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November Hotel

23 04 2007

November Hotel es la última canción del disco Above del grupo Mad Season. El video en cuestión está sacado de un concierto que editaron en cinta en la mitad de los 90. Es en el Moore Theater de Seattle.

Mad Season es un grupo de amigos que se juntaron para hacer un disco y una pequeña gira en verano de 1995. Con un sólo disco grabado en pocos meses es para mí uno de los grupos que más me han gustado nunca.  

El grupo estuvo formado por Layne Staley (Alice In Chains – vocalista, guitarra), Mike McCready (Pearl Jam – guitarra), Barret Martin (Screaming Trees – batería, percusión) y John Baker (The Walkabouts – bajo) y colaboraron en él Mark Lanegan (Screaming Trees – vocalista) y Skerik (percusión – saxofón). 

Mad Season Above
 
 

10 de los mejores minutos de Mike McCready como guitarrista en directo.

Imagen de previsualización de YouTube

Filmed at the Moore Theatre in Seattle, on the 29th April 1995.
Mad Season was formed in 1994 by the trio of Mike McCready (guitar), Barrett Martin (drums) and John Baker Saunders (bass). All three had long been a part of the Seattle music community with McCready playing in such bands as Pearl Jam and Temple of the Dog, Martin with Skin Yard and the Screaming Trees and Saunders with The Walkabouts as well as blues talents such as Little Pat Rushing, Hubert Sumlin, Sammy Fender, and the Lamont Cranston Band.


Immediately the trio set up rehearsal time together and wrote two songs, "Wake Up" and "River of Deceit", both of which would later appear on their album Above. McCready then brought in friend and Alice in Chains frontman Layne Staley to round out the lineup.
Despite not having a single song completely prepared (only beginnings of songs, according to Martin) and not even having a name for the band, McCready scheduled an unannounced show at the Crocodile Cafe in October 1994, which turned out to be a big success. In fact, the song "Artificial Red", which was also to appear on the album, actually came together during the show itself.

Two more gigs were scheduled at the same venue, with the band calling themselves the Gacy Bunch, after both the notorious serial killer John Wayne Gacy of Chicago and a sitcom from the 1970s called The Brady Bunch.
On January 8 of 1995, the band made an appearance on Pearl Jam's Self-Pollution Radio worldwide broadcast, performing "Lifeless Dead" and "I Don't Know Anything".


After gaining more popularity, the band recorded their only album and changed their name to Mad Season, which is an English term for the time of the year when psilocybin mushrooms are in full bloom.


The album, Above, which was recorded in Seattle at Bad Animals Studio (co-owned by Ann and Nancy Wilson of Heart) and co-produced by the band and Pearl Jam sound engineer Brett Eliason, featured 10 songs. It also included guest vocals by Screaming Trees frontman and solo artist Mark Lanegan. The album was released on March 15, 1995 on Columbia Records to critical and commercial success. Over the course of 1995, Above scaled the Billboard 200 eventually peaking at #24, furthermore spawning two singles: "River of Deceit" (#2 Mainstream Rock Tracks, #9 Modern Rock Tracks) and "I Don't Know Anything" (#20 Mainstream Rock Tracks). Above was certified gold on June 14 of that year.
The band continued to play shows during the Spring of '95 before going on hiatus to return to work with their main bands. During this time the band released the 'Live At The Moore Theatre' video which was a live performance recorded at Seattle's Moore Theatre on April 29, 1995. Also during this time the band contributed a cover of John Lennon's "I Don't Wanna Be A Soldier" to the John Lennon tribute compilation Working Class Hero.


In 1996 a live version of "River Of Deceit" surfaced on the Bite Back: Live At Crocodile Cafe compilation although by this time Mad Season had long been dormant from live work.


In 1997 attempts were made by McCready, Saunders and Martin to revive Mad Season although by this point Staley's health had worsened due to severe drug addiction. As a result he declined to participate in the project any further thus leaving Mad Season without a singer.
With Staley now out of the picture, the band recruited vocalist Mark Lanegan (of the Screaming Trees) who had previously guested on the Above album (as well as at live shows) as their new permanent singer. With the switch in frontman the group also switched names adopting the 'Disinformation' moniker in late 1997.


Work reportedly began in 1998 on what would have been Disinformation's debut album although between everyone's busy schedules studio time was hard to come by. Over the course of the year the quartet gradually grew apart making a 'Disinformation' album all the more unlikely. Another critical blow was dealt to the project in January 1999 with the death of bassist John Baker Saunders (from an overdose of heroin). The group (esp. Saunders' long-time friend Mike McCready) were deeply saddened to hear news of his death.

[tags]Mad Season, Above, Layne Staley, Mike McCready[/tags]

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One response to “November Hotel”

24 04 2007
Versvs (09:00:15) :

maravillosos… Staley era grande :_

¿irás a festimad este año?

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