Welcome Back! Our second full week has had our staff busy, cruising through a number of new releases and have posted a ton of reviews. We hope you have had the chance to get caught up.

In Alvin Lee & Ten Years After news, this is the classic tale of miscommunication, pride and misunderstandings with another classic rock band. It seems that due to Alvin finishing up his latest CD in Nashville last fall, he was unavailable to re-form with the other original members of the great TYA. The other 3 members made a hasty decision to tour without Alvin under the TYA moniker, record and release a live CD! Now, TYA without Alvin Lee is EXACTLY the same as Creedence Clearwater Revival touring without John Fogerty. Same deal. It�s kind of sad that this stuff goes on but egos, money, insensitivities all play into these family spats. Now the rift is probably too wide between them all to ever get back together. Alvin Lee just finished up his own UK Tour with Edgar Winter supporting him, this past April-May. There was a recording posted over at SharingTheGroove that gave downloaders a chance to sample a recent live performance from Manchester the first week of May. His chops are still sharp and I hope we get a chance to see him here in the States. Apparently, some US West Coast dates had to be cancelled for June because of a late application for a Work Permit! How long have these folks been doing this? You would think they would have the processes down by now! Anyway, the new Alvin Lee CD, In Tennessee, is a recommended listen. He teams up with Elvis Presley�s old band for a great cross-section of country flavored jazz and blues and of course, rock n�roll!

It seems that the Rod Stewart/RonWood partnership is becoming a strong force again! We mentioned the one-off concert scheduled at the Hollywood Bowl for August 30th, but now it seems Rod Stewart will headline �The Olympic Torch Concert On The Mall� in London on June 26th and Ron Wood is slated to join Rod for the finale. Woody has been rehearsing with Stones in Paris and commented, "Being up on stage once again with Rod The Mod will be a real treat," and "In The Mall, looking out of Buckingham Palace, doing 'Stay With Me', I'm sure it'll be a street party to end all street parties." There�s your taper alert!

An unauthorized Led Zeppelin DVD has shown up on store shelves around the U.S. Led Zeppelin A to Z is apparently a 60 minute video with no Zep music just interviews with those that were close to the band in the early days and some audio interview snippets from Robert Plant and John Bonham. The consensus seems to be that for the budget price of about $15.00, it�s a good purchase. Basicly, it's a budget production that mimics the VH-1 "Legends" show but not as slick.

Now for some updates on the bootleg collecting front. It seems that those japanese Beatles Chronology DVD�s have sold out there initial run! But not to fret, an enterprising DVD-R label is busy making clones that will cost collector�s about half of the originals, complete with duplication of the fantastic cover art and booklet that accompanies the set. Volume 2 is all you really need unless you have to have everything! That probably describes most of our members!

With the original Black Sabbath line-up re-uniting for the latest Ozzfest Tour, a new budget priced DVD has surfaced from Cat�s Meow. Black Sabbath: The Ozzy Years 1970-1985 is a well intended compilation of somewhat familiar material. The real treat on this is the 1975 Don Kirshner�s Rock Concert footage. Great stuff that hasn�t been formally provided by any label. We just got our copy, a review is forthcoming.

This week, I had the opportunity to sit down and view the current DVD-Audio, Video Montage catalog releases form Genuine Masters. Again, this is a Led Zeppelin label that has introduced a new take on familiar material. Zeppelin fans are some of the most opinionated and you certainly find folks on both sides of the fence on their feelings with GM�s offerings. To keep this brief, I want to simply state that the approach here is FRESH. Nobody else is doing anything clever or new so stop the whining about these titles and take them for what they are. For the most part, an upgrade in sound quality along with a beautiful slide show that is thoughtful and of the highest quality. Choose to watch the damn thing, or not. After reading through the information I was provided on the process, it is a labor of love and it shows. Please refer to the new reviews posted here at HotWacks On-line for more information.

Now on to the revelations shared earlier this week on Genuine Master�s latest project. One of the most heralded Led Zeppelin recordings is the June 21st, 1977 concert, recorded by the late Mike Millard. Mike the Mike, as he was called, captured one of the most wonderful audience recordings ever on that evening. It is referred to as the �Listen to This, Eddie� show. Genuine Masters has apparently gotten either a master tape clone or something of near generation to work on their latest "Watch And Listen To This Eddie".
About 2 weeks ago, GM offered mp3 samples of the work-in-progress to their mailing list, I requested samples myself and received them earlier this week. Folks, when this thing hits the street�I can hear stereos cranked to �11� in unison across the globe. The mp3 samples were short, 1-minute comparisons to Empress Valley�s Christmas Edition �Eddie�. The first 30 seconds was the EV snippet against 30 seconds of the GM version. There is no comparison. It is essential that GM finishes this project up and get it out. I understand the visuals for these projects are the real time-consuming component but, they hope to have this thing completed sometime in July. It will be brilliant and again, another �must-have� version of this most booted Zep show. I want it now so, please, get to work and shut me up.

There�s lots of titles on the way from every corner of the world. We will continue to aspire at being the hub of information to help you collect your way to happiness. With that sappy comment, I bid you a good week and remember��Visit us often!

Svengi