Racer X / "Fire of Rock" / Technical Difficulties (2) / Dec 1999

Artist: Racer X
Original Album: Technical Difficulties
Track: Fire of Rock

Although I've picked two tracks by Racer X before, I don't think I've ever presented a sort of '"beginner's guide" style introduction for the benefit of people who are new to the band. So here goes:

For most people the primary attraction to Racer X is Paul Gilbert's solos. The band were formed in 1985 seemingly for the primary purpose of showcasing PG's Malmsteen inspired guitar wizardry. The debut album was recorded with a line-up featuring Jeff Martin (the American one) on vocals, John Alderete (now known as Juan Alderete and performing with The Mars Volta) on bass and Harry Gschoesser on drums. Incidentally, singer Jeff Martin has been the drummer for Dokken, Michael Schenker and Badlands at various points as well as singing backing vocals on the Priest track Wild Nights, Hot & Crazy Days from Turbo, he also now has a solo album available called The Fool. The debut album Street Lethal was released in '86 on Mike Varney's (that's the guy who discovered Malmsteen, Marty Friedman, [artist vinnie moore and many others I've listed time and time again) Shrapnel label, and seemed mainly to catch the attention of fans of Malmsteen, not least on account of the instrumental Y.R.O. (which stands for Yngwie Rip Off). Between solos, the music of Racer X initially owed a lot to the faster 'speed metal' style Judas Priest tracks, lyrics tended to revolve around motorcycles and going very fast on the streets of LA at night, unsurprising given that the music itself was very fast and the band took its name from a character in Speed Racer. Vocally, Jeff Martin was a decent disciple of the Halford school of vocals, though he's perhaps not as good as the real thing.

There wasn't much change for the second album Second Heat, although there were some changes to the line-up, an even bigger Priest fan, Scott Travis (who is now the actual drummer of Judas Priest) replaced Gschoesser on drums, and a second guitarist Bruce Bouillet, presumably to bring more of a live feel to the lightning fast guitar harmonies (imagine if there was someone harmonising Malmsteen's playing in perfect time, if you're completely in the dark). Further adding to the similarities between Racer X and Judas Priest, Jeff Martin. a personal friend of many of the members of Priest having performed backing vocals on Turbo had, so the story goes, expressed an interest in an unused Priest demo Heart of a Lion, so when the band decided they weren't going to use it, they gave it to him, and Racer X covered the unreleased Priest track for Second Heat. Another cover also found its way onto the sophomore release David Bowie's Moonage Daydream, if you're a fan of that track it's well worth checking it out by the way as the Racer X version is a very cool rockier version.

Sadly though, after two albums and frequent touring the band's popularity was failing to increase at rates certain band members were happy with, and when label owner Mike Varney offered to set Paul Gilbert up with a new supergroup he was assembling on behalf of Atlantic records, Paul jumped ship to the newly formed Mr. Big. Around the same time Judas Priest began looking for a new drummer when Jeff Martin (also a drummer himself don't forget) recommended Scott for the position, which as I mentioned earlier, he was soon awarded. Two live albums Extreme Volume Live and Live Extreme Volume 2 were recorded during the touring supporting Second Heat though.

From there there was a brief period with a couple of alternate members which yielded no studio albums and essentially lead to an extended hiatus, until a couple of years after Paul left Mr. Big. Between late '99 and 2002, the reformed band (minus Bouillet who returned only in a production role) recorded three albums, though exact release dates of the albums are rather unreliably reported these days so its hard to put exact dates on the albums which were mostly released either just before or just after New Year's over the subsequent years of that period. The first two albums Technical Difficulties and Superheroes while carrying over several unrecorded songs from before the hiatus (including today's track) featured a vastly improved studio sound, an injection of mild humour in several songs, and a handful of slower songs that brought some admirable variety to the songs and arguably better songwriting. Many listeners agree that instrumental tracks like the title track Technical Difficulties and King of the Monsters are among the liveliest, most interestingly crafted and, above all, challenging instrumentals they've heard. Of course, some disagree but that's always going to be the case. The vocal tracks regularly meet a much more mixed bag of reactions, it's notable that the vocals are mostly lower pitched (though still fairly high) and more like the sort of rock vocals music you'd have heard on 'alternative hard rock' radio at the time. There's still a strong influence of Judas Priest and Malmsteen, but a myriad of other influences too many to name are given a more rominent role, a reflection perhaps of theband members' added maturity post-hiatus and experience with other bands during said hiatus, perhaps? If you're not particularly partial to Halford imitation vocals, Technical Diffilties is the first album you'd ant to check out.

The fifth and, to date, final album was 2002's misleadingly titled Getting Heavier. The music on which was generally slower paced and not as heavy. The band would later respond to criticism, claiming that the title was more a description of how life was 'getting heavier' every day and that the lyrics supposedly reflected that. You could almost call Getting Heavier a sell out album, except that there was no real increase in sales, and if anything a decrease as a result of the album, and the band never really saw any commercial success. Getting Heavier generally bares more resemblance to Paul Gilbert's first handful of solo albums that drew heavily from the Beatles, Who, Rolling Stones and a even The Osmonds (and included a Spice Girls' cover on 2000's Alligator Farm) than Priest, but sounds even more like Jeff Martin's 2006 album The Fool, which again draws from the Beatles, but more from bands like Zeppelin and UFO. If that sounds appealing to you, it might be worth a gamble, but the general consensus, even among fans, is that their effort at mind 70s hard rock/metal doesn't really standout as a great album.

Nevertheless, I enjoy all the albums, though to varying degrees. They're all good, but in these days of wide choices of great music, I fully understand if people think they can find music they prefer. Anyway, I hope this is a helpful (to someone), if slightly badly planned, "beginners' guide", though I feel like I've probably written more here than on their wikipedia page, making it more of a thorough, expert's guide than a beginner's. Thank you for listening to my lecture, are there any questions?