Montrose

[tommyv]

So a late night at work...drinking Twice As Mad Tom after a couple at the curling club. We had a big comeback win tonight. Down 5-1 after 4, we ended up with a 12-7 win.

The first Montrose album is on the turntable and is a spectacular piece of vinyl. I don't give a fuck about who the lead singer is, this was a practice project for Mr Templeman.

Sammy peaked early.

Discuss amongst yourselves, I only have 2 beer left.

[FORD]

Still have it on vinyl. Still listen to it on occasion..... try to drown out the vocals somehow.

[VHscraps]

Yeah, Sam is the singer and he actually wrote most of the tunes, which - in light of his later career - makes it all the more amazing that it is one of the most killer rock albums ever. Still have the vinyl.

Check this out - this is Montrose playing the intro to 'Rock Candy' in the movie A Star is Born from 1976 - you don't actually see 'em up close, but that's them on-stage as the camera flies over the stadium:

I think Hagar had left by then - but you don't hear any vocals on that clip anyway. Think his replacement was a guy called Bob James. I also like their second album, Paper Money - but their albums were actually dreck after Hagar left. Figure that one out.

Ronnie made a couple of decent albums with Gamma in the late 70s/early 80s (Gamma 2 is the best in my book)

[Seshmeister]

I'm not interested, I hear Adolf Hitler was kind to his pet dogs.

There is enough music in the world that there is no need to ever go anywhere near anything Hagar was involved in.

[DLR Bridge]

I'm not interested, I hear Adolf Hitler was kind to his pet dogs.

Not quite. Rent Downfall with Bruno Ganz. That fucker made the dogs swallow cyanide, too.

[Seshmeister]

Better than being eaten by a bunch of Russian soldiers.

[VHscraps]

I suspect that people could be split into two camps on this:

(i) those who heard Montrose long before Hagar came within a country mile of Van Halen

(ii) those who never knew the album at all (it wasn't a big seller, although it had gone platinum probably before he joined VH due to its reputation) and only knew him as the luckiest man in rock'n'roll in 1985 in being able to step into what Dave created.

I was listening to Montrose - the 1973 debut - as a fan of it for at least 6 years before all of that. I had been hearing it since the day it was released - 'cos one of my brothers was the first guy in our small town to own it!! And even though Hagar was recognised by many in the late 70s as just another mediocre talent, no one that I knew and who had been familiar with the Montrose debut changed their mind about it. They didn't change their mind after he joined VH either.

It's just some kind of cosmic accident that he made that album - he managed to hook up with three other guys who were perfect in letting it all happen, and of course, Templeman and Landee showed that they made the best sounding records of anybody at that time (I recommend also Sailin' Shoes by Little Feat from around the same time, maybe earlier - 72 - to see that they were two guys who knew what they were doing).

I gave him a chance in VH for the first two albums, then I bailed - because it wasn't VH. The realisation was very clear - VH was more DAVE than anything else.

I fully understand, though, that if you are in the second of those two camps, it would be impossible to go and listen to it now without all that has happened colouring your view of it. But, I still rate it as one of my favourite hard rock albums.

[chefcraig]

For me, the best Montrose album is still Open Fire, mainly because there isn't any annoying singing going on to clutter up or cover over the freakin' guitar playin'.

[cadaverdog]

Montrose Montrose is a better album than any of the Van Hagar stuff, most of Dave's solo stuff and a couple CVH albums.

[Matt White]

I'll take DIVER DOWN over MONTROSE anyday of the week........

better than Van Haggis? Yup....I will give you that...RONNIE plays his ass off on the 1st record....Spam is almost tolerable....AND it was 1973....so they got that going for 'em...........too bad Spam's ego got in the way so early in his career...MONTROSE might have actually been important.......instead of a footnote....funny how history repeated itself?

[cadaverdog]

I'll take DIVER DOWN over MONTROSE anyday of the week........

better than Van Haggis? Yup....I will give you that...RONNIE plays his ass off on the 1st record....Spam is almost tolerable....AND it was 1973....so they got that going for 'em...........too bad Spam's ego got in the way so early in his career...MONTROSE might have actually been important.......instead of a footnote....funny how history repeated itself?

No doubt Sammy's mouth runs too much. So does the sisters but everybody forgives them. They fucked Dave twice. Sam treated Dave better than he deserved when they toured together. Everybody forgets that.

[Matt White]

No doubt Sammy's mouth runs too much. So does the sisters but everybody forgives them. They fucked Dave twice. Sam treated Dave better than he deserved when they toured together. Everybody forgets that.

I mean the lyrics on MONTROSE suck...which is typical Spammy

DAVE worst stuff is MILES better than Spam's best...........

Now...if DAVE had been the singer on MONTROSE.....hell, we know who'd be more famous.....

The sister's are lucky to have had DAVE...otherwise they'd have been QUIET RIOT....

still....that CD is a good one....

[Nickdfresh]

Montrose Montrose is a better album than any of the Van Hagar stuff, most of Dave's solo stuff and a couple CVH albums.

You're retarded if you think that jerked-off noise is better than anything CVH or EAS...

Actually, I don't mind "Rad Motor Scooter" or whatever the fuck it is, but the lyrics sound like they were written by a four year old overdosing on a sugar high...

[Nickdfresh]

No doubt Sammy's mouth runs too much. So does the sisters but everybody forgives them. They fucked Dave twice. Sam treated Dave better than he deserved when they toured together. Everybody forgets that.

Sam runs his mouth alright, but I don't have a huge problem with that. The sisters have only on occasion run their mouths on anything after the initial war of words in 1986, save for the MTV meltdown of "Tonight is not about your fucking hip!" 1996. But the sisters are both virtuosos at what they do. Sam certainly ain't. He'd good at maximizing what little talent he had and for self-promotion, but he sucks balls musically. Many will argue he has a really good voice, but I've always thought he sounded like Janice Joplin being raped by howler monkeys...

[FORD]

You're retarded if you think that jerked-off noise is better than anything CVH or EAS...

Actually, I don't mind "Rad Motor Scooter" or whatever the fuck it is, but the lyrics sound like they were written by a four year old overdosing on a sugar high...

Especially this part....


Now, since you been gone, I been feelin' a-bad, yeah!
I come out to your place – I'm afraid of your dad.

Seriously.... this was written by someone who claimed to be a badass boxing champion??