Nicholas Pell

I am bracing myself for the incoming fury of guys who graduated high school in 1996, but I’m just going to come out and say it: Nirvana ruined rock & roll. Every couple of years I check out their catalog again. Every couple of years I’m left with the same......

So I guess Ted Nugent was in the news again. He wrote some kind of list about why you should support Donald Trump, which upset certain people as every move the Nuge makes is wont to do. But let’s put the man’s politics aside for a second (though regular readers know......

One thing I enjoyed about watching both conventions was the tepid wedding bands reminding me of songs I actually like. Steely Dan, REO Speedwagon and Faces all got nods from either the DNC Band or the RNC Band. But I have to tip my hat to the DNC Band for......

“And in the beginning there was the word, Freebird. And Freebird would be yelled throughout the centuries. Freebird, the mantra of the moron.” - Bill Hicks I don’t understand why the Allman Brothers’ stock has risen over the last few years but Lynyrd Skynyrd remain in the Dixie dregs of......

I recently had some friends visiting from the States. That’s right, kids; not only do I not live in L.A. anymore, I don’t even in live in America. It can be a bummer not being able to walk around with a handgun or five and they don't even celebrate Independence......

I know it’s fashionable to mock Danzig, but if I die tomorrow I want to be known as the man who cried out, “Enough!” There’s nothing funny about Danzig, all right? Unless your name is “Gordon Lightfoot” or “Lemmy,” his worst performances are orders of magnitude better than the best......

What is classic rock? It is one of the most nebulous terms in the music business. When exactly does the classification of classic rock begin, and where does it end? How do you compare different eras with disparate talents with other rockers who may have been the first to unleash......

I was actually kind of surprised at how angry people were about my "Bat Out of Hell Is Better than Born to Run" article. I didn’t even say I didn’t like Born To Run, just that I liked Bat Out of Hell better. A friend of mine asked if my Hot Water......

Strap yourself in, kids. This is one of those "Unpopular Opinions" where people are going to accuse me of being a Radiohead-adoring elitist (oh hell no) or a Justin Bieber fanboy (I have literally never heard Justin Bieber, so for all I know, he could be amazing).  If you’re a......

Following up from my Hall and Oates essay, I decided it was time to talk about another musical “guilty pleasure” for those not quite cool enough to abandon the idea of guilty pleasures. I’m talking about what the common folk call “hair metal,” but what has alternately been called glam......