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Rating:
An album unfairly dismissed. I believe that on the web it's up to me to play the devil’s advocate, but I want those looking for information on "Still Climbing" (1994) to also hear an opposing voice without prejudice.
That's why I’ll start with what, in my opinion, did not convince those who listened to the album. Firstly, the courage to make this music that does not give an inch to the trends of the time: I think this is the reason for hasty listens and judgments like "yes, good, goodbye". The eleven tracks proposed by Tom Keifer and his associates are often quite long, and I imagine they were perceived as repetitive. Hence the last potential weakness of this work: despite the return to some sounds from "Long Cold Winter" and the continuity on the path of "Heartbreak Station", this album is neither immediate nor easy listening. On the contrary, it requires a high metabolism time because the components that animate it are complex, articulated, diverse, and so well-developed that they form a perfect whole where it is difficult to distinguish the individual elements.
Having said that – I myself was a victim of the last observation I made for a while – I’ll now share my personal vision of the fourth full-length from Cinderella. Take it as you will. From the times of the "Saints In Hell", many things have changed in the soul of Tom Keifer. The Cinderella experience, in the height of the 80s, marked both him and rock. His gypsy band, gypsy by vocation and migrant by nature, never lingered too much on purely glam territories, remaining wonderfully on the margins and thus becoming a cult for all 80s rock lovers: a unique ability to marginalize themselves to become desirable. Like the mysterious and dark charm of wanderers, Cinderella built their image as caravan rockers, covering themselves in wild animal skins, from cheetah to zebra, and veils like fortune tellers. Indeed, their music has never been an example of digestibility, but since the beginning with "Night Songs" and up to the previous “heartbreak station”, success was always guaranteed. Initially from tough and set tracks, then from super sweet ballads. The best virtue and worst limit (but not for me) of Cinderella remains Tom Keifer. An immense personality probably victim of his prosaic and simultaneously poetic artistic genius. A fleeting comparison makes me relate him to Marcel Proust. A page and a half without a period. So Tom Keifer writes, writes, writes and composes texts and melodies that from the verbal synthesis of a Push, Push! reach the The Road's Still Long of Still Climbing. Here, the mechanism that moves this album becomes full of gears and humors that make this army of notes fluid, released late (alas!) due to the outbreak of the Gulf War.
Blues and auteur hard rock are the genre boldly proposed by the Philadelphia quartet, which for this obsessive work relies on the collaboration of no less than eleven other members among musicians and choristers. Do you get the hint? If you go look at who wrote all the lyrics, then you can also understand that this album is the novel Tom Keifer kept inside for ten years. (Another highly punishable literary comparison) Like Miguel Cervantes combined an infinite variety of literary genres, here the legendary Tom has kneaded poetry, diary pages, and free prose, protecting them with the shields of the finest forges: blues, country, hard rock. I get disgusted by the music market generated by grunge: if you’re not like this, you're a corpse. In this perspective, herein lies the indifference towards this work. And yet, the step back everyone talks about, for me, is a step forward. Tom Keifer decided to abandon even the last glamorous airs to dig inside himself and compose the album of the soul. No wink, no pat on the back, nothing at all to be liked. Just music (sometimes almost at the level of a musical) that emboldens his spirit, a strong form of expression, a way to extrovert himself, like a painting or a poem. Everything is full of details. Breaths, moans, gasps, diaphragm movements are rendered by winds like the trombone that more than once, almost imperceptibly, carries an entire track with a low and rough tone. Those who hear these things in the album can understand why it is a great album. Those who miss these details do not know what they are listening to. This tracked vehicle brazenly furrows the clods of hard blues terrain. The techniques used are varied. The sounds produced as well. Acoustic guitars brushing the banjo almost seem to produce that rhythmic sound of oriental trinkets moved by the wind hanging above doors. I think of a music box. Blues is suffering, in some cases resignation. The death of Tom’s mother leads him to compose the greatest ballad our guys have ever proposed: "Hard To Find The Words". And then an excruciating, long, destructive melancholy that invades even the theoretically livelier tracks, from the overture of "Bad Attitude Shuffle", retro like the music listened to in the 30s, to the wonderful "Talk Is Cheap", which screams while it cries. I leave the other tracks to you. I’ll keep this "Still Climbing" close.
Posthumous work of a living person.
Tracklist and Lyrics
01 Bad Attitude Shuffle (05:31)
When I get up in the morning
Got a world of trouble on my mind
And nothin seems too easy
When your clock�s tickin quarter to five
Make my way down to the door
Can't put my troubles on no shelf
Cause when nobody worries for you
You got to worry for youself
Cruisin in my four wheels
It's got everything I need inside
Think I'll stop and fill it up for the ride
Man said that be twenty dollars
Mister, by the way how's your health
I said mister here's your money
Now you keep your questions for yourself
And it's my life that I'm livin
Wouldn't want to be no one else
So if you don't like how I dot it
Ya better keep it to yourself
Kick it in
When I get up in the morning
Got a world of trouble on my mind
And nothin seems too easy
When your clock�s tickin quarter to nine
Make my way down to the door
Can't put my troubles on no shelf
Cause when nobody worries for you
You got to worry for yourself
And it's my life that I'm livin
Wouldn't want to be no one else
So if you don't like how I do it
Ya better keep it to yourself
And it's my life that I'm livin
Wouldn't want to be no one else
So if you don't like how I do it
Fuckin keep it to yourself
03 Talk Is Cheap (03:59)
You¹re wearin out
your welcome wagon
Scraped ya up to drag ya
Home on the range you got the flame
So now you suck some honeys
Comb your hair get out of bed
And wash your face, now look you¹re all
Alone in your room you feel the gloom
So now you curse the day you¹re
Sorry you missed the boat
Sorry that¹s all she wrote
I don¹t wanna hear it
Mm you talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
I don¹t wanna hear it
T-T-Talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
You talk of love and hope someday
You won¹t be feeling so
Neglected, all your promises
And now you turn to me and scream
It¹s hectic at the bottom
And it¹s lonely at the top, so run to
Mommy¹s always waitin
But this time she blew her top,
you say you¹re
Sorry you missed the boat
Sorry that¹s all she wrote
I don¹t wanna hear it
Mm your talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
I don¹t wanna hear it
T-T-Talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
I don¹t wanna hear it
Ah your talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
I don¹t wanna hear it
T-T-Talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
Sorry you missed the boat
Sorry that¹s all she wrote
I don¹t wanna hear it
Mm your talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
I don¹t wanna heart it
T-T-Talk is cheap
I don¹t wanna know
04 Hard to Find the Words (05:45)
CINDERELLA
Hard to Find the Words
Mama sometimes I feel inside
There's nothing I can say
Nothing I can do
Could ever match the love you gave
You taught me how to live
Told me walk before you run
And you were always there to pick me up
Everytime I'd have a fall
And mama I know there's been times
When I didn't always understrand
By and by we do some growing up
And it makes just a little more sense
But sometimes it's hard to find the words
But I'll do the best that I can
Thank you for the love mama
It's what made this boy a man
I know the road�s been long
And I know you've seen some rain
Making the best of what we had
I never heard you complain
When I look in the mirror today
Wondering could I be as strong
Could I give as much to someone else
As you gave to your son
And mama I know there's been times
When we didn't see eye to eye
By and by we do some growing up
And we understand the reasons why
But sometimes it's hard to find the words
But I'll do the best I can
Thank you for the love mama
It's what made this boy a man, yea
Many years have gone by
And I've been living them the best I can
And mama I know there's been times
When I didn't always understand
By and by we do some growing up
And it makes just a little more sense
But sometimes it's hard to find the words
But I'll do the best I can
Thank you for the love mama
It's what made this boy a man, yeah
05 Blood From a Stone (04:51)
Well I've been walkin
Down a one way dirty street
Tryin to find the answers
And I've been hopin
For a chance to meet
The rat that spread the cancer
And the lies they've been spinnin
And the smiles they've been grinnin
There has sure been some sinnin
But nobody's winnin
When the walls start to crumblin
You feel like you're stumblin
And nobody wants you when you're down
They took the boy from the city
But they can't take the city from
the boys lookin� pretty
Now he's lookin like a pity
Cut the flesh down to the bone
But you can't get
You can't get blood from a stone
You can't get blood from a stone
Well I'm a rollin
But my train�s gone off the tracks
and my wheels are spinnin
And I'm a walkin
Down a one way dirty street
But my heart�s not sinkin
From the love they've been buyin
And the blues they've been cryin
Now the time keeps a flyin
But nobody's tryin
Cause the love of the money
Didn't turn out so sunny
When the well�s dry
No one comes around
They took the boy from the city
But they can't take the city from the
Boys lookin pretty
Now he's lookin like a pity
Cut the flesh down to the bone
But you can't get
You can't get from a stone
You can try
But I still got the fight in my eyes
Suck it dry
Cause I've had about enough of your lies
They took the boy from the city
But they can't take the city form the
Boys lookin pretty
Now he's lookin like a pity
Cut the flesh down to the bone
But you can't get blood from a stone
They took the boy form the city
But they can't take the city from the
Boys lookin pretty
Now he's looking like a pity
Cut the flesh down to the bone
But you can't get
You can't get blood from a stone
07 Freewheelin' (03:07)
You say I get around but
I'm gonna hit the ground
I don't hear a word you're sayin'
Going out of my head and
The world's turnin' red
Don't think I'll be stayin'
You got your fancy pants now
Wear 'em to the dance
All I got is what I'm playin'
But the trouble with you is there ain't just a few
Don't take the ride unless you're payin'
Like a hot burnin' fire
Blazin' out of control
I couldn't get much higher, I'm
Freewheelin
Nothin' gets in my way
When I'm freewheelin
I'm free yea
Take a look around cause it's all fallin' down
Fallin' from the dream that we created
I'm lookin' up at the sky and I'm wondering why
Why it's all deflated
You got a million and one ways to have fun
Everything I've done is over-rated
So take a step back cause I don't need the flack
I can see your promises a fadin'
Like a hot burnin' fire
Blazin' out of control
I couldn't get much higher, I'm
Freewheelin
Nothin' gets in my way
When I'm freewheelin
I'm free yea
Like a hot burnin' fire
Blazin' out of control
I couldn't get much higher, I'm
Freewheelin
Nothin' gets in my way
When I'm freewheelin
I'm free yea
Freewheelin
Nothing get in my way
When I'm freewheelin
I'm free yea
Freewheelin
When I'm freewheelin
I'm free yea
11 Hot & Bothered (03:57)
You got me jumpin right out of my skin
You keep it up and I¹ll be comin on in
You start a feelin you¹re the cream of the crop
You gonna break my heart or just make it stop
You told me that you¹d always love me true
But then I heard you told another guy too
Take a cold shower but he water boils hot
The way you twist and shake it girl
you tie me in a knot
and get me hot
Ooh hot & bothered
So hot & bothered
You get me
Hot & bothered
Come on now
Now listen
I pick you up at eight by ten we do the town
Empty my pockets just a tryin to get you down
Throw in the towel I think your games are such a bore
Just when I think I¹ve lost you pull me to the floor
And get me hot
Ooh hot & bothered
So hot & bothered
You get me hot & bothered
So hot & bothered
Ooo you get me hot
Hot & bothered
So hot & bothered
Baby Baby Baby get me hot
Ooh you get me hot
Hot & bothered
So hot & bothered
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Other reviews
By Aquarius27
"Still Climbing is a grand album, with an incredibly inspired Keifer... just over 53 minutes of pure Rock n Roll and Blues perfectly fused together."
"'Hard To Find The Words'... one of the most beautiful ballads of the '90s, a goosebump-inducing song."
