Another local venue, Turner Hall

Milwaukee Turner Hall is now booking shows. The same guy who runs the Riverside theater is running Turner Hall. I suspect he's trying to compete with the Rave market. Turner Hall is not huge. At least this venue is in a good location. Don't get me wrong, The Rave is a cool place visually, but it's an echo chamber and (in my opinion) a fire trap. Here's to you Turner Hall. I hope some great bands take advantage of the new venue.

Sacred Order, Milwaukee punk from the 1980's

Way back when, there was this great Wisconsin punk band named Sacred Order. I say way back when because the original line-up featuring Jay Tiller, Mike Podolak, Chip, and Beezer were the top-end Sacred Order. Chip moved on to The Crusties, Jay Tiller started Couch Flambeau, leaving Beezer and Mike to rotate other mates into the mix. Damien Strigenz, and Don Nelson moved into Sacred Order in the later years. Those are the guys you will hear on the 2004 Last Rites DVD/CD from WMSE and Push Button Gadget. I don't know what line-up will be on the stage at The Miramar Theater on November 10th, but I am certain that it will crush.

Where did all the Ozzy fans go?

You would think that the Ozzy show would be sold out. It's not. You can still get good tickets to the Ozzy/Rob Zombie show at the Bradley Center. Mind you, they aren't in the first 30 rows, but side stage seats are good. That's going to be an echo chamber show. The Bradley Center is was built for Hockey, not rock shows.

Waiting for Rilo Kiley

If they came to The Riverside Theater I would surely go. I'm talking about Rilo Kiley. The new disk, Under The Black light has 6 strong tunes. After song six, the disk drops in quality. It even sounds like the production and mixing drops in quality by song seven. It's as if they just stopped tweaking the songs after number 6. With that, they are worthy. I see by their tour dates that they are passing Milwaukee by. That's no surprise. We're "fly over" country now. Right from Minneapolis to Chicago, or vice versa. Since Rilo Kiley has a strong front woman singer, my guess is that some people would think that the band is named after her, but it's not. Jenny Lewis is her name. It's kind of like the Jethro Tull deal. No, Ian is his name, not Jethro. Get it?

Trans Siberian Orchestra Milwaukee

Trans Siberian Orchestra, or TSO as the devoted fans call it, are coming to Milwaukee's Bradley Center on December 16th. They now have multiple bands called TSO that tour the country at the same time. This band seems to attract all sorts of fans. Young, old, rockers, non-rockers all dig this stuff. I think I will wait one more year before I check them out. Some time I will pick up a TSO ticket, but not this time.