Racin' and Rockin'..."JB's Take"

[WildcatOne]

Thanks, Wheelz...Joe is as cool as the car and it runs great. I've always had a thing for Topolino Altereds myself.

My pick for Racer of the Week is Justin Wilkinson from Brisbane, Queensland, Australia. Justin was recommended to me by my friend Karlene Morrison. Thanks, Karlene!

Justin is the owner and operator of JW Automotive in Omiston, and his work there is truly extraordinay. He is an engine specialist who builds turbocharged small-block engines, and the results he gets out of these projects are simply breathtaking. Justin can build a thousand horsepower into these cars if that's what the objective is. He is a master of turbo technology and his Holden VL 10.5 Radial Pro Street car is what I believe is the ultimate sleeper. It's different. His best ET to date with this car is an 8.05 and he got 169.5 mph with it.

The only giveaway with this car is the exhaust header that curves upward from the wheel well in front. Other than that, it looks like a standard right-steered Australian street car that would pull up next to you at a stoplight. His use of a dyno and computer technology is first-rate, and he can fine-tune an engine to a thousandth of a degree that will hit exact numbers and blow everybody's mind while doing it. I highly recommend visiting Justin's Facebook page for JW Automotive, as it deals with stuff I am not qualified to detail here on the show, but I can tell you that what I've seen there is nothing short of awesome.

He features his customer's engines, everything from old-school Camaros and Falcons to modern-day street cars. He shows dyno results and subsequent performances, and it was a very entertaining and informative trip going to the JW Automotive page and checking all this stuff out. GREAT job on these projects, Justin. Good luck, safe racing and best of times to you in the future.

Rich Panicaro suggested I give an essay on Bachman-Turner Overdrive. What I found from doing some research on this band is that it is part of the story of Randy Bachman, from Winnipeg, Manitoba, and in his 71 years, he has been the driving force behind several bands that reached the pinnacle of success on the record charts. He is also one of the most individualistic, some would say eccentric personalities in Rock History. Along with Frank Zappa, Todd Rundgren and David Bowie, Randy Bachman created and thrived in his own universe and he did not compromise either his music or his career to suit anyone or anything but his own singular vision.

As a child, Randy (I should point out that the actual pronunciation of his name is Backman but he's cool with how it's said) played violin and he was a prodigy who studied and took lessons at a conservatory in Canada. His life and my life were identical in many ways during this time. When he was 12, he found his mission in life when he heard Little Richard on the radio, and from then on it was rock 'n roll. Having learned and mastered music theory by then, he was no longer interested in the structured and rigid format of classical music. He ditched the academics and started playing from the heart. In his teens, he met Les Paul and Les taught him some of his stuff, which you can hear throughout Randy's recording career. Les Paul, Randy Bachman, and yes, even John Bockelman didn't read music anymore. Randy started writing songs and jamming with rock 'n roll musicians.

An early example of his lead guitar playing is on the Guess Who's first hit, a cover of Johnny Kidd and the Pirates' "Shakin' All Over" in 1962. I purchased that record when it came out. It rocked harder than anything else, and I performed the song in the early 1980s as a note-for-note cover of his version. He founded the Guess Who and co-wrote all their hits. In 1970, he had beliefs and standards, and he left that world-conquering band to start his own career, forming Brave Belt which eventually morphed into the incredible Bachman-Turner Overdrive, which they named after the truckers' magazine.

It was at this time that Randy broke the mold and dug into his Fender Stratocaster guitar and committed what purists called Supreme Blasphemy. He installed a Gibson Humbucking pickup in it. He was vilified for this atrocity by his peers, who probably never thought to do something like that, but what came out of that guitar from then on was pure magic. All of BTO's hits had that guitar in the lead slot, and it was not only the big beat, the awesome vocals and the great songs they did, it was that sound...that unique, special tone of Randy's guitar that grabbed me and kept me listening. Over the years, he has reunited with every musician and every band he played in. He didn't burn any bridges, and there isn't one bad word anybody has ever said about Randy Bachman. In the music business, that speaks volumes about the character that he posesses. He played here in Houston a couple of years ago as the guitarist in Ringo Starr's All-Star Band.

I bought all of BTO's and Randy Bachman's albums. I have everything he recorded formally with bands from the beginning of his career up until present time. He is not just a guitar gorilla. As well as the unforgettable rock 'n roll songs we all know, Randy wrote, sang and played some of the most poignant and touching music I have ever heard. He has deep insight and a firm grasp of song structure and music theory, and his latter-period BTO and solo recordings exposed his soul in a way I never would have expected.

I highly recommend Randy Bachman and anything he worked on, if you're looking for quality, talent and depth. I guarantee that he won't disappoint.

Y'all be sure to tune in tomorrow evening at 7 PM Eastern on RacersReunion Radio for Racing Through History. It's a Goat Rodeo you don't want to miss. Everybody Rock On. Thanks, I'll see y'all next week.

[Novel-T]

Shot! missed it again. Holidays can mess things up

[WildcatOne]

I missed you last night, Boyd, but hope you can tune in next Monday. Last night was the Randy Bachman essay. Great musician, songwriter and person. Winnipeg, Manitoba guy...Best, WC1

[Wheelzman]

The Guess Who was one of my favorites. JB here is a little gift to you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zlpb1zG0GlI

[Wheelzman]

Another one.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S8l_LTadOgg

[WildcatOne]

These are GREAT, Wheelz! THANKS!

[WildcatOne]

My pick for Racers of the Week are Jack and John Ross Alloway, from Columbus, New Jersey. Jack has been great to chat with and he sent me a drag racer's perspective of his life in the sport. Here's what he told me last week:

I started racing at the start of the 2008 season at Atco Dragway in Atco, NJ and Raceway Park in Englishtown, NJ in the Street ET class with a 1980 Chevy Malibu. The car ran in the 11.80s. That year while racing at Raceway Park on Fathers Day I lost the motor; at that time it was a 400ci SBC. After that disaster, we put in a GM Crate motor: the zz4 383 wtih 425hp, still using the 3 speed trans that came in the car when I bought it. We ran the Street ET class through 2010 when I had that motor rebuilt. In 2011 till now I run the Pro ET class. With the addition of a Power glide trans the car now runs in the 10.80's at 126 mph. In 5 of the 7 years I've Been racing I've qualified for our NHRA Division 1 Bracket Finals. On Nov.3, 2013 I won my first race at Atco. In the past 7 years I have raced at Atco Dragway, Raceway Park, and Island Dragway, all in NJ, Maple Grove, and Numidia Dragway in PA, US13 Dragway in Delaware, Cecil County Dragway in MD, Coastal Plains Raceway, Piedmont Dragway in NC and Bristol Dragway in TN. Yes, we enjoy traveling around, seeing other tracks and meeting other racers. We made hundreds of friends along the way.

This year my son John Ross started racing in the High School Eliminator class running my 2008 Chevy Silverado at Atco and winning the track Championship in that class by winning the last 4 races in a row! Over this winter we are working on a 1984 Chevy El camino for him to run in the Street ET class starting in the 2015 season. We are in the process of switching the 10 bolt rear end with a Ford 9-inch then we'll be replacing the original GM 305 motor with either a 350ci 375 HP or a 383 410 HP; just not sure yet which way we're going yet. As far as our goals go we just do the best we can on any given day and have fun doing it together!

That's Jack and John Ross Alloway, an up-and-coming father and son racing team from New Jersey. Good luck, safe racing and best of times in the future, guys!

Anybody who is familiar with me knows who I have called the greatest electric guitarist who ever lived. It was Jimi Hendrix. But there is another guitar player who I have placed in my own personal hall of fame who sits at the right hand of Jimi Hendrix, and that player is Stevie Ray Vaughan...another player who we lost at a young age. He left a 7-year recording career behind, and it is from the music he made during this period that has left a history which although it does not overtake what Hendrix did, it opened the door to many careers and gave inspiration to countless others to follow the style and sound that Stevie Ray achieved.

Texas has always been a hotbed of musical innovation and virtuosity. Along with SRV, the names Johnny Winter, Eric Johnson, Freddy King, T-Bone Walker, Bugs Henderson, Derek O'Brien and Bert Wills turn up when discussing musical genius and guitar-playing prowess. But Stevie Ray Vaughan went all the way to the Mountaintop. He left an impression on the world, and he did it with humility, class and pure determination. I could talk for several hours about him, and Hendrix as well, but I've made a condensed essay here that includes my own take on his life, his music and his legacy. You can buy an SRV Strat with Tex-Mex pickups, modeled after the ones he used to develop his unique tone. That alone says a lot about what needs to be said about him.

He had a troubled childhood and adolescence and he finally dropped out of high school and left home at the age of 16 to make it on his own. He loved his family and they loved him but he had to go and it somehow worked out after years of struggling to survive as a musician. His gifts with his playing were without question, supernatural and awe-inspiring. I submit the video of his live performance from the very early 1980s at the El Mocambo Club in Toronto, Canada as proof of his otherworldly talent. Nobody could play like that. His onstage image belied his true nature, which was a shy, quiet and unassuming person who had a sensitivity and personality that was several steps down from the swaggering guitar slinger we all saw playing blues from Hell every night.

He grew up in Dallas, in the shadow of his older brother Jimmie, who was reknown for his work with the Coachmen and later with the Fabulous Thunderbirds, the greatest blues band to emerge from Austin in the 1970s. Although they loved each other, they had a stormy relationship which was thankfully reconciled and produced the Family Style album before the end came. Stevie's personal life was never easy until he got clean and sober a few years before he left us, and in September of 1986, he finally gave up the stuff and turned his life around. We almost lost him that year; he came within about a month of dying, but when he did recover and came back, he was like Zorro with an electric guitar and he kept that vibe right up until the night he got in that helicopter in August of 1990.

Stevie played clean for the most part. He combined amplifiers and he relied on sheer volume to project his sound. There was not a whole lot of stomp boxes involved in his sound. He also used a rotating speaker to produce an organ-like sound, a wah pedal and a power-boost pedal to create more gain in his solos occasionally, but for the most part, what we heard was straight-ahead plug in and play. His main guitar was a 1959 Fender Stratocaster using the heaviest strings money could buy, and he and the whole band tuned their instruments down a half-step below A-440, producing that heavier sound and at the same time making it easier on the vocal cords. His style of playing always reminded me of Hendrix with a Blues sensibility and he could go from a roaring crescendo to a whispering, gentle lullaby and back again inside of one song.

I highly recommend listening to any of his albums, but my favorite has always been his first, which is called Texas Flood. Preceding that project, he had played on David Bowie's Let's Dance album and he thanked David in his liner notes. The album was recorded at Jackson Browne's studio in Los Angeles, overseen by John Hammond, Sr. and it was done live in the studio with no overdubs or production tricks. To me it's the most genuine representation of SRV's sound and style.

For whatever reason the Lord had, Stevie Ray Vaughan's life was cut short in that terrible accident. It was a heartbreaking loss on a number of levels. First, the voice of a new approach to playing Blues was silenced. The people who knew SRV loved him for his genuine good will and spirit of love that he brought out in everybody around him. His years of struggling with himself, overcoming seemingly impossible odds in his life and coming out of it successful, happy, well-adjusted and playing better than ever, then he died.

If actions speak louder than words, I can look to the Stevie Ray Vaughan story to see proof of that and to learn that no problem we might have in our lives is impossible to fix. I can thank him for all these things. Stevie Ray Vaughan, the greatest electric guitarist to live since Jimi Hendrix. He'd be 60 now. May you rest in peace, Stevie Ray Vaughan. Your spirit lives on with us.

Y'all be sure to tune in tomorrow evening at 7 PM Eastern for Racing Through History on Racers Reunion Radio. It's a Goat Rodeo you don't want to miss. Everybody Rock on. Thanks, I'll see y'all next week.

[Wheelzman]

The red Malibu made me drool!!!!!!!!!!

The story of the legend we know as SRV.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BIeeUF ... IhVJnYaRX4

Everyone associates Stevie with his hand speed and fast paced playing but this is my
favorite from SRV. Such soul and depth, it just seems to carry you away.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V8wtZeVAa9I

[WildcatOne]

Great links, Wheelz! Thanks! I enjoyed every minute of them!

My pick for Racer of the Week is Michael Rosa, from Wolcott, Connecticut. Mike has an outstanding '64 Nova Pro ET hot rod, and he was recommended to me by our friend Rich Panicaro. Thanks, Rich! Mike's a Division 1 hitter and this car is quite a sight to behold. I chatted with Mike this week and here is what he sent to me:

I started racing in a junior dragster at Lebanon Valley Dragway in 1995 when I was 11 yrs old. I raced them until I was 16 and then I had a 12 sec '80 Malibu. The next year I got my license and started racing an 8-second dragster. I did that for 2 years, then I took a few years off, just racing here and there until I bought my Nova in 2009. I raced the Pro series points in 2010 and finished 7th in my first year and top ten ever since with a few wins along the way. In 2012 I started driving for Glen Crane in his dragster in the Lucas Oil Divisional; it's a Top Dragster. I won the Lucas Oil Divisional in 2013 and also qualified for my first national event and of course winning the foot brake nationals.

I'd like to thank my daughter Addison and my girlfriend Kara for all their support, Joe Nardelli for helping me with setting the car up and Brian Hansbury and Glen Crane for their support and advice over the years. Special thanks to Ralph Kehlenbach at Kehltech Performance for an awesome engine and Henry Heward for the tranny. My goals are to win a Pro points championship and maybe one day go pro. The '64 Nova is a full chassis car. It has a 414 small-block Chevy with a power glide. My best ET is a 9.49 and I've run 138 mph in the car. I do all my own driving. That's Mike Rosa, Racer of the Week. Good luck, safe racing and best of times ahead, Mike.

Rich asked me to talk about the band Molly Hatchet for tonight's Rockin' segment, and I have to say that I can't think of another famous band short of Badfinger who has had a more difficult and often tragic story. Yet they perservered and made it to the top.

We all know Molly Hatchet as being the hardest-rocking of all Southern Rock bands, and it's a well-deserved reputation. But maintaining that level of intensity inevitably took its toll on the members. As of 2014, the only remaining original founding member of the band is Dave Hlubeck, the lead guitar player. The Hatchet was known for its triple lead guitar attack, and their material was fast-paced, as tight as a well-oiled machine and far above the standard impact factor of hard-hitting bands from the era they came from, which included the Allman Brothers Band, Lynyrd Skynyrd (whose studio and equipment they used to record their demos), 38 Special, Blackfoot, Wet Willie and the Marshall Tucker Band. By the time they were signed to a recording contract in early 1978, they were hardened veterans of the roadhouse and club circuit in the Southeastern US. When they made immediate chart success with their second album, the 1979 release, Flirtin' With Disaster, they hit the road, and they've never gotten off of it since. The band was named after the legend of a prostitute who hacked her customers with a hatchet after they did business with her. That's a charming thought, and it fit the band's agenda.

There has never been a band with more attitude and power than Molly Hatchet. My late friend Buzz Nickell taught me how to play Flirtin' With Disaster in 1980 and we performed it in our band. It was a difficult song for me to learn but I never forgot Buzz' admiration for these
guys and I kept up with Buzz' tips from then on. The original singer on their early albums was Dave Hlubeck, as well as co-writing and
producing their records, but by the time their first album came out, Danny Joe Brown stood up front at the mic and his signature
horse-herding whistles and buttery Southern Soul voice became the band's immediately identifiable sound along with Hlubeck's
orchestrated lead guitar sections, which at times were mind-boggling in their speed, precision, intensity and creative direction.

Hlubeck could have been the conductor of a philharmonic orchestra, but he chose Molly Hatchet. The bottom-line on this band is if you
wanted to get knocked-out by some red-hot Southern metal, Molly Hatchet was the ticket to get, and they never let anybody down on
that premise.

The years were not easy for these guys. They're human. They lived as hard as they played. Danny came down with diabetes and suffered a series of strokes over the years. Dave Hlubeck almost died from a drug problem but being out of the band for nearly 8 years, he recovered and returned to be the only original member currently touring and recording with them. One of the original guitar players, Duane Roland died in 2005. Former member Riff West died in 2006. Danny Joe's Son Jake and former member Mike Owings have formed a band called Sweet Georgia Brown and are out on the road touring as of 2014.

The band Molly Hatchet is still huge in Germany, Spain, France, United Kingdom, Czech Republic, Belgium, Sweden and in the Pacific rim and Australia. In total, there were 33 members of this band from the time it started until now, with Molly Hatchet still being a 6-piece band with keyboards added since the 1980s. When you see a Molly Hatchet concert, you're seeing more than just a really fast and loud band, ya know. You're witnessing a very important piece of Rock 'n Roll history that continues a tradition as well as breaks new ground for the future. Go, Molly, Go!

Y'all be sure to tune in tomorrow evening at 7 PM Eastern on RacersReunion Radio for Racing Through History. It's a Goat Rodeo you don't want to miss! Everybody Rock on! Thanks, I'll see y'all next week.

[WildcatOne]

Unfortunately we have two more Lost Friends to acknowledge. Jaime Sarte passed away December 8th. Jaime was one of the foremost funny car chassis builders and fabricators in the 70s. His work was known as the best on the track for many years. Another racer we lost on December 8th is Luther Johnson from Bowie, Maryland. Luther was a member of the Moore Racing Team. He was well-known, loved and respected by all who knew him. Our condolences go to Jaime and Luther's families. May they rest in peace.

My pick for Racer of the Week is Lee Huxley from Worcester, Worcestershire, United Kingdom. The Huxleys are closing out 2014, and it's a pleasure to feature them. Lee and his 1968 Mustang Pro ET Race car are proof that more than just the world-famous sauce comes from there. Lee was recommended to me by our friend Carla Pittau. Thanks, Carla!

I've been chatting with Lee over the last week and here is the info he sent me for his feature:
The car has a 520 ci Ford motor motor with a c6 gearbox to be updated next season to a 2 speed power glide. Car weighs about a tonne. Best et to date is 9.45 at 145 mph. I've been racing since 1985 and my dad since 1979. My Dad Brian won fastest street legal car in 1988 with his 85 Toyota corolla. I won the Super Street triple crown in 1990 with a 1932 Ford Roadster. We finished 5th this season in the Pro-et class winning the perfect reaction money at one event and dad got no 1 qualifier at one event in 2014. My brother Marc is Huxley Motorsport and is doing well in the British drift scene at the moment. We don't aspire to go up in the classes but do hope to win Pro-et at some point. We have recently had help from a top fuel team sponsor, Forbes And Andrews Racing along with other local businesses.

Lee and Brian alternate as drivers, and including Brian with Lee in this feature is certainly the right thing to do. Good luck, safe racing and best of times in the future, Lee and Brian Huxley.

This will be part one of the story that ends 2014. I'll kick off 2015 with part two. There will probably be a part three but I'll see how much I can get done, ya know. If I run out of time tonight on part one, I'll start off the next one where I left off tonight.

My friend who stayed with us for a few days last week, Bob Schulenburg, left a book with me and I've been reading it. It's the third book I have about Led Zeppelin that I have. I read Hammer of the Gods and Stairway To Heaven a few years ago. This one is called Trampled Under Foot, and it is around the size of an unabridged dictionary. I know all the details about the Led Zeppelin story, and this book goes past that, into the quotes of the band members themselves, their managers, their roadies, their groupies, their friends and the record company executives who supported them. The story of this band is nothing short of magical. I'm keeping it simple so as to maximize time, but I'd say just kick back and enjoy the ride. That's pretty much what everybody did with Zep.

Led Zeppelin was entirely the product of Jimmy Page's vision. After the Yardbirds broke up in 1968, he hand-picked each member to be in the band, starting with John Paul Jones, a multi-instrumentalist and veteran session musician who Page had worked with throughout the early to mid 60s. Both musicians had played on countless hit records by everybody from the Who and the Kinks to Herman's Hermits. If the band had a secret weapon, it was John Paul Jones. The singer, Robert Plant, was recommended to Page by Terry Reid, who was Page's first choice as vocalist. He brought along his drummer from the Band of Joy, a Midlands folk and rock band. They were originally named the New Yardbirds and their very first rehearsal was fantastic...they all knew at once that this group was something special, the chemistry and synergy that they produced was something that only comes along once in a lifetime.

Keith Moon of the Who told Pagey in a pub, you call this band the New Yardbirds? This band will go over like a Lead Zeppelin! Page knew at that instant that Keith Moon had just named his band, and he immediately applied the name, dropping the a out of the word Led so people wouldn't misconstrue the name by calling it Lead Zeppelin when they read it. He secured a management deal with Peter Grant and a recording contract with Atlantic records, giving him full and complete studio control. After playing a few Scandanavian gigs that the Yardbirds had booked before the band split up as the New Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin was launched.

Page and Grant financed their first album, which to put it mildly was a revolutionary step forward for a band. The other bands from England who were dominating the airwaves and the charts were blown away by the diversity and complexity of Zep's sound, yet the album was recorded and mixed in its entirety in approximately 30 hours. This album had a consistency and cohesiveness that was unique and compelling to everyone who heard it. Cream was splitting up, Hendrix was moving away from his wild live act and was jamming loosely with his friends a lot, in America the Doors were busy getting in trouble, and the Airplane and the Grateful Dead were doing great, but they were a different kind of band altogether than these groups. They focused on America. Their first gig here was opening for Vanilla Fudge in Colorado, but from there they found their American home, which was Los Angeles.

An interesting side note to the Zep story was when Page had to change guitars from the Fender Telecaster he had used from the time he was in the Yardbirds, through Led Zeppelin's first album up until the end of their first American tour. He wanted a vintage Les Paul. He found a great '58 Les Paul in American but he couldn't afford to buy it...when the owner would find out who wanted it, the price would be ten times what it was really worth at that time. Joe Walsh heard about this deal when he met the band, and he contacted the owner of this instrument, went to him and paid street price for it. Then he got on a plane with the guitar, flew to London and handed it to Jimmy Page. Joe Walsh is good people.

For the next 12 years, this band was the most popular band in the world. Their image was of a sleek and powerful unit of top-flight musicians who not only could play better than almost anybody, they could party just as hard. Page's fascination with the occult lent a certain vibe of darkness and danger to their name, and they made a fortune and then some. They also made some of the most memorable music I ever heard in my life.

This concludes part one of the Led Zeppelin story, folks. Stay tuned for part two starting in 2015.

I want to thank everybody for a truly great 2014 on Racin' and Rockin' with DragList.com and I'd like to wish you all a safe and happy holiday season. Merry Christmas and here's to a Happy and prosperous New Year!

Y'all be sure to tune in tomorrow evening at 7 PM Eastern time for Racing Through History on Racers Reunion Radio. It's a Goat Rodeo
you don't want to miss. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everybody, and thanks for being with us for another great year..