Rock

Still exotic after all these years

Nick Krewen For The KW Record September 21, 1999   It’s an ode with an oud. The Tea Party has accumulated an interesting collection of exotic instruments over the years, but singer, songwriter and guitarist Jeff Martin admits that their latest addition came out of the blue. A four-stringed instrument called the oud makes its debut on “Samsara,” a cut from the Windsor trio’s latest album Triptych. According to Martin,…


Endgame in Sight for The Tea Party?

  Nick Krewen For The  KW Record May 20, 1999     The clock is ticking for The Tea Party. Jeff Martin warns that the fat lady could be singing for his Windsor-born trio sooner than later. “Every record we do is getting closer to our vision,” said Martin last week, in Toronto to master his band’s latest opus Triptych, due in stores June 15. “But once we get there…


Rush Future Uncertain

Nick Krewen The Kitchener-Waterloo Record December 24, 1998 On the eve of their 25th anniversary, the future of Rush is uncertain. A pair of personal tragedies suffered this year by drummer and lyricist Neil Peart, namely the double blow of losing his daughter and wife within a few months of each other, has placed a question mark on whether the enduring Canadian band will continue. “It’s difficult to discuss a…


Right Kind of Garbage

  Wisconsin alt-rockers glad making fresh and innovative pop   Nick Krewen Special to the KW Record Thursday, November 5, 1998     In the video for the new Garbage single “Special,” guitarist Duke Erikson says the three boys in the band get into an cyber-animated airplane dogfight with their Scottish singer Shirley Manson. Who wins? “Guess,” laughs Erikson, as if to suggest the feisty Edinburgh-based Manson would have it…


Aerosmith – A Little South of Sanity

                Nick Krewen Twenty-five years together is usually considered a milestone. In the case of rock and roll legends Aerosmith, it’s a miracle. Excessive bouts of drug and alcohol abuse, as documented by the band themselves in the excellent and intriguing 1997 autobiography Walk This Way, legal entanglements, personality conflicts and even a partial breakup in the late ’70s and early ’80s are…