Reviewing the Beatles Solo Albums in Order - part 13

I'm amused now to think that, when I heard McCartney II, I thought that was Paul's experimental phase. I was completely unaware of his pseudo-anonymous albums, where he called himself "The Fireman." Now I've listened to some of Strawberries Oceans Ships Forests (which I listened to out of order, having to jump back to 1993 for) and all of Rushes (the 1998 sequel album) and...well...it's very experimental stuff. Some of Rushes is almost not terrible, elevating it above John's and George's experimental albums, but that's really not saying much.

Which brings us back to Ringo. VH1 Storytellers: Ringo Starr, was a TV special turned into a "best of" album, with the added bonus that Ringo introduces each song with a humorous anecdote about that song. It's fun to listen to the stories and makes me wish more Best of albums had this kind of framing device.

Which, like a ping pong game, brings us back to Paul. In 1999 -- completely unknown to me at the time -- Paul came out with Run Devil Run, a really fun albums of rock n' roll covers. I've talked before about how much I love it when the Beatles, together or alone, cover their nostalgic, favorite rockers because they seem to be having the most fun when they're doing this. This album has several surprises -- apparently, Paul wrote three original songs that feel like rock n' roll oldies and hid them in the album so they would seem like covers. Surprisingly, the best song on the album is the most obscure oldie -- the 1958 skiffle song, transformed into a slower, haunting piece by Paul, "No Other Baby" -- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YipnDL3VrCw&list=PLNZ4pVtD8MsEYxFGTbGHJQ5guU7mFUdKZ&index=18 -- but in other cases Paul wisely knew better than to mess with the originals, like his slavish recreation of "Coquette." But there's not a bad song on the album.   

And next we pong back to Ringo for I Wanna Be Santa Claus, the only solo Beatles Christmas album. I don't have access to the full album, but have heard the treacly title track "I Wanna Be Santa Claus," "Come On, Christmas, Christmas Come On" -- a solid rocker, if not overly Christmas-y, and his cover of "The Little Drummer Boy" -- which is no Mormon Tabernacle Choir version (or even Burl Ives version), but seems so appropriate for Ringo that it can be forgiven. 

Paul's Working Classical is his third classical music album and his second best one, after Standing Stone. The highlight of the album is the inclusion of snippets of instrumental versions of some older and newer Paul songs (up through Flaming Pie), and not just with the vocals cut out, but actual new arrangements for different instruments. They sound really nice and, as snippets, they solve a problem a lot of instrumental covers have where, not the entire song really stands out well enough to be enjoyed just for the music, so you lose your place in the song if you're mentally singing along. These snippets highlight just the most iconic-sounding bits from the songs. Unfortunately, the original tracks also sound like they're just snippets, even the ones that kind of ramble on for up to 12 minutes.

From August of 2000, just four months before getting the Beatles' 1 CD for Christmas (I think most of the family gave each other copies, in fact), Paul then came out with Liverpool Sound Collage, yet another of those experimental albums. The first piece, "Plastic Beetle," isn't too bad, and it's kind of fun hearing random noise punctuated by the Beatles just talking and laughing. But "Peter Blake 2000" is just someone saying "Blake," I'm guessing, 2000 times and it was so awful I bailed on listening to the rest.

Which brings me to 2001 - the 21st century, at last! -- and Ringo's The Anthology ...So Far. This is Best of album, with material from the first three All-Starr Band albums, but there is so much extra material here that it feels like I'm listening to something brand new, or at most just similar to the previous albums. There's Ringo covering the songs you expect him to, and people from The Band, The Who, The Eagles, The Guess Who, and Billy Preston performing songs you would expect them to, and then surprises like Peter Frampton covering "Norwegian Wood" and Rick Danko of The Band covering Buddy Holly. Granted, I had to look up the names of everyone on this album other than Ringo, Billy Preston, and Joe Walsh of The Eagles because I'm not an expert on these bands, but I liked everything I heard and I'm sure that, had I been aware of this 3-CD set at the time, I would have snatched it up and fallen head over heels for the All-Starr Band, instead of wondering what that was all about all these years.

Which brings me to the multi-disc CD set (2 instead of 3) that I did get, Wingspan (though I didn't get it right away in 2001, but a few years later). And...well, what is there to say I haven't already said about dream Best of collections for Paul? It doesn't make sense to compile another Best of Wings collection because there's been no new Wings music to add to the last one. Though on the other hand, this is the one I bought and not the previous one, so maybe from a marketing standpoint this did make sense. 

It's also worth pointing out that Wingspan includes a lot of past singles, while I've been sticking to songs that appeared on albums. The weakness of my approach being that it left "Live and Let Die" out of contention.

   

Company of the White Oak Campaign - Sessions 28 and 29

Session 28

While most of the Company of the White Oak was celebrating Richfest in Grossettgrottell, Haruspex Niv and Reed Underbough (with their hirelings) had returned to Greyhawk City and found out the name of a thief to contact among the gnomes.

They returned with one, Gimlen. After a few days they found him. Gimlen did not know Ommetog the Shade, but the thief who trained him had trained under Ommetog the Shade, and Gimlen could take them to where he thought Ommetog lived. Since this was a minor side mission, not everyone went – just Haruspex Niv (and Peter), Langdon, Reed Underbough (and Herv), Rom Riverbluff, Brother Ulrich the Maimed, and Gendri.  

Reaping 7, 621 CY

Grossettgrottell

Grossettgrottell was a township of five connected villages and the Company had never seen the other villages. Gimlen escorted them to Verseglise, the next village over, with more militant gnomes. Gnome guards accompanied by large badgers in leather barding met them at the entry tunnel and escorted them through straight tunnels with right-angle corners.

Next was Radonnaz, a village with no posted guards and twisting tunnels. Down one uninhabited tunnel was a small, round, steel door. Gimlen explained how no one actually knew who lived behind this door, but everyone else was accounted for so people said this was Ommetog’s home .

Of course the door was locked and it proved to be a tough nut to crack, too tough for Reed to pick. Not giving up, the companions searched the floor of the tunnel for tracks and found some that disappeared by a wall. Looking up, they saw a narrow shaft leading up into the ceiling there. The humans would never fit through it wearing any armor, but Reed was small enough to climb up easily. The shaft went straight up 10’ and then gradually bent sideways before widening into a large tunnel and coming to a T-intersection. Reed was clearly well above and about 100’ south of the locked door. 

Reed returned to the shaft and lowered a rope down for Niv. Niv tried climbing up but, not having just average strength, he lost his grip on the rope just inside the entrance to the shaft and fell back down (safely, but embarrassingly). Unwilling to try again, that left Reed to explore on his own. He chose to go left at the T, heading in the direction of the front door, found a trapdoor that went up instead of down, went past that, and found the tunnel ended at a single round, wooden door. This door opened onto a luxurious bedroom. 

Which Reed started looting. He had stripped it of four tapestries and an antique nightstand when the far door of the bedroom flew open and, though Reed could see no one, he heard someone yelling. “Thief!”

Reed ran back to the shaft and descended to the others, who all beat a hasty retreat from the spot. Not everyone felt good about this thievery, since they were not even sure it was the thief who stole magic items from Niv they had stolen from, but when Reed fenced the goods he got 500 gold pieces for them, which was split between Niv, Reed, and Rom (plus Langdon later insists on a third-share for Saraband). 

Later that night, they were discussing going back to the Hidden Dell of the Ringstones on the next morning. They returned to Corrippo’s Inn to discuss it with the rest of the Company still resting there. Vask, fresh off his latest performance with Gert the trained bear, was willing to go along.    

Reaping 9, 621 CY

The Hidden Dell

The 8th had been an uneventful day of travel through the Cairn Hills. Even without Trotter there to guide them, they found their way back to the Hidden Dell late on the afternoon of the 9th – to find it not abandoned. 

Ten orcs were there, nine of them watching and roaring with laughter while one of them was repulsed by the barrier around the inner ring of menhirs. But then they spotted the White Oak Company and battle was joined. A short, one-sided battle. Soon, the companions were picking 50 electrum pieces off the fallen orcs. 

Afterwards, Reed tried to lead everyone through the gap they had left in the barrier – only to be repulsed by it again. Finding the barrier had been restored in their absence, they lured the shadows out of the same two menhirs and destroyed them again with the magic axe, the magic javelin, and Niv’s newfound admiration for the Magic Missile spell. 

Now the way inside was clear, so everyone proceeded to regather the items from the altar stones. Langdon’s method of swinging a grappling hook at the items from a distance until they were knocked off the top was time-consuming, but worked on three altar stones, and a pole was used to push the items out of the altar stone that was a hollow tube. No one was hurt by the elemental traps on any of them. 

They reopened the spiral staircase from the inner room of the cairn at the center of the rings and descended. But what next? 

There were four columns in the room, so they assumed the columns had some important role to play. They examined them for symbols, or indentations to insert items from the altar stones, but they were plain, smooth pillars. 

The secret clue that was hidden in the runes on the inner menhirs suggested they take the east door out of this room. It was a yellowish stone slab instead of a normal door, so Vask offered to move it out of the way. As soon as he laid hands upon it, he and the three people closest to him were hit by a magical explosive force. Vask was knocked unconscious, while Reed was seriously hurt and Haruspex was moderately hurt. 

Maybe, they quickly decided, they didn’t want to solve what was down here so badly after all…

After healing Vask and making sure he survived, and other injuries were healed until the last of the healing spells were spent, everyone packed up and headed back the other way to Grossettgrottell.

Reaping 11, 621 CY

Grossettgrottell

The journey back had been unremarkable. However, once they returned, and more spells were cast and everyone was healed back to normal, a vote was cast on where to go next. Back to exploring Castle Greyhawk…or to look into this Lord Robilar’s Castle they heard about? They needed more downtime to reassemble the full company for an expedition there…but everyone currently assembled was free for a reconnaissance trip, if only they knew where the castle ruins were!

Langdon solved that, asking around until he learned of a mapseller in Grossettgrottell with a map of the Menhir Hills. It clearly showed Lord Robilar’s Castle on it, and it only cost 15 gold (Langdon would later ask for reimbursement for this). 

Using the map, they embarked once more westward out of the Cairn Hills…

Reaping 12, 621 CY

Western edge of the Cairn Hills

They only got this far before needing to camp for the night. During first watch, Langdon and Saraband were startled by the silhouettes of eight men quietly walking up to their camp. Saraband tried to put them to sleep with his spell, but it failed. When the men got closer, Langdon could see why – they were zombies! He turned them and all eight fled.

On the next watch, the zombies came back. This time, realizing they were going to have to do something about the persistent dead, the companions were roused from their sleep and battle was joined. The zombies proved to be unexpectedly dangerous and many companions were hurt, but in time all of the zombies were felled. They had come from the north both times; no one knew what source for zombies might lie to the north,  but they already had a destination in mind and planned to stick to it in the morning.

Reaping 13, 621 CY

The Ruins of Lord Robilar’s Castle

Two thousand feet of open field lay between the castle and the trees that concealed the Company. Reed climbed a tree for a better vantage point. They could see that the whole east end of the castle was in ruins. The outer curtain wall was pentagonal in shape, with a main keep in the north triangular part of the pentagon and two smaller buildings on the west side south of the keep. There were also two intact towers in the curtain wall. It sounded like they had horses inside and Reed could see men – or more likely orcs, but it was impossible to tell at this distance – in armor moving about inside. There was a dry moat around the ruins, like at Castle Greyhawk, but no intact drawbridge like at Castle Greyhawk. Though, surely there was some way across for the orcs to come and go. 

Everyone was sure there would be an exit tunnel to be found somewhere about the hill on which the castle stood, but no one was ready to look for it yet, as searching for it in broad daylight posed problems, while trying to search at night in the dark posed its own separate problems.  It was resolved that they would go and maybe try to come back with the full Company another time.

Reaping 14, 621 CY

Menhir Hills

On the way back, they came across a dead tree they had not noticed before. It drew their attention this time because five giant centipedes were swarming over the tree. Niv put them to sleep before they could pose any trouble. And that was the closest to trouble they had on the way back…

Session 29
Reaping 28, 621 CY
Grossettgrottell

On the last day of the first month of high summer, the Company of the White Oak was still “vacationing” in Grossettgrottell. During this vacation, a thief had stolen magic items from Haruspex Niv and items from John Grond while everyone was renting the Corippo Inn and, today, Haruspex Niv, John Grond (accompanied by his new henchman Biros Frapple), the three holy brothers Langdon, Percy, and Ulrich the Maimed (and Langdon’s henchman Saraband), Reed Underbough (and his henchman Herv), and Rom Riverbluff planned to get them back. Biros, a local (local thief, but a local gnome nonetheless) escorted them through the Village of Verseglise and safely to the Village of Radonnaz (west of Grossettgrottell), where stood the Steel Door.

The 4’ diameter, locked, steel door had blocked them before, but they had more tools to try and gain entry this time, including new, stronger lockpicks Reed had bought. These did the trick, and the door was opened.

Inside was a hallway, heading east, with straw mats covering the floor. John took the lead, with Reed sitting on his shoulders, poking ahead of them with Herv’s 10’ pole. This was fortunate, because John might have otherwise walked into a 5’ wide pit concealed under the mats. Lifting the mat, they saw the pit was filled almost to the top with what looked like water covered in green scum. Rom tossed some food in and watched it sink. Satisfied that it was not acid, they let it be and moved on.

The door at the end of the hallway was just stuck, and John shouldered that open. Beyond was a second hallway that went left and right. To the left, just 20’ away, was a dead end. In front of the dead end was a very unusual statue that looked like a large bear, with a lion’s head, carved from a single huge chunk of amber.

John poked it, tried to lift it, and found it to be exceptionally heavy. Percy found this odd because amber, he knew, was lighter than stone. John swallowed his pride and asked Herv to help him lift. The statue was not anchored to the spot, just unnaturally heavy, and they were able to move it only a few feet before sitting it down. Reed went behind it and checked the floor where it had stood, but saw nothing there.

No one recognized the statue as having any religious significance, it was just some fanciful artist’s creation perhaps, but Rom convinced the others that it might have some secret compartment underneath it and wanted them to tip it over. Even with Rom helping them, the three strongmen were not able to gently set the statue down, but had to loudly tip it over.

And then it animated and attacked.

It lightly raked John with its claws at first, as if toying with him. John damaged it with his magic sword, but when Rom struck it soundly with his morning star the weapon just bounced off of it as if he had struck a stone wall. Now the amber monster reacted more strongly – putting John in a bear hug and nearly tearing his right arm off with a bite from its lion mouth. John was about to die.

For the first time in a long time, companions began to panic. Langdon stepped into melee so Rom could back out, but then Langdon too fled. Reed jumped onto the statue’s back from behind and kept plunging his magic dagger deep into the monster, got bashed into the wall once and was moderately hurt, but kept holding on. While he distracted it, Herv picked up John and ran for the exit. Percy followed, already having begun casting his Cure Light Wounds spell to save John. Haruspex also tried distracting the monster, at close range, with a magic missile. It barely cracked the surface of the statue, but the monster responded by crushing Haruspex in a bear hug, then nearly biting off his right arm too. Now Haruspex was dying.

Rom had run, but not far. Seeing John’s magic sword lying there on the floor and knowing the monster would be vulnerable to it, Rom picked it up. But unbeknownst to him, the sword was chaotically aligned and wanted Rom to die for being lawful. Rom was overwhelmed with pain -- and now he was dying on the floor too!

Although they were losing members fast, Reed kept attacking and Herv came back and also picked up the magic sword. The sword liked Herv, though, and accepted him as his new master. Between Reed and Herv (and a little help from John and Haruspex earlier), the enchanted statue crumbled into little lumps of amber all over the floor.

The three clerics unleashed all their cure spells and everyone was saved in time. No one had yet responded to all this noise, so their next priority was filling every sack and backpack they had with amber. There was a lot.

But there was one other treasure that was hard fought over -- the chaotic magic sword. John wanted it back, but Herv didn’t want to give it up. Langdon cast Hold Person on the two of them, which took on Herv, allowing John to get his sword back. Both men were acting suspiciously irrational, but once John had his sword resheathed he seemed his old self again.

There were a lot of gem merchants in Radonnaz; they knew because when they went to the first shop, the gnome summoned all the other merchants in the village to come see all this amber. They pooled their resources to buy it all from the Company -- 4,000 gold pieces worth. The Company went to the local tavern, Bos Rolbasoreg (gnomish for The Dinner Rolls), to celebrate. But, as the evening wore on, they began to become concerned that Ommetog would visit them in the night and try to punish them.

They tried to rent the cellar of the tavern to hide in for the night, but the greedy tavernkeeper, Felbis, would not for less than 35 gold. Most everyone would be holed up in the 30’ x 30’ cellar that night while rotating guards would watch from the common room upstairs. Felbis was behind a locked side door for the night; only one lone drunk gnome was in the common room with them.

During first watch, Reed gave Herv a good talking to about the sword incident. Herv confessed that he had been feeling scared and vulnerable, more aware of his own mortality, since Vask died and then almost died again.

Two watches later, it was looking like Ommetog would not find them, but the third and final watch was Langdon, Saraband, Percy, and Biros. While Percy sat with his back to the cellar door, Langdon was just standing around when a sword came out of nowhere and stabbed him in the back. Langdon was seriously hurt, but not out of the fight, as Ommetog the Shade appeared (though still concealed in magical shadow and only visible in silhouette).

Ommetog shrugged off a Hold Person spell from Percy, but Saraband managed to get a one-arm hold on Ommetog, and then Langdon managed to grab the other. Suddenly, and as other members of the Company began to show up who were awakened by the short combat or Biros, Ommetog wanted to parlay.

The Company was, equally surprisingly, open to his terms. He would return the stolen items and the map of Castle Greyhawk they knew he had and never come after them again. In return, they would not come after him again, and he was free to steal back his amber if he wanted it. Ommetog said he never planned to return to Castle Greyhawk anyway, so he was game to give back the map. And he only came out of retirement every few years to “stretch those muscles,” but had never encountered a challenge like the Company before and they had his respect. He even suggested they might all work together someday. Reed further sweetened the pot by offering to report to the dwarven embassy that they found Ommetog dead, so the bounty on him would be lifted. Ommetog found this gracious and said he would throw in a gem for that.

But the question was, could they trust Ommetog’s promises. They kept his sword as insurance and waited at the tavern. Time passed. The tavernkeeper opened his door, asked what had happened, and then barricaded himself in. A half-hour passed, but Ommetog came back with everything they had asked for, plus a 100 gold piece gem.  And with that, Ommetog waved and simply walked out.

The tavernkeeper did emerge eventually. The drunk gnome (who had not been Ommetog, though Haruspex had suspected such) woke up, and staff started to arrive to open for the day. Biros helped Felbis make them a decent breakfast and then everyone left -- except for Haruspex and Reed. The two of them had plotted in secret to steal the 35 gold back from that greedy gnome, so Haruspex cast Sleep on the tavern staff, caught all of them -- and Reed -- woke up Reed, unlocked Felbis’ door, and raided his private rooms for all the loose coinage they could find.

And with that, everyone headed out, back through the tunnels, to return to the surface at Grossetgrottell, retrieve the others at the Corippo Inn, and head back to the City of Greyhawk!