Arts & Entertainment
Album features
guitar mastery
Steve Morse Band
“Southern Steel”
MCA Records
Rating: 4
Ratings are 1 (bad) to 5 (excellent).
By Shannon Uehling
Staff Reporter
He may not be a guitar god like Steve Vai or
Joe Satriani, but Steve Morse is certainly no
amateur on the guitar.
The Steve Morse Band’s latest release en
titled “Southern Steel” is a hard-rocking instru
mental that is similar to a Steve Vai work, only
more bluesy.
The Steve Morse Band has been nominated
for five Grammy Awards. This is not surprising
when one considers the band’s mastery of
complex rhythms and intense guitar playing.
The best song on the record is the title cut,
“Southern Steel.” It is a rather simple song
made up of flowing guitar and mixed with
clever bits of intricate guitar playing.
Of the 10 tracks on this record, eight are real
hard rockers and two have a certain balladlike
quality.
“Vista Grande’ is the first of these and is
very melodic compared to the rest of the al
bum. It doesn’t take much to imagine Damn
Yankees or Warrant whimpering out a sappy
rock ballad to this music.
The other piece of work on the album with
a slower tempo is “Wolf Song.” Not only does
it contain guitar synth, but it also uses synthe
sized piano. It is one of the two best songs on
the record in spile of its use of synthesizers.
Most people would never think of trying to
put words to the music of Joe Satriani, but it’s
actually quite easy to picture lyrics to accom
pany the music of the Steve Morse Band.
For the most part, “Southern Steel” is a top
rate record, but it is not without its faults.
There is only so much that can be done with
an instrumental album without becoming re
dundant, so why does Morse repeat himself?
While playing “Sleaze Factor,” all one has to
do is turn the tape over and listen to the same
song with a different title of “Weekend Over
drive.”
And considering Morse’s talent on the gui
tar, he shouldn’t have to use guitar synthesiz
ers. Songs such as “Wolf Song” would have
been just as good, if not better, had they not
been adulterated by synthesizers.
For example, Y & T could sing the lyrics for
“Arena Rock,” and Sammy Hagar could do
“Weekend Overdrive."
This is not to say that this album would be
better if it contained lyrics. It stands on its own
quite solidly without the use of vocals.
Despite any faults, this is a great investment
for anyone who truly enjoys the music of
Satriani or Vas.
Jazz saxophonist Branford Marsalis will play to a sold-out house
Saturday night at the Lied Center for Performing Arts.
Jazz saxophonist to perform
to full house at Lied Center
by Mtcnaei diocK
Staff Reporter
The show has been sold out since early
January, and waiting lists for the show are
pages long. But Saturday night, a full
house will wait for jazz saxophonist
Branford Marsalis to make his appearance
at the Lied Center for Performing Arts.
Marsalis’ musical training began at age
4 on the piano. He moved to the clarinet
at age 6 or 7 and to the alto sax at age 15.
His choice of the alto saxophone was the
result of a challenge from his father, who
told him it was the hardest to play.
Marsalis attended Southern University
in Baton Rouge, La., and the Berklee
School of Music in Boston. He was
included in numerous gigs with such jazz
greats as Art Blakey, die Clark Terry
Band and Lionel Hampton.
Studying classic jazz saxophone per
formers, including Sonny Rollins, Charlie
Parker, Ornette Coleman, Wayne Shorter
and Cannonball Adderly, Marsalis said, “I
wanted to understand everybody’s
contributions to music.”
This study of a wide range of saxo
pnomsts lenas nsen to iviarsaus wiue
ranging influences in his playing style.
Marsalis switched to tenor saxophone
in 1981, calling it “the closest instrument
to the human voice in terms of depth and
emotionally moving a person.”
Marsalis has played with various jazz
artists as well as in the band of his brother
Wynton. Wynton’s second album features
Marsalis on many of the tracks, and
includes several of his own compositions. •
Marsalis’ wide range of successes have
earned him Grammy Award nominations,
successful movie roles and recording
album contracts with such jazz greats as
Dizzy Gillespie and Miles Davis.
Perhaps best known for his work with
Sting on his award-winning and critically
acclaimed albums, “The Dream of the
Blue Turtles” in 1985 and “Nothing Like
the Sun” in 1987, Branford is no longer
known as simply “the older brother of
Wynton Marsalis,” his trumpet-playing
sibling.
Sting’s album, “The Dream of the Blue
Turtles,” sparked a world tour, enlisting
See MARSALIS on 10
Search for a keeper
among punk, metal
yields little to enjoy
the
fifth
column
album review
Last semester, Pickles Records held a 90
percent-off sale on albums, which yielded a
bonanza for those who maintain record players
in defiance of those damned little CD things.
With vinyl going the way of the eight-track
cassette, I visited a super sale at Pickles this
semester, but opted for cassettes this time around.
Keeping with the cosmopolitan nature of
Fifth Column, we will sift through the metal,
punk and rap realms in search of a lasting
bargain.
Cleared of accusations in a recent back
masking/ suicide message case, Judas Priest
offers “Painkiller” on Columbia Records.
There are two parts to this album: the first is
the title song itself, which opens the collection
in a furious burst of speed and energy.
Let no one deny the influence of speedmetal
upon the rest of the metal scene after listening
to this scather.
Then there is the rest of the album, filled
with the familiar Judas Priest staples like Rob
Halford’s screeching voice, overdone guitar
solos and songs with titles like “Leather Rebel”
and “Hell Patrol.”
A few songs come close to “Painkiller” in
intensity, but they tend to sink back into more
familiar metal sounds and themes.
With me release ot ishiar, New Jersey
punksters Adrenaline O.D. have moved from
the thrash underground of Buy Our Records to
the punk middle-ground of Restless Records,
who have been scooping up quite a number of
punk bands lately.
Along the way, the band has kept its pen
chant for goofy and obscure lyrics that seize
upon moments from the lives of band members
and mean little to the listener.
Out of 12 songs on “Ishtar,” “Tiny Fingers”
has the best sound, yet one song does not an
album make.
Two genres down and still looking for a
keeper... what better place to start than with
“Dangerous Music Straight From Oakland.”
Too Short's “Short Dog’s in the House” LP
(Jive/ RCA Records) comes complete with a
parental advisory: An explicit lyrics sticker, a
sure way to raise sales.
Yeah, 1 have some problems with these
lyrics, but it’s not about using curse words or
graphic descriptions of sex.
Too Short was taken to task by the (female)
rapper Choice over his sexual altitudes, but he
is still at it, now joined by Ice Cube for one
track.
Apparently it takes two people to tell me
See FIFTH on 10
I Dark, dismal film
Movie combines miserable lives with murder
By Jim Hanna
Senior Reporter__
Spring is just around the comer.
Happiness and optimism dance in the
air as nature gaily prepares to move
into its annual rebirth. Hope springs
eternal.
Thank God there are movies like
“The Kill-Off’ to send our joys crash
ing miserably to the ground.
The latest offering of the Sheldon
Film Theater explores, nay, celebrates
the utter wretchedness of human ex
istence.
Set during the off-season at a dy ing
beach resort town, “The Kill-Off*
focuses on the pitiful, intertwined lives
of the few remaining residents.
The gruesome matriarch of the town
is Luane (Loretta Gross), an aging
bedridden woman who ruins most
everyone’s life with phone gossip.
Luane has dirt on everyone in town
and will not hesitate to spew gossip in
order to wreck lives.
One of the only businesses in town
is a crummy bar run by Pete (Jackson
Sims). Luane’s young husband Ralph
(Steve Monroe) works as Pete’s handy
man and Rags (William Russell) is
the bartender. They’re all miserable.
Pete’s daughter Myra (Jordan Fox)
works in the bar in spite of the fact
that he raped her when she was 12.
Bobbie (Andrew Lee Barrett) is the
psycho son of the town doctor who
gets Myra hooked on heroin and beats
her up from time to time. They’re
miserable, too.
To pick up business, Pete hires a
local prostitute, Danny Lee (Cathy
Haase) to strip at his bar. She eventu
ally falls in love with Ralph, but that
“The Kill-Off’
Starring Loretta Gross, Jackson
Sims
Not Rated
Rating: 4
Ratings are 1 (bad) to 5 (excellent).
doesn’t keep her from being miser
able.
Everybody in the movie has a reason
to kill Luane. Danny Lee wants Ralph
to kill his miserable wife so that they
can run off together. Pete wants to
retrieve the $10,000 that Luane’s father
stole from him and left to her when he
died. Pete wants to kill her because
he’s nuts.
The miserable lives twist together
into a pathetic cesspool of despair,
from which death would be a wel
come relief.
“The Kill-Off" is based upon a
novel by Jim Thompson, an author
noted for his gruesome crime stories.
Thompson once attended the Univer
sity of Nebraska-Lincoln and was even
published in The Prairie Schooner,
which adds a nice local twist for Lincoln
audiences. Another movie based on a
Thompson work, “The Grifters,” is
playing in Lincoln.
But “The Kill-Off” has enough
twists all by itself. There is scarcely a
redeeming moment in this most bleak
of bleak films. Thompson’s story
makes Eugene O’Neill’s plays seem
downright cheery.
The actors arc primarily stage actors
who do very little film work. This
translates to what may seem to be an
unnaturalness in front of the camera.
Actually, it lends an abnormal feel
and adds to the overall unpleasant
ness.
The movie was made on a small
budget and it shows. The interior scenes
appear to have been filmed in some
body’s basement with a couple of
floodlights. But again, this potential
flaw was most likely intentional and
adds to the sense of incorrectness.
“The Kill-Off’ won’t cheer any
body up. It’s a grim little film that
would ruin even the happiest person ’s
day.
Go see it.
“The Kill-Off’ is playing at the
Sheldon Film Theater, 12th and R
streets.