I disagree about Ashes To Ashes. I think Fleischman would've killed on that track. I can't imagine him on Love Kills...to me that's the high point of Mark's singing career.
I would chip into a fund to hear Fleischman sing That Time Of Year!

Rf would have been great but I like the robert plant thing mark brings to it.

doublev2 wrote:Rf would have been great but I like the robert plant thing mark brings to it.

Totally agree.

I strongly believed in the charges and i think it is different from the other topic.Halford was the singer for the short-haired priest, Robert could do the same if things had fallen and he had better stay.

I agree. Robert's "look" didn't bother me then and it doesn't bother me now. The guy can fuggen sing and that's all I care about.

All of us recognize Robert's pipes ,but to a fifteen your old boy, if the song didn't have shredding guitar and all the members looking uniform, it was hard to accept. I did look past it ,however.

I say that and Cheap Trick is one of my favorite bands. GO FIGURE !!!!

I would watch Cheap Trick videos at the same time and hope that Rick Neilsen would pull out some shred licks. I thought everyone should be able to do it and being a little let down when they didn't RIP.

Now I understand.

I thought he was the drummer . I thought bobby was vinnie and vinnie was dana and Dana was the vocalist . I badocally got it all wrong.. this was just looking at the album before I looked into things.

I just remember being disappointed when guitarists wouldn't shred on EVERY SONG.

Not me. I loved a guitarist that could make a moving solo out of just a few notes AND blister my ears with a thousand. Vinnie, I think, is within a small group that would be proficient at both.

I love the sound. To me its vinnie number 1, lynch 2 and Friedman 3 . He just used to sound so good.

doublev2 wrote:I love the sound. To me its vinnie number 1, lynch 2 and Friedman 3 . He just used to sound so good.

I like those choices!

My brother told me about the latest version of Vinnie's history on Wikipedia, so I checked it out and here it is as it stands today. This one is VERY short.

Early life

In 1980, Vincent moved to Los Angeles, California where he became a staff songwriter for the television series Happy Days and Joanie Loves Chachi where many of the series songs were written on Vincent's acoustic guitar while sitting at the "Cunningham's" kitchen table on the "Happy Days" set, during off-time from the show's rehearsal schedule. Vincent has said the times of working at the Paramount lot were genuinely "happy days". According to the site "Kiss Related Recordings", Vincent has also played with the bands Hunter, Warrior, Hitchhikers, and Heat going as far back as 1970.

Kiss

Vincent's personality meshed well with Stanley and Simmons. However, Vincent's refusal to sign the employment contract strained the relationship. Due partly to disputes over what his role in the band was and his pay would be (some reports indicated that Vincent had asked for, and was flatly denied, a percentage of the band's gross profits), and despite the exhortations of both Simmons and Stanley, all through his tenure with the band Vincent refused to sign any contract making his employment official. The cumulative result of these factors would ultimately lead to Vincent leaving the band after the European leg of the "Lick It Up" tour.

With the band unable to secure a replacement guitarist on such short notice, Vincent was enticed to return for the American leg of the tour with the promise of payment of Vincent's royalties which were owing and overdue. A major rift developed between Vincent and the rest of the band over his guitar solos; what were once 5-8 minute solos timed to finish on a cue so that Stanley could introduce the next song suddenly expanded, in some instances leaving the rest of the band impatiently waiting on stage for Vincent to finish. At an LA Forum show in January 1984, Vincent continued playing despite Stanley's cueing him to finish the solo. The two nearly came to blows in the dressing room afterward, with Stanley accusing Vincent of showing him up and Vincent accusing the other three members of ruining his solo and trying to hold him back as a performer. They were separated by Carr and Simmons. At a March show in Quebec, as the band prepared to close out their set, Vincent broke into an impromptu solo, leaving the other band members standing onstage with nothing to do.

After the "Lick It Up" tour ended in March 1984, Vincent was terminated from the band, and replaced by Mark St. John (birth name Mark Norton). Despite parting on bad terms, Vincent was later utilized by Kiss as a songwriter on the 1992 album Revenge, contributing to the songs "Unholy", "Heart Of Chrome" and "I Just Wanna". Before long Vincent again fell out of favor with Simmons and Stanley, as they claimed that Vincent again began "making all kinds of crazy demands and pulling the same kind of crazy stuff all over again". In 2009, Cusano sued Kiss and A&E Network for using his image without his permission in an episode of "Gene Simmons Family Jewels."[citation needed]

Later career

A tribute album entitled Kiss My Ankh: A Tribute To Vinnie Vincent was released by SplitScreen Entertainment on August 27, 2008. The album consists of new recordings of songs from Vincent's careers with Kiss and the Vinnie Vincent Invasion. Featured artists include Steve Brown of Trixter, Troy Patrick Farrell of White Lion, T.J. Racer of Nitro, Mike Weeks of Robert Fleischman's band, Sheldon Tarsha of Adler's Appetite, Chris Caffery of Savatage and Trans-Siberian Orchestra, Ryan Roxie from the Alice Cooper band and rock & roll comic C.C. Banana, who performs a parody of the Kiss song "Unholy" (rewritten as a roast of Danger Danger vocalist Ted Poley).

In 2009, Cusano sued Kiss and A&E Network for using his image without his permission in an episode of "Gene Simmons Family Jewels."[citation needed]

And let us guess...Vinnie LOST that lawsuit? So he is appealing it to the supreme court?

yes lost. Diane did say that vv agreed some out of court settlements. who knows what though.

[youtube][/youtube]

So does that mean that this is Vinnies Wikipedia account? Surely instead of editing Wikipedia he could make some new music!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Co ... sDAword101

He was editing it.

It was previous obvious it was him given the amount of masturbatory self-flagellation in the article afterwords.

Unlike him to admit he was ousted from Kiss though. He usually fluffs his way around that.

No he says he had to leave because he was being held back. Same excuse with asg actually and supposedly enigma also.asked him to hold back gfh and actually hated what vv submitted to them.

doublev2 wrote:No he says he had to leave because he was being held back. Same excuse with asg actually and supposedly enigma also.asked him to hold back gfh and actually hated what vv submitted to them.

Let's face it. We are all fans of Vinnie's music here, so we are generally more open to his technique. I have listened to GFH about 2 dozen times and I can say, as a fan of his music, this would not have been a successful album. There is a LOT of potential, but even with the 3rd-gen copies it's easy to tell that the mix is horrific, the drum machine is glaring in spots and some songs would benefit from a more toned down guitar presence.

It is what it is though and, as a fan, I would LOVE a hi-quality version of it.
I would love even more to see a strong producer & tech remix all the songs to fix the levels. (My god, is there even bass audible in any of the songs?!?!)

For me, GFH has some of the things that I dislike about MAB's playing-
atonal shredding
Not a diss on MAB.

The first VVI album is perfect: Great songs, shredding with heavy melodies, over the top burn,passionate string bending, overtly sexual lyrics.
ACTUALLY, Vinnie's bending is what I like the most about his playing. I can't get enough of him bending over backwards and pulling on the high E string to it's highest note.

Gfh is a specialist record .. we love it but the radio and record labels is a hard sell. A couple of tunes could cross over but for sure its a vv showcase most of all .

Pretty much vv needs to release two versions of all his songs.. 1. Over the top and then a commercial toned down version. Chose your medicine .

Exactly. Vinnie is such a talented player that it seems a waste that he dedicates so much of these songs to the batshit crazy shredding. I like shredding, but it's not the end-all be-all. There should be some shredders, some melodic, some combo and some bendy like PB was saying. He does that amazingly well. I'd love to hear some solos that focused more on that.

But I think GFH was more Vinnie trying to make a point that the playing on ASG was forced to be watered down...and he was going to use GFH to set the record straight. But I think he got too OCD about it and went too far. However, I also think a good remixing from the original tapes could make it more palatable.

PinkWiz wrote:I've ALWAYS wished he would tone down the shredding in the ballads and more melodic stuff (Back On The Streets and No Substitute suffered from the shredding IMO... he had eight other heavy tunes to shred on after all.) Animal... now THAT was the perfect song to shred to. That jizz-all-over-the-place-ascending-on-the-high-E-string solo at the end gives me goosebumps every time!

Like u guys said, a perfect balance between the debut and ASG would be perfect.

I agree with all you said though. And lucky he had the Rhoads' front pickup to push the E string onto to hit that high A in Animal!!!!!


Though I do love that shredding on the ballads! God damn it!!!

shramiac wrote:
Though I do love that shredding on the ballads! God damn it!!!

Vinnie did shred PERFECTLY on those ballads.

i like what vv puts out just the way it is.. but i am just saying from a commercial stand point, but who would have thought Metallica would be commercial.

doublev2 wrote:i like what vv puts out just the way it is.. but i am just saying from a commercial stand point, but who would have thought Metallica would be commercial.

Metallica mixed it up a bit though... they had the heavy, riffy songs but their ballads remained pretty accessible.

But who knows... maybe if promotion for the debut album wouldn't have been so fucked, No Substitute or BOTS would've been hits with the shredding (afterall, Metallica DID have that little jam session at the end of One.)

I was so frustrated that BOYZ was the only single from that album because I agree, No Substitute and Back On The Streets had the potential to be huge hits at the time. And believe it or not, I never saw the BOYZ video until a few years ago. I missed the weekend they hosted the Ball. All my friends kept telling me how awesome the video was, but it never seemed to get a TON of play.

Yeah, a chance of a hit with another single. They could have made a video of just vv and no band members to counter the robert issue. Maybe vv driving around like the hunter Dokken video.
That said that time of year and love kills were released and did nothing and I would have thought they would be certain hits.
I think the look of the first record may have not worked well with the great ballads on the first record.

If that time of year had been a hit I am sure vvi would have lasted a little longer with or without the other members . It really was a make or break moment that video as well as love kills.

With Vinnie's ego he should have treated the Invasion as a solo project instead of flip flopping between a band/solo project... that's what bit him in the ass (besides his own self destructive behavior.) Hell maybe even had different singers on different songs as well as him singing lead.

I think that GFH is the Pinnacle or Zenith of Vinnie's playing from a technical standpoint. If it had been properly mixed and produced it could have made Vinnie a true guitar icon like Vai, Satriani or Malmsteen. His playing on GFH is incredible, technical, unique and in my opinion second to none. Robert's Voice is fucking amazing also on GFH!

Not bad for a hater and I do hate the little fucker

Lets give credit where credit is due, Vinnie is an ignorant, selfish, narcissistic, theiving pig but when he was playing through lets say 1992 he was one of the greatest guitar players whoever lived!

There you go

Yeah.. that's why we still hold on here. The genius that is lost inside.. and who knows if he still can even play mind blowing stuff

It's a shame that Robert's voice is so buried in the GFH mix because if you really spend some time focusing your ear on the lead vocals, they are amazing. I know there is a lot of Mark love on this board...and I like him too...but IMO Robert Fleischman is in another league.

If Vinnie would've been able to land a top tier producer for GFH and (more importantly) allow that producer do his job, GFH would've absolutely had to be considered on the list of top guitar oriented albums and potentially have earned the accolades reserved for the likes of Satriani, Vai, etc.

if vv had just been cool with everyone he would be like Vai/Satriani etc. Still around and respected. He has done so little work that its hard to really elevate him to the league of the greats.

doublev2 wrote:if vv had just been cool with everyone he would be like Vai/Satriani etc. Still around and respected. He has done so little work that its hard to really elevate him to the league of the greats.

True. He could have been one of the greats. What did his parents do to him to give him such a personality? Then again, I dont want to blame his parents.

Portillo wrote: True. He could have been one of the greats. What did his parents do to him to give him such a personality? Then again, I dont want to blame his parents.

Vinnie shows all the signs of a spoiled brat...


much like myself.

poserboy71 wrote:ACTUALLY, Vinnie's bending is what I like the most about his playing. I can't get enough of him bending over backwards and pulling on the high E string to it's highest note.

I wonder how many strings Vinnie snapped.