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Артист: TED NUGENT Альбом: Free For All , 1976 Жанр: hard & heavy Формат файла: eac-wv-cue-log-scans Ссылка: CD 7 clicks Нахождение: eDonkey

01. Free-For-All 03:21
02. Dog Eat Dog 04:01
03. Writing On The Wall 07:08
04. Turn It Up 03:40
05. Street Rats 03:39
06. Together 05:56
07. Light My Way 03:05
08. Hammerdown 04:11
09. I Love You So I Told You A Lie 03:48


His hair is well past shoulder length and uncombed, let alone styled. He wears a headband, an animal-tooth necklace and suspenders beneath his open shirt, which is adorned with leather fringe. Ted Nugent dresses the same way he did in 1968. He also plays guitar the same way-with a vengeance.

Roughly a decade ago, Ted Nugent and the Amboy Dukes emerged from the Midwest playing thunderous rock which knew no discipline and no boundaries. Even at the beginning of his career, Nugent played every solo as if it were his last. Though one detected bits of Hendrix and Beck in his style and technique, his sounded more parallel to than derivative of theirs. The songs never seemed to warrant Nugent's wild-eyed, frenzied treatments; listening to the Amboy Dukes' albums was like going into hand-to-hand combat with your speakers. Once Nugent had you, it was best to surrender to the omnipotent six-string and its master.

The turn of the decade had little effect on Nugent. Throughout a series of personnel changes in his band and a constant changing of labels, he continued to preach the gospel of guitar. Blazing his trail up and down the middle of the United States, Nugent stayed in the Midwest, where his loyal following supported him while times and tastes changed all around him. Last year he landed a contract with Epic, and with the corporate hype machinery laying the foundation (forewarning the masses, actually), Nugent finally set off to conquer America.

Children in the audiences, too small to remember mind splitters like "Baby Please Don't Go" or "Journey to the Center of the Mind," gaped at this bona fide hippie madman, wearing skins from creatures that Nugent the hunter had captured himself, and marveled at a brand of openended, loose-screwed guitar playing that had been rendered virtually extinct by all clearheaded, success-oriented guitarists on their way up. It was extravagant riffing with feedback, distortion, echo, fuzz and wah-wah implemented not for effect or coloration but as weapons for attack. The tribal young, aching for visceral pleasure while the elders were busy seeking aesthetic comfort, rose to the call of the wild. Ted Nugent had not found a new audience-the audience had found him.

Having a million-dollar seller, as last year's Ted Nugent album was, has not noticeably soothed the savage breast. On Free-for-All one need only listen to the breakneck mania of "Turn It Up" or the extended whine of "Writing on the Wall" to realize that he isn't resting on his musical achievements. Trophies and awards must go up on the wall at Nugent's house in the same spirit as moose heads: gratifying to look at when you're back from safari, but of no use on your next trip to the jungle. Each song on Free-for-All leaves you gasping for breathing room; no space is too small for Nugent to cram in a grand, searing riff, and his long solo on "Together" is so sinewy and melodic that I found myself staring at the turntable in disbelief.

But I do believe. And when Nugent fades out of the album's final track, "I Love You so I Told You a Lie," with a quotation from the Stones' "The Last Time," I share with him the knowing smile of those who believe in the sound, and often the fury, of rock & roll. (RS 226)



BILLY ALTMAN