“… This is a high fidelity recording. Steely Dan uses a specially constructed 24-channel tape recorder, a “State-of-the-Art” 36-input computerized-mixdown console, and some very expensive German microphones. Individual microphone equalization is frowned upon. The sound created by musicians and singers is reproduced as faithfully as possible, and special care is taken to preserve the band-width and transient response of each performance. Transfer from master tapes to master lacquers is done on a Neumann VMS 70 computerized lathe equipped with variable pitch, variable depth helium cooled cutting head. The computer logic circuits of the VMS 70 widen and narrow the grooves on the disc in accordance with its own bizarre electronic mentation for reasons known only to its designers; this accounts for the lovely light and dark patters that can be seen on the surface of the pressing. Vinylite compound is used. For best results observe the R.I.A.A. curve. …”
“… This band has no past. Literally. We can tell you some things—a little of this and a bit of that—but CHEAP TRICK is, in fact, a band without a history.
Rick Nielsen, CHEAP TRICK’s lead guitarist (and when we say lead, we’re not kidding: he’s got thirty-five guitars) and Tom Petersson, the band’s bassist, have spent three out to the past five years in Europe. Having formed the band overseas, the returned home to the U.S. where they have been performing constantly for the past ten years. “We came back,” says Rick, “because we like the musical climate.” With them they have brought a melting-pot of ideas and experiences from throughout the world. “The European thing and being from America,” continues Rick, “brought us together as CHEAP TRICK and because of our travels we were opened up to an enormous number of musical styles.”
Rick was born in Chicago, but certainly spent little time there. He met Tom, who was born in Sweden and raised somewhere in the hinterlands of America, under somewhat mysterious circumstances. Together, in search of adventure and new faces to peer at, they zoomed into Europe, wandering throughout Germany, Italy, England and Spain, blowing amps and minds with astonishing frequency. They finally came to roost in the South of France amidst a warm sunny clime, nubile bodies and a plethora of expatriot American musicians who, having heard of Rick’s and Tom’s brilliant but joyously unsavoury reputations, were continually clamoring to play with them.
There they met the remaining two members of the band, so that to Rick’s hyperthyroid Donald Sutherland and Tom’s warmth and charm were added Robin Zander’s brain-boiling good looks and Bun E. Carlos’ avuncular charm.
Robin, the thin man with a thousand voices—some say he is related to Lon Chaney—was born in either Boston or Kansas City, depending on which day you approach him.
Bun E., short for Bunezuela, hails from Venezuela where he learned his drumming and where his father was an industrialist moving around South America. His family was instrumental in the building of the Panama Canal to which Bun E., who is fluent in English, comments, “That was a long time ago.”
While in the South of France, CHEAP TRICK came together, but that is not all. Rick ran into Ken Adamany in a dusty café one day. They had known each other in America and when Rick told Ken about the group, the latter, being a manager and promoter based in the Midwest, invited the band back to the States. To Rick, it seemed like the least likely thing to do. So he did it.
Despite the fact that Rick and the band are highly unconventional, and despite the fact that Rick himself has been described by some who are most certainly knowledgeable as “a high risk in the business,” CHEAP TRICK’s wealth is their music.
Songs, songs, songs. The band has so many top notch songs that they used to do three separate sets a night of completely different songs. Now, with the rigors of extensive touring, they know better. They’ve obviously had to cut it down and the fact is that they recorded twenty-one tunes for their Epic long-player and could have gone on forever. The band just hasn’t any “B” material. Nielsen songs such as “Taxman, Mr. Thief,” “Mandocello,” “He’s a Whore” and “Oh, Candy” put pure musicality—richly varied melodies, lyrics of both thought and heart—back into rock’n’roll.
What you are listening to is only one-half of the story. Because CHEAP TRICK is that rarest of entities, a classic rock’n’roll band, aware that the disk and the concert are two separate theatres. On stage, their spectacular showmanship combines magically with their musicianship to create a total event. You’ll be able to see them soon because the band plays 290 dates a year, taking their music to the streets. And, after all, that’s what rock’n’roll is all about.
