Father Geek here, and I'm dying of envy. Our Coffin Joe just got to experience an incredible seven days of musical nirvana. Just way toooo Coooooool! In 1968-70 I got to experience several of the giant POP Festivals here in the states hearing Joplin, Hendrix, Sam and Dave, Santana, Country Joe, and the Dead one after the other in those wonderful outdoor shows; and in about 64 (I think) I caught the legendary TAMI show with the STONES, DAVE CLARK 5, HERMAN HERMITS, ERIC BURTON AND THE ANIMALS, and at least a dozen other groups, buuuut those were only one to three day events. This was seven days and it was in the city that's very name symbolizes the word festival to everyone in the world. What an experience. In March we have the SXSW Film and Music Festival here in Austin. There will be maybe 600 bands from all over the world playing all over town in about a 10 day period, and that's plenty cool, but those bands aren't these bands and no matter how much I love it, Austin, Texas will never be Rio...
Hi , Coffin Joe here , back for another week of news from Brazil and the Latin world .
Hi , Coffin Joe here , back for another week of news from Brazil and the Latin world .
This last week was the week of ROCK . Rock in Rio , that is , a huge music festival that happened down here , on January 12th , 13th , 14th , 18th , 19th , 20th and 21st . The acts that came were playing in front of huge crowds , from 150,000 to 250,000 people , depending on the day . The list of artists that took a trip to Rio , include : Red Hot Chili Peppers , Foo Fighters , Deftones , Five , R.E.M. , Britney Spears , Sepultura , Iron Maiden , Silverchair , Beck , Queens of Stone Age , Papa Roach , `N Synch , Aaron Carter , Oasis , Neil Young , Dave Matthews Band , Guns n´ Roses , Sheryl Crow , Rob Halford , Sting and James Taylor , just to name a few , plus a bunch of local bands .
As you can see it was HUGE . Lots of people . Lots of drunk people . Lots of naked dudes every now and then ( most of whom were drunk as well ) . All in all , it was pretty sweet . You folks are lucky ´cause! I decided to put together a list of interesting stuff I saw there , " the best " of everything if you will , here we go :
-BEST SHOW : GUNS N´ ROSES . Fuckin´ amazing set of oldies and a few new songs ( which you can already download via Napster ) , played by the new guys in the band , who are truly talented and made everyone´s jaws drop . Axl still has it , just in case you were wondering . The man is back and he´s got a new bunch of cool freaks who are set to conquer the world . Don´t say I didn´t warn you .
-BEST NAKED DUDE : NICK OLIVERI - QUEENS OF STONE AGE . " The bass player is naked " , that´s what everyone said when these stoners came out . Gee , the man is naked . There it is . Just hanging there . Ok . The rest of the band didn´t seem to mind though . They played most of their songs like that , until later he put on some pants . Oh , by the way , he was almost arrested for that . The whole naked thing .
-BEST DRUNK LEAD SINGER : COBY DICK - PAPA ROACH . So , this guy throws up right , and looks really disoriented throghout most of their set , and afterwards he says it´s all because he was so happy to be playing in front of that many people . Honestly folks , have any of you thrown up because of happiness ? Didn´t think so . Anyway , it was a good show , people warmed up to their stuff , the whole rap/emo/metal thing they got going there . Pretty cool .
-BEST LEAD SINGER AS FAR AS ENTHUSIASM GOES : DAVE GROHL - FOO FIGHTERS . Wow , was this guy happy to be there onstage playing ( maybe it was the money he got to be there , not sure ) . He came out screaming , kept screaming , then he rocked , worked the crowd , rocked some more , celebrated his birthday , yelled , rocked a bunch more . Decaf anyone ? Former bass player for Hole and The Smashing Pumpkins , Melissa Auf der Maur , handed Dave his birthday cake and gave him a kiss . It was sweet . He didn´t settle his ass down though , just kept going like the Duracell bunny . Energetic fella , that Dave .
-COOLEST GUITAR PLAYER : BUCKETHEAD - GUNS N´ ROSES . This guy was a freak , a cool one , but a fuckin´freak . He does these little dance moves while playing the most complex , intricate and detailed solos . He wears a Kabuki mask , that makes him look like Michael Myers from " Halloween " , only with a KFC chicken bucket on his head as a hat ( I´m not kidding here ) . He is Buckethead .
-LAMEST LITTLE MORON : AARON CARTER . The tiny idiot lip synchs . Do I have to say more ? He dances like a turkey on acid and lip synchs the whole thing . Besides his entire performance lasted like 20 minutes . Midget .
-COOLEST OLD GUY : NEIL YOUNG . The fact that he played as hard as he did , for nearly two hours , just showed everybody how amazing he still is . Grandpa keeps on rocking . Long live Neil .
-BEST NEW SONG : SEPULNATION - SEPULTURA . I gotta admit , I love these guys , and this new song was awesome . It has the tribal drums from Igor Cavalera , the excellent guitar work from Andreas and just a neat groove to it . Highly recommended . Sepultura´s new album , called " Nation " , comes out March 20th all around the globe . Check it out .
-BEST LAST SONG OF THE SET : " IT´S THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT " - R.E.M. . Everybody singing , there was this vibe there , a peaceful one , that could be felt all around the place . I can´t quite describe it , excuse me , I got a tear in my eye . It was beautiful man . Somebody give me a hug .
-COOLEST MOMENT OF THE FESTIVAL : DRUM DUEL BETWEEN DAVE GROHL AND TAYLOR HAWKINS - FOO FIGHTERS . It was great to see Dave back there behind the drums , brought back a lot of memories from those glorious Nirvana days .
-BEST SCREAMING MANIAC : CHINO MORENO - DEFTONES . This guy was scary . He screamed like he was dying or something . That´s what´s so damn amazing about him . One of the great vocalists in the biz , Chino sings with his heart . Brainy/emotional metal that truly is here to stay . God bless the Deftones .
-COOLEST DANCE MOVES : BECK . This skinny white guy was busting a move there , know what I mean ? Yo . Sorry , it´s late , I´m just running out of funny things to say .
