Carmine Appice

Carmine Appice & Friends - Rock Super Session #1

‘Carmine Appice & Friends’ was a very short-lived “all star” project that included Appice on drums, Eric Carmen and Rick Derringer on guitars, Duane Hitchings on keyboards and Tom Petersson on bass. Using the moniker “Rock Super Session Vol 1” they played five shows in Japan, recording this album at their first show at The Budokan in Tokyo on March 4, 1982. They also played in Nagoya, two performances in Osaka and a show in Fukuoka.

Just 10 days later on March 14, 1982 they played at the Savoy in New York City in a benefit concert for UNICEF. Eric Carmen was absent for this show but other special guests such as Charlie Daniels rotated through the show, and all appeared on stage together for the final song. This benefit concert was recorded and released under the title “Hanging On Live”, then later re-released as “Savoy 1982”. Then the Budokan concert was re-released as a double album titled “Rock Super Session #1 / The Advent of Zeus” in 1999, resulting in this “all star” band releasing four live albums after playing a total of just six show dates, only two of which were recorded. That’s got to be a record of some sort.

It is revealing that none of the participants in this band, even Carmine Appice, mention any of these albums in their discographies or music biographies. The reason is simple - the albums are awful. It seems this band was a failed attempt to capitalize on the popularity of American bands in Japan at that time, with players who had previously been well received by Japanese audiences included to increase attendance. But it didn’t work - crowd response to the band was lukewarm at best.

The albums are poorly recorded even by 1980’s standards with repeated feedback, muddy and unbalanced mixes, the song selection is very uneven as it includes tunes written by each band member combined with cover and jam band tunes, plus the vocals at times are frightfully bad. For instance, on the “Rock Super Sessions Vol.1” album, Tom Petersson sings two Cheap Trick songs, ‘Ain’t That A Shame’ and ‘I Know What I Want’, both of which were deleted from the show when the concert was broadcast by an FM radio station in Japan three months later.

Carmine Appice & Friends - Hanging On Live

UNICEF benefit Concert

This show was not so much of an “all stars” show as it was a ‘Return Of Vanilla Fudge’ show. After playing a few songs and introducing the players on stage, Appice calls his band-mates from Vanilla Fudge to the stage, stating, “This is the first time in 10 years that we’ve been on stage together”. They proceed to play almost the entire remainder of the show.

Tom Petersson played his 12-string bass on the cover song ‘Be My Baby’ that was originally recorded by The Ronettes in 1964, then sits out the rest of the show until the final song, ‘Bo Diddley’. This was a jam song that included all the players from the show including three bassists, with Appice telling them all that the song was to be played key of “E”.

Carmine Appice & Friends - Savoy 1982

This album is the re-release of ‘Hanging On Live’. The only difference is that the song list includes nine tracks whereas the original album shows ten. The difference is that the introduction of the band members is listed as a separate track on the first album.

Carmine Appice & Friends - Rock Super Session #1 / The Advent of Zeus

In 1999 the album was re-released in a 17-track double CD “fan club issue only” version. Truly terrible - most local cover bands have better backing vocals than these so-called “stars” can sing.