Almost famous

I've been thinking about bands that never made it lately. Of course by this I mean bands that made it big enough for me to know about them, but that never really made it. It started when I bought an air "freshner" called Black Ice, which reminded me of the song "Black Ice" by Aragorn. That got me in a NWOBHM (i.e. nostalgic) mood, which led me back to Diamond Head. They were supposed to be the next Led Zeppelin but never made it. I saw them, though, either here or here, and got to shake the singer's hand (only about the first five rows of seats were sold, as I remember).

In the days before this blog I had a website on which I answered various questions about myself that my students sometimes asked (or that I liked to think they might ask someday). This included a list of my favorite bands, and although Diamond Head didn't make the cut, the June Brides did (my review is the more carried away of the two). As a result I got an email from Phil Wilson himself, who was amused that someone at VMI liked the June Brides. And now I find that Dave Eggers is also a fan.

I'm glad that both Diamond Head and the June Brides have had some recognition from big names at last. There's probably not much money in that, and money means more than people make out, but it isn't everything. It's like the heartwarming story of Anvil. There's a less happy ending to the story of the World of Twist. They were big enough to be named by my friend Richard as the only group he could think of that he liked at one time (or the only new group worth mentioning, or something like that) and to be named in a song by Saint Etienne (see below). But they never made it, and I heard once that at least one of them never got over it. There is so much brilliance in the world, and what gets noticed and what does not is not random, but it's painfully close. (Video from Fish Tank.)