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Living Colour’s Debut Album ‘Vivid’ Turns 30 | An Anniversary Retrospective


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http://www.albumism.com/features/living-colour-debut-album-vivid-turns-30-anniversary-retrospective#.WukY-hZjFlU.twitter

I was working as an entertainment writer for the college newspaper when Vivid came out. Had the pleasure of doing a phone interview with Vernon about the album and the band. A top 10 record for me in my lifetime, no question.

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That album is still in my regular rotation.  Favorite track was their Heads Cover... Memories Can't Wait.  Not only did they make it their own, but there is some mighty tasteful playing on there from Vernon!

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Vivid is a fantastic album, I think I've heard at least one track off that disk per month since it came out. I've had the pleasure of meeting Vernon a few times, and he is a very cool cat :) His stuff with Masque is also superb.

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I saw them at a small place in Richmond, VA after the first album came out.  I had been turning people on to them and some of them went to the show with me.  Afterward, they were hanging out on the sidewalk and we got to meet them all and I got their autographs on my CD.  I told Vernon how much I liked one of this guitars and joked that I thought he should give it to me for all the CDs I was selling for them, so he signed my CD with "IOU [drawing of guitar] Vernon Reid".  While we were standing there, literally across the street, Prince was dropped off at an after hours club with members of his band.  They had played somewhere in the area the same night.

Edited to add: at the time I saw them, Middle Man was the song being pushed.  Cult of Personality was nothing more than a deep album cut.

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I saw them twice in small venues (once each on the Vivid and Time's Up tours) and once opening for the Stones in a football stadium. That's why I say I saw them 2 1/2 times back in the day.

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Saw Living Colour live on that tour at a smaller venue (Primus opened, they were still an obscure band).  What a show.  I played Vivid endlessly for months, still a great album.

Just remembered that singer Corey Glover was in the movie "Platoon" as well...

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I never cared for Vernon's soloing, but his rhythm on that record playing has one of the most bone crushing tones I have ever heard.
Amazing dimed-out, incredibly loud Marshall tone, expertly recorded.

Think I'll queue that up right now...

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Still have my original CD copy of Vivid.  I keep it in my truck's CD changer, along with Gretchen Goes to Nebraska by King's X.  Both were late '80s hard rock classics and both still sound good in 2018. 

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6 minutes ago, Biz Prof said:

Still have my original CD copy of Vivid.  I keep it in my truck's CD changer, along with Gretchen Goes to Nebraska by King's X.  Both were late '80s hard rock classics and both still sound good in 2018. 

Skipped a lot of classes and killed a lot of brain cells in college while listening to those two.

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2 hours ago, 1foggy said:

Just remembered that singer Corey Glover was in the movie "Platoon" as well...

I forgot about that and we (Corey and my crowd) talked about it.  At the time I saw them, I was the manager of a video store and all of the people I went to the show with worked there.

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I certainly liked it when he migrated over from ESP to be a Hamer artist, but this Mirage always reminded me of something only VR and Steve Stevens would have concocted. Pretty cool.

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I've been a fan since the late '80s too, and saw them at a bar in east Denver back in Feb. 1989...  They were absolutely awesome and I love Vernon's style!  I recall they were having monitor problems and stopped in the early part of the set and talked with the crowd for a few until the issues got straightened out...  I listen to Vivid regularly, as well as the 2nd album.  Just a great, great band!!! 

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3 hours ago, Biz Prof said:

I certainly liked it when he migrated over from ESP to be a Hamer artist, but this Mirage always reminded me of something only VR and Steve Stevens would have concocted. Pretty cool.

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I'm 99 percent sure the case my VR Centaurafornian shipped in was the original flight case for the "Glamour Boys" M-I Deluxe. Look at the tape on the case ... the only ESP he had that I can recall with anything close to a "crackle" finish was the one above.

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+1.  Still in rotation after all these years.

And I know I own Gretchen Goes to Nebraska, picked up some time in the early 90s, but have never really given it a listen.  I'll have to dig it up and give it a shake.

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30 minutes ago, Toadroller said:

And I know I own Gretchen Goes to Nebraska, picked up some time in the early 90s, but have never really given it a listen.  I'll have to dig it up and give it a shake.

Wow!  Prepare for greatness.  I wonder if it will have the same impact on a new listener today as it did on so many of us back when it was first released.  Let us know what you think.

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What an amazing album by such an amazing band!

Their third album, Stain, is unbelievable as well. It never got the press of the previous ones, but is freakin slammin.

I had a cool moment with him when he came to be a guest artist at the National Guitar Workshop, where I was a teacher along with some killer guys like Matt Smith, and the usual guest clinicians are the likes of John Scofield, To Duke Robillard, To John Petrucci to Brent Mason. On this particular occasion, Vernon had just delivered the most rambling, baffling, non-sensical clinic I have ever seen or heard of;

I was buddies with the main house sound guy Fred Schane, so that day I went to Vernon’s soundcheck. NGW had rented a Mesa half stack for him (probably the same one they got for Petrucci) and it sounded great before he got there. He plugged in one of his custom Hamers and said “Yech! Give me more high mids, Nothing but High Mids!” I was literally sitting next to Fred at the board, who looked at me like, “WTF?” And I smiled and went off to go teach my class before the afternoon clinic started. I came back down just before and had a cigarette with Fred and he was just pacing going, “I don’t know Man, I don’t know...” I, of course laughed it off, and we went in for the clinic. Vernon is a great player and a schooled guy, but started by rambling about getting bogged down by theory or technique (!!!) . What very little playing he does sounds like the Mesa had been replaced with a broken Gorilla, and then he paced back and forth across the stage saying, “picking... picking... picking...picking...” for, no exaggeration, five minutes. My mouth agape, Fred started to click his sharpie on the desk says, “Dudes gotta be high...” He proceeds to start inviting students onstage to plug in and wail. Fred Scrambles to adjust. A metal kid gets up and shreds. He invites a stray kid to play some funk. No drummer or rhythm section, or relation to key or playing in the same room. Vernon encourages this. Kids get anxious clutching their guitars. Vernon says, “Fuck it. Anybody that wants to come up and plug in, come on up.” Fred spasms and throws his sharpie over his shoulder as his eyes spin in his head and kids rush the stage. I died. I can’t even... It becomes a complete melee and after way too long the director jumps up and says, “Thank you Everybody! Blah blah blah” and they close the curtains. I am convulsing in my seat as Fred just says, “Why?... Why?...” The audience shuffles out in complete bewilderment. There were literally no specifics discussed. Fred and I step out for a smoke as the possibilities fly. Drugs? Schizophrenia? Complete lack of preparedness? Boggling.

I go back in to the theater and go past the curtain onstage and Vernon is sitting quietly with a couple other staff members, and I introduce myself as a faculty member and Hamer Guy. He is bright, articulate and def not high or mentally ill. I ask, “Hey, the transcription I learned Cult of Personality in GFTPM has a ton of pull offs to use the open D’s But the footage I’ve seen of you looks way different and I can’t figure it out. How do you approach it?” He was bright and articulate and picked up the custom and showed me how he moves his first finger from the low g up to the f, ring finger on the d on the 5th fret of the a string, and repeats that motion for each part of the riff. I was like, “Wow, that’s a lot of motion, I would have a much harder time with that!” He says, “Yeah it’s quirky, but works great. Here, you try.” And takes the guitar off and hands it to me. So, utterly unexpectedly, immediately after a completely baffling public display, Vernon Reid very articulately teaches me how he plays Cult of Personality - on his custom Hamer.

That was a really gracious thing to do, and we had a nice little chat for a few more minutes and I went off to go teach another class. I have no explanation for the clinic debacle, but he was kind, and lucid and very gracious to me one on one.

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Here's a condensed version of VR explaining the origin of "Cult" and playing the main riff up close. There's a more-detailed seven-minute version on YT as well.

Having a VR-owned guitar, EVERYONE expects me to play this lick when I show off the guitar and share its story. The lick is a very choppy, unnatural and unorthodox fingering, hand motion and string skip, as Geoff pointed out. All you can really do is concentrate on hitting the notes as clean and as in time as you can, because you will never make it fluid and/or graceful under your hand.

Hell, watch Vernon play it below ... he's been playing that lick daily for three decades and he still looks like he's stroking the cat's fur the wrong way haha.

 

Good call on "Stain," Geoff ... as much as I love "Vivid," my copy of "Stain" probably has more miles on its odometer over the years.

 

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