Chicago Coming to the Orpheum

Chicago, the self-styled rock band with horns, that throws a little bit of everything at their audience when they hit the stage—tapping into an extensive catalogue of ballads, hard-rockers, and jazz-tinged jams—are coming to Boston’s Orpheum Theatre on April 18. Songs like “If You Leave Me Now,” “Does Anybody Know What Time It Is?,” “Saturday in the Park,” and “Twenty-Five or Six to Four” remain timeless classics in the Chicago song canon and have made the band one of the best-selling American rock groups of all time. Other than The Beach Boys, no American rock band has created as many chart-topping hits as Chicago. Named for their hometown, the group’s concerts traverse decades and styles, as the musicians blaze through their audience favorites, such as “Beginnings” and “Questions 67 and 68.”

Chicago has toured for a long time without it’s famous singer, Peter Cetera, who left the band in the summer of 1985. Cetera had asked for hiatuses after tours in order to focus on his solo work (mirroring that of Phil Collins and Genesis), but the band declined. 

Cetera soon topped the charts after leaving Chicago with the songs “Glory of Love” (which was the theme song of the Hollywood film The Karate Kid Part II) and “The Next Time I Fall” (a duet with Amy Grant). Two more Cetera songs reached the Top Ten: a 1998 solo hit called “One Good Woman” (Number 4) and a 1989 duet with Cher, “After All” (Number 6).

Chicago replaced Cetera with bassist and singer-songwriter Jason Scheff, who was not nearly as popular as Cetera, causing Chicago’s popularity to wane a bit in the late 1980s and early ’90s. In May 1990, more inner turmoil caused original drummer Danny Seraphine to be kicked out of the band, further separating the fans from the original Chicago they loved. Keyboardist and vocalist Robert Lamm and trombonist James Pankow continued to carry the weight for Chicago.

In 2015, Chicago was finally inducted into the rock n’ roll hall of fame and Peter Cetera briefly said he would rejoin the band to play during their induction. As the date of the ceremony approached, a disagreement arose between Cetera and Lamm about the how the horn section in “Twenty-Five or Six to Four” would be played. Cetera dropped out of playing at the ceremony, but once again Chicago carried on without him and put on a wonderful show, playing a blistering live version of “Twenty-Five or Six to Four,” full of loud horns and high-pitched electric guitar solos.

Cetera later criticized Chicago, saying in an interview with Ultimate Classic Rock Magazine, “Every idea or suggestion I offered about how it could work musically was either rejected or changed by the show’s producers. While I sent those same emails to the group, the only reply I ever received back from them was a very snarky ‘Take a chill pill, dude!’ Whoa! Really?” Cetera also said that he had no regrets leaving the band after its bestselling album titled17. He has grown comfortable calling the shots in his own career and told the magazine, “At this point in my life I don’t care to reintroduce the same negativity, misplaced egos, and petty jealousies I left behind so many years ago.”

Now, Chicago, get ready to play Boston’s Orpheum. Everyone is waiting to hear those timeless hits played live!

Miele Live At The Midway Cafe, Jamaica Plain, 3/12/19

Miele Keyboardist Melissa Lee Niles and guitarist Joe Spilsbury

On Tuesday, March 12, Miele played a rocking set at the Midway Café in Jamaica Plain. The musicians in this talented rock band—vocalist/keyboardist Mellissa Lee Nilles, guitarist Joe Spilsbury, bassist Cedric Lamour, and newcomer-drummer Jeff Edwards—are hot on the local club scene. A year ago, they released their first, well-received album Transience.

Miele kicked off the evening with “Spring Rain,” a quiet original that opens and builds up with some very beautiful piano by Lee Nilles, followed by stellar guitar picking by Spilsbury. Lamour's bass guitar work was notable. “It’s a new release and we’re in the middle of recording it right now,” Lee Nilles informed the crowd before dipping into the opening piano chords. Following two more originals, “Anxious Ghost” and “Unfiltered,” Spilsbury broke a string on his guitar with his hard, signature strumming. While he restrung his guitar, the rest of the band went into a jazzy jam with Lee Nilles leading the beat with a piano verse that was incredible.

With the band whole again, Miele launched into “Hold it Together,” one of their best jams that dates way back in Miele’s song canon. It sounded fantastic with Spilsbury’s heavy distortion guitar leading the way, and Lee Nilles voice reaching high levels of wailing in the chorus. “Such an energetic song,” she declared at the end of the tune, and yes, the song has a ton of flow and energy to it!

Other notable songs in the latter part of the set were a politically driven anti-Trump song, “We Don’t Care,” and the popular Miele set closer “Slip Away.” In “We Don’t Care,” the song goes through several cool transitions, beginning with a slow, distorted drive and gradually picking up. The riff by Spilsbury is highly original, and I hope this song gets played at more of their upcoming shows. The song closes with several minutes of incredible musical wails by Lee Nilles—“Ahhh, ahhh, woo, woo,” followed by the music slowing down and then picking up again with Lee Nilles singing over and over again, “We don’t care.”

Miele bassist Cedric Lamour

Then the show wrapped up with Lee Nilles thanking the audience: “Thank you, so much everyone, this is going to be our last song—it’s called ‘Slip Away.’ If you guys like our music we have CDs in the back. Thanks so much to Lockette for inviting us to be here. It’s always fun to play a show with other badass ladies. I want to see more of that in the scene.”

“Slip Away” is one of Miele’s heavier originals with fewer transitions than some of their other songs. It follows a more continuous flow of rhythm. The piano, drums, and guitars all keep a steady rhythm that syncs nicely with Lee Nilles vocals. At the end, the song gets heavier, then slowly fades out with Lee Nilles’ piano, and once again picks up for a final chorus. Spilsbury strums one last powerful chord on his guitar to close it out.

This Boston-based band is what Boston is famous for producing—original and amazing musical talent. The musicians have said that they strive to “celebrate the emotions, spirit, and wisdom that live and breathe in all of us, as well as the rage, the desire, and the chaos that erupt out of us when we cannot give them voice.”

Miele’s next concerts are at Boston’s New Music Showcase at Union Tavern, Somerville, Friday, April 5, and Club Bohemia, Central Square, April 20. For updates about other concerts that continue to be added to their spring and summer schedule, check Miele’s website or Facebook page: www.mielemusic.com,www.facebook.com/mieletheband.

Miele live at the Midway

Fleetwood Mac Concert Preview

 Fleetwood Mac is scheduled to perform at Boston’s TD Garden on April 12, 2019, with two new guitarists, Neil Finn and the very creative Mike Campbell, primarily known for his collaborations with Tom Petty in Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers. In early 2018, Fleetwood Mac’s guitarist and principal songwriter, Lindsey Buckingham, was fired and almost immediately replaced by Finn and Campbell. Later it was disclosed that it was mainly Stevie Nicks who had a problem with Buckingham, and not the rest of the band. Buckingham was Nicks’s former lover in the 1970s, and the two joined the band on New Year’s Eve 1974. At that time, Fleetwood Mac was in total disarray, having just fired guitarist/vocalist Bob Welch. Buckingham became the group's seventh guitarist in seven years. He also had leverage with the band’s drummer Mick Fleetwood and was able to convince him to allow his girlfriend and recording partner, Stevie, to join the band as well. The addition of Buckingham and Nicks led to the classic-era’s lineup of Fleetwood Mac. This lineup would last until the early 1980s and would produce some outstanding albums, including Fleetwood Mac, Rumors, Tusk, and Mirage. 

One final album came in the ’80s, titled Tango in the Night, which began as a Buckingham solo project, but became the band’s, as they needed Buckingham’s creative output to release new music. With a ten-week tour scheduled, Buckingham refused to go at the last minute, saying he felt his creativity would be stifled if he toured and did not record more music. A band meeting at Christine McVie’s house on August 1987 resulted in turmoil, as tensions came to a head. Mick Fleetwood, in his autobiography, claimed there was an altercation between Buckingham and Nicks. Buckingham left the band the following day. After Buckingham’s first departure, Fleetwood Mac replaced him with two new guitarists, Billy Burnette and Rick Vito, without even auditioning them. This lineup of Fleetwood Mac released only one studio album in 1990 titled, Behind the Mask, which only made it to Gold Sales and did not achieve the lofty multi-platinum success the band had become used to with Lindsey Buckingham writing most of their material. Stevie Nicks grew frustrated with the band’s lack of success and quit following Behind the Mask’s commercial failure.

It took until 1997 to get Buckingham back in the band, and by this time a lot had changed in the music industry. Still, Fleetwood Mac continued to be hugely popular with many of the old fans who were eager for the band to do a reunion tour. Vocalist Christine McVie did not participate in a number of the reunions in the early 2000s, but later joined in 2014.

Everything seemed fine in the group’s camp until January 2018, when Stevie Nicks handed the band a “he or me” ultimatum after the MusiCares Person of the Year benefit concert, where she had felt slighted by Buckingham. As Buckingham told Rolling Stone, "A few days after the show he received a phone call from the band's manager Irving Azoff, who proceeded to list various issues Nicks had with his behavior that night, including his complaints about their intro music being Nicks' ‘Rhiannon,’ and that he may have ‘smirked’ while she was giving her acceptance speech.” (The band received an award that night.)

"The irony is we have this long-standing joke, that when Stevie talks, she goes on a long time," Buckingham said. I may or may not have smirked, but I look over and Mick and Christine were doing the waltz behind her as a joke." As for the choice of intro song that night, Buckingham admitted he was against it, but said Nicks took it the wrong way. "It wasn't about it being ‘Rhiannon,’" he said. "It just undermined the impact of our entrance. That’s me being very specific about the right and wrong way to do something."

Regardless of Buckingham's defenses, Azoff gave him a direct message: "Stevie never wants to be onstage with you again." Buckingham took this to mean that Nicks was quitting Fleetwood Mac, so he emailed Mick Fleetwood to discuss the band's future, but didn't hear back, so he called Azoff for clarification. "This feels funny," he recalled saying to Azoff. "Is Stevie leaving the band or am I getting kicked out? Azoff told Buckingham he was "getting ousted" because Nicks gave the band an ultimatum: “Either you go or she's gonna go."

Shortly after the April news release of Buckingham's departure, Fleetwood said, "Buckingham's unwillingness to tour this year was the reason for his dismissal.” The only other public comments Buckingham made prior to Rolling Stone's interview were at a May fundraiser, where he said the band had "lost its perspective.” He went on to say, “That harmed the 43-year legacy that we had worked so hard to build. The legacy was really about rising above difficulties in order to fulfill higher truths and one's higher destiny."

It has yet to be seen how Fleetwood Mac's 2019 tour will turn out. They are now in the midst of battling Lindsey Buckingham in a lawsuit over “how” he was terminated from the band. Will people still have the same lofty expectations of Fleetwood Mac's musical ability minus the creative output of Buckingham? Will this be another “greatest hits package tour” for people just wanting to see Stevie Nicks belt out such hits as "Rhiannon," "Landslide," and "The Chain"? We’ll have to wait and see how it all turns out, although it’s nice that Mike Campbell from The Heartbreakers now has a new musical opportunity since the death of Tom Petty in 2017. Can the combination of Campbell and Finn fill Buckingham's shoes for a successful 2019 Tour, or will this be similar to Buckingham’s departure in 1987, when replaced by Burnette and Vito the band's next album tanked big time? 2019 is sure to bring revelations about the current state of Fleetwood Mac, and their tour is worth catching despite the loss of Buckingham.

Kiss Concert Preview

2019 promises to bring some great rock ‘n’ roll concerts to the Boston area. While many—including Maroon 5's vocalist Adam Levine—have been quick to write off rock ‘n’ roll as dead in the last year, there are still signs that rock is alive and well, with four big classic bands coming to town this spring.

Kiss is the first big act and will play in TD Garden on March 26. The band formed in New York City in 1973, with guitarist/vocalist Paul Stanley, bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons, guitarist Ace Frehley and drummer Peter Criss. These musicians were well-known for their elaborate face paint and fancy stage outfits. They rose to prominence in the mid 1970s with their live performances that featured fire-breathing, blood-spitting, smoking guitars, shooting rockets, levitating drum kits, and pyrotechnics. The band has gone through several line-up changes over the years, with Stanley and Simmons the only two original members remaining. Former drummer Criss refuses to have any contact with the other two members over unresolved song credits and royalty disputes.

Frehley had not performed with the band since a 2002 Farewell Tour because of similar disputes, but appears to have since buried the hatchet as he reunited with Kiss this past October to perform four songs on a cruise boat: "New York Groove," "2,000 Man," "Hide Your Heart,"  and "Domino."

Earlier, on September 19, following their performance on America's Got Talent, Kiss announced that they are ending their career with One Last Kiss: End of the Road World Tour 2019, which kicks off January 21 in Vancouver and currently includes 74 additional dates that run through December 3, in Auckland, New Zealand. 

At TD Garden, Kiss will perform its One Last Kiss: End of the Road World Tour, and it promises to be a great show—although don't count on it being the final Kiss show you’ll ever attend if you are a huge Kiss fan. The band has already staged several Farewell Tours, and this one may be just be another cash grab for Stanley and Simmons, known to be more business enthusiasts in the rock ‘n' roll world, than actual rock ‘n' rollers.