Jones both insisted that guitars would be an excess on their record - Galas' voice at times became indistinguishable from guitar feedback. A piercing yet obviously trained and controlled shriek punctuated every song, soaring over Jones' virtuoso bass playing and Pete Thomas' (of Elvis Costello's band the Attractions) apocalyptic drumming. A remarkably obscene string of insults preceded the spiteful "You're Mine," while the homicidal "Baby's Insane" and bluesy "Tony" were characterized by Galas' powerful, throaty croon. Jones remained deceptively mellow through the tempest of Galas' passions, executing complex bass lines with laid-back ease. The two rarely played off each other; instead they worked separately, only tied together by Thomas' ricocheting *Teats.One notable exception occurred when Jones sat down to play an amazing lap steel guitar, almost perfectly' replicating Galas' vocal. He began the encore in the spotlight with an atypically bright, beautiful bass solo which reminded everyone in the roomjust how good the man was -and still is. "The Sporting Life" isn't sweet. It's dark, bitter, savagely funny and one hell of a lot of fun to visit for an hour and a half - especially in the company of a psychotic diva and an aging legend or two. ,Verve Pipe moves u in the music world, keeps their focus You won't find the Samples rolling around in the MN buzz bin or sprawled out on the cover of Rolling Stone. But you'll find them at the Michigan tonight. Samples jusct want to playvgod music By ELLA DE LEON To say things are going well lately for the Verve Pipe would be an under- statement. The East Lansing-based band has sold close to 19,000 of both of their self-released CDs and played in umerous venues, including k -alamazoo's State Theater and Detroit's St. Andrew's Hall. They have been featured on Detroit's major alter- native radio stations, Planet 96.3 (WHYT-FM) and 89X (CIMX-FM, 88.7). Not to mention the rave reviews for their latest effort, "Pop Smear," the two songs on the AWARE II compila- tion, and the numerous awards they've Won. Not bad for a band which has only ten together since 1992. So who are these guys? Originally comprised of members of the defunct local groups Johnny With An Eye and Water 4 the Pool, the Verve Pipe is currently made up of brothers Brian and Brad Vander Ark (vocals/guitar and bass, respectively), A.J. Dunning (guitar), DonBrown (drums) and Doug Corella (percussion/keyboards). And a o, their name has no real significance; ere's not a story behind it, really. "We were kinda throwing names around and those two words came to- gether," explained Brad Vander Ark. "It just doesn't mean anything." But you certainly couldn't say that about their music. The VervePipe com- bines lyrics about anything from poli- tics to love lost. Their textured pop melodies and four-part harmonies give rise to the emotional acoustic numbers and driving rock songs on both 1992's "I've Suffered a Head Injury" and this year's "Pop Smear." There is, how- ever, a noticeable difference between the two albums. AsBrian VanderArk stated, "There were more life experiences on the first album than on the second album. The second album was a State of the Union and a couple of political songs," refer- ring to their successful singles "Sena- tor Speak" and "Spoonful of Sugar." A.. Dunning added, "The second album was more of a band type of production, in terms of the compilation efforts within the song writing, as op- posed to the first record, which were See VERVE, Page 10 By KARI JONES You won't find Colorado based band The Samples rolling around in the MTV buzz bin. You won't catch them sprawled out on the cover of Rolling Stone, either. So what? Hype be damned, these guys just want to play good music. "I certainly don't want to switch to a major label that's going to spend a lot of money on us just so we can get on MTV," drummer Jeep MacNichol laughed. "It would be nice to be on MTV, but it's definitely not the 'make it or break it' thing for us. Touring wise or even album selling wise, we're as successful, if not more successful, than half of the bands on MTV." With their fifth and most recent album of ambient pop, "Autopilot," debuting at number one on Billboard's national heatseaker's chart, The Samples have become one of the few bands to break the standard "exposure equals success" formula. They have sold hundreds of thousands of records. They have appeared on "The Tonight Show" and were featured performers at the H.O.R.D.E. festival. Obviously, they have arrived at what most people would consider a level of success. They just took the back roads to get there. "For a lot of people, there is a pres- sure that if you're not on MTV or in Rolling Stone, then you're not doing anything, but that's just the obvious perspective of whether bands are suc- cessful or not," MacNichol said. "It's really not the bottom line." The bottom line is that after leaving a major label (Arista) in the fall of 1991, vocalist Sean Kelly, bassist Andy Sheldon, keyboardist Al Laughlin, and MacNichol signed with the indepen- dent label W.A.R? and found success on their own terms. "We weren't the right band for (Arista), and they weren't the right label for us," said MacNichol. "They wanted to change our music. The cool thing about W.A.R.? is that it enables us to keep our fingers in every aspect of our career instead of having to answer to some big-wig in a suit." Perhaps because they have the free- dom to control what happens to their own material, The Samples are by no means one man's band. All band mem- bers contribute to the songwriting, sometimes writing on their own, and sometimes developing a song around improvisations and chord progressions that come up in sound check. "The Last Drag," the group's fourth album, featured individual songwriting, which, in the end may have only suc- ceeded in making it sound less cohe- sive than it could have. The fairytale- ish "Little Silver Ring" (written by Kelly) and the down to earth "Eatonville" (written by Sheldon) are excellent songs in their own right, but tend not to flow smoothly in the album's overall view. "It was sort of disjointed. It's more like a movie soundtrack because there are a lot of different styles on it," MacNichol admitted. "But I think in the span of our whole catalogue it's a really cool album." With "Autopilot," however, the band has reeled in the loose edges and come up with a focused and energetic album which MacNichol feels "is one of the first albums that has captured our live feel." This may have something to do with the fact that, unlike "The Last Drag," the music on "Autopilot" was written as a group effort. It was re- corded immediately after a 37 show tour, and this constant practice shows up in soothing and "to the point" songs like "Buffalo Herds and Windmills" and "As Tears Fall." "We came right off the road, went into the studio and cranked it out," MacNichol stressed. "We were in such good shape from playing live that I really think we captured that 'live vibe.' That's essentially why we called it 'Autopilot.' There wasn't much sitting around time trying to figure out what to do. Everything sort of happened on your first intuition." The Samples plan to continue hon- ing their live playing skills on a tour that will continue into the spring of 1995. As for any future albums, MacNichol said that all the band mem- bers are writing so much good material that eventually, they'll probably end up releasing solo albums. (Kelly has already recorded a solo album which will appear in stores sometime this fall). For now, The Samples are content to switch on "autopilot" and kick back in the driver's seat of their musical career. "We definitely are in the control position with our whole situation right now," MacNichol said. "We've been able to do what we do and grow beyond the point of being a one hit wonder, and it's all kind of been on our own. It's almost like the people come to our shows and buy our albums, and we know they're not buying them just be- cause we have a 'hit song.' "It's kind of a good feeling to know that we're not just here one year and gone the next depending on if MTV will play us or not." THE SAMPLES will be playing an all ages show tonight at the Michi- gan Theater. Tickets are $12.50 (balcony) and $15 (main floor). Doors open at 7p.m., showtime is 7:30. Call 668-8397. V I. - ' 9PRAGJ e the Remaiders Sim0 Mokon Ice Late Night Nappy war E2-d~oge QL5 Pitcher e Wrrks From New York The NLATTEM9 wi Brother Rabbit wappy wour 3-8 5/.50 Pitchers s w/l~.. John King From Boston CD. PA ease Party wi §pecW Gue~ The wag COws 54.25 Pitchers 52.25 Bottles Ice Jager Shots $200 Pitchers Kepone mnusic w/ Ti C .T.'S and Sons of EMS~ wi Gum R2"dston hport Beer gpedi*S over Tues. B&13 CARIBO Friendly, Comfortable Full Breakfasts, American Owned Harold & Cindy Mondol of Michigan, Innkeepers 1-800-830-5558 BEACH! Bed and Breakfast on Cozumel Island, Mexico (40 miles from Cancun) $135 per person per week* Clean/efficient/i 0 rooms, most with private bath 6 blocks to the beach *Per Person/Double Occupancy THE FOLK ART C LATIN AMERICA OCTOBER 16-JANUARY Featuring more than 275 vibrant, colorful objects from 17 countries. The Toledo Museum of Art 2445 Monroe St., one block off I-75 (419) 243-7000 ,.iz7W Organized by the Museum of American Folk Art, New York. The exhibition and its national tour are made possible by46 75 ; . ,.t 1 S S -ft S F- S ty}2} }}i 'yj S 1L. {'. . .5 a 2. :.t IL^ 1 r- II I Prk-z C F MADMOI N.^Mil 1. r-4%-4N Z-31 %--09-41v-- 1 F_19 & aver" Cover Starts At 9:0 WI i I The Asian American Association and the Office of Academic Multicultural Initiatives invites you to a lecture on "Anti-Asian Violence" by Roland Hwang: Assistant Attorney General, President of the American Citizens for Justice / Asian American Center for Justice GMAT, GRE, MCAT, & LSAT.