All purpose UFO thread...ask anything

well I'm out here on the road...

 

I feel just like a rolling stone...

 

Into the highways of the night

 

Great shots! Thx for posting them.

 

I probably saw them on that tour. Thanks for the pix!!

 

Thank you.

I think I have a 3 minute roll of Super 8 movie film shot of this show as well. I've not seen it in 30 years. It's silent but I recall it is "Shoot Shoot".

I put on the live Strangers version when I've viewed it.

 

If ya'll would like to see more of my stuff I just updated my Flickr album with some more rock shots. The link is Rock Concert Photography in my signature. Some pretty hot and hard rocking shows from back when.

The two Rush shots are from this UFO night in I think 1979. They are on tour in support of Hemispheres. Just about their peak period imo.

 

Holy crap that is some amazing stuff. GREAT shots!

Petty. Van Halen. Rush. Frampton. Black Sabbath. Queen. Aerosmith.

Are the shots with the realy skinny guy on the black Les Paul of Diamond Head (Brian Tatler)? Or is that Brad Whitford of Aerosmith?

AC/DC. Stones. Nugent. Ozzy. Kiss. Tom Petty/Stevie Nicks (man she was gorgeous back then). Clapton. Those are just the ones I recognize.

 

That is Brad Whitford playin' Leed Getar. I have shots of the band with Joe Perry and with Jimmy Crespo. I have not decided on which of those shots I should consider.

Glad you like them. They should be fun and remind us of the fun of going to a good concert, or of the period for those that were around back then.

 

I guess Paul Chapman hadn't yet switched to BC Rich on this tour.

[Weird though, I went to post a picture of him with a Rich Bich, and this says it was on that tour, maybe later in that tour?]



UFO ~ 'No Place To Run' ~ An Underrated Gem

Mystery solved! Later on in that same thread:

UFO ~ 'No Place To Run' ~ An Underrated Gem

 

I don't recall if I ever mentioned it in this thread but I used to own a Gibson Flying V that previously belonged to Paul Chapman. It's kind of a funny story how I came to buy that guitar and if I haven't told it and anyone is curious just ask and I will tell the tale.

 

Of course we want to know...stop teasing!!

 

OK, goes like this.....

In the 80's my first real job out of college I was working at a big pharma company. There were two "old" guys in my department both named Joe (in their late 20's or early 30's but that was ancient to me being like 21-22 or whatever). They both worked their way up from nothings in the mailroom or something like that and wouldn't give me or another recent hire out of college the time of day. Barely spoke to me at all really. They had something against "college kids".

After about a year or so somehow my music tastes, guitar addiction, etc came to their attention and won their respect, especially Joe #1 who was a huge Wishbone Ash fan, a band which I liked but only had a few albums by and had not pursued investigating any further after mabe 1 or 2 early albums that I bought in college. But Joe turned me onto Ash in a big way and I began picking up all their albums. Joe used to play guitar but I think that had kind of fell by the wayside in recent years after he got married, but his main guitar hero was Andy Powell of Wishbone Ash whose signature guitar was a Flying V.

The company we worked for was near a main road which led into a town that had a music store called Medley Music. One day Joe had gone out to lunch and he came back with a used Flying V that he bought at Medley and said that the store told him it used to belong to somebody in a band called UFO.

He wasn't into UFO and didn't really know anything about them. I of course was a huge UFO fan and total Schenker worshipper. The guitar was a brownish sunburst, not a black/white iconic Schenker V btw. It had some mods done to it, extra toggle switch and Dimarzio pickups or something like that. Nevertheless I was out of my mind with envy that he had a guitar Schenker might have played - at this time though the band lineup was Tonka, not Schenker. But I didn't even know/remember Chapman playing a V (I saw them in 1979 at a show that was supposed to be Schenker but he was awol, Chapman filled in and all night long many of us in the crowd kept yelling WHERE'S SCHENKER?!!? every time it got quiet. AC/DC opened up that show and blew them away but that is a different story. I did not remember Chapman playing a V at that btw).

So Joe did not know the name of the guitarist who used to own it. As soon as the work day ended I ran down to Medley and went to the guitar section, told the guy that a friend of mine just bought a V there today, and that my friend said it used to belong to someone in UFO but that he did not recall the name, and before I could even finish my sentence the guy said something like "No that was not Schenker's, that was Paul Chapman's". I don't recall the exact story how the store got it but I think Chapman lived in the area at the time (this would be the suburbs outside of Philadelphia). Or maybe he knew the owner. I dunno.

A couple years later Joe decided to sell it and I bought it for $500. I kept it for a few years but ended up selling it to guy who was a V collector/total Schenker nut like me. Ironically a few years later we recognized each other while at a Phillies game! I haven't seen him since though but that was weird seeing him at the game.

The main reason I sold it was because I bought a brand new strat that I liked a lot more, and something about that V that always bugged me was how filthy the fretboard was. Everytime I played it my fingers turned black. I just couldn't figure out how to clean it either. I assume that it must have gotten a lot of use from Chapman under the hot stage lights and his sweat or whatever got soaked into it (???).

Unfortunately I don't think I have any photos of it or I'd post them. If anyone has seen any Tonka photos playing a V steer me to them and I'll see if that looks like that guitar.

 

Wow, cool story!

 

Are they still unidentified? Are they flying? What sort of objects besides vinyl do they have? Do they like Roswell?

 

Dang, that's an awesome story. I've never seen Chapman play a V either, and I think I saw them twice with him in the '80's.

... I got a BC Rich Eagle in the early '80's because of Paul Chapman and Neil Giraldo. Still have it, a really nice metallic blue. The store had it at a closeout price or something, my dad called and asked if I wanted it, and of course I said yes. My '79 Les Paul is my "baby", but the '81 Eagle isn't far behind, I tell ya ...

 

I absolutely LOVE this band, and happen to think that this might be the best "Reunion" type of LP that any band has ever put out.

Saw them on the tour in support of this album at the Limelight in NYC...fantastic show, but it must have been a nightmare for anyone with claustrophobia. I've never been in a venue that was as packed and over-sold as that place that night!

Also saw them in May of 2017 with Saxon...another great show.

I can't think of another band that has continued to put out quality new music so late in their career, year after year, as UFO - even with all the personnel changes.

 

The main question I always have about UFO is just how great could they have been if they'd kept it all together. They were pretty damned amazing in the state they were usually in, so it's probaby anybody's guess!

 

IMHO, I think they had more or less the success they deserved. Music was changing, and there's almost no hard rock band that was big in the 70ties that was able to continue their success through the 80ties, they all struggled sooner or later...

 

Yeah when you look at the big picture 60's didn't translate to 70's, 70's to 80's. 80's to 90's and so on....

They had a great run all things considered

 

I wasn't speaking of the levels of success they achieved, but what they could have managed musically if they'd had it together all the time!!!

 

Sorry, but I really don't get where you're coming from. UFO have very well established themselves as a hard rocking, hard living band, fueled with and loaded full of their authentic attitude. Is that so miserable?
Also, I can't see where they messed things up because they hadn't it together - apart from, of course, the one or other occasional bad gig here and there...
But album-wise, in creative terms, song-wise... to me, it's all there, a rightful legend.
As I understand you, you could either ask what AC/DC could have achieved if they didn't have limited themselves to hard driven rock'n'roll. What's the point?
If you mean Michael Schenker and his virtuosity, he never was the leader in that band (like Page in Zeppelin, if you want) and, just like Randy Rhoads or John Sykes, just added his flavor during his tenure.
The only thing that didn't work out was establishing a stable line-up. Like Thin Lizzy, too many changes and too many new faces. But would that have changed or even elevated the music? I don't think so.

 

I'm listening to this one right now:



I don't know if I like it more than my other two faves from the Paul Chapman era:

1/10/1981 Hammersmith London
3/14/1982 Kiel St Louis

But it's quite good, nonetheless!

 

Regarding the Rockpalast DVD/CD/LP ... I found myself driving through Dortmund a couple of weeks ago and went right past the Westfallenhalle. Unfortunately it was gone before I realised what it was, and I'd no time to turn back to get a pic.

It's a big, round, old-fashioned glass building. Interesting to see these venues "in the flesh" after seeing the name so many times over the years.