In prepping for the big drum session a couple weeks ago I did some digging in the basement closet and found my drum stick bag from Musicians Friend. I misplaced this delight ages ago – even before buying the junior Ludwig kit for my budding percussionists. Finally I can whip out the nylon brushes and old school ginormo-mallets that I picked up along the way. So much fun.
Who doesn’t love banging on things after all. Right?
The new music project is under way. It has been WAY too long, so I’m pretty jacked. Sure, there have been some starts and stops, but this new piece has been bubbling and churning for a while. There are 15 songs that assemble to sort of tell a story. Tuning, key, overall mood… it all ties together. A couple of weekends ago we laid drum tracks for 10 of the songs. All 10 now have bass and I’m just starting to work on the guitar parts. We’ll probably never have a horn section or exciting cello strings or anything, but the pieces are coming together and it feels great.
I saw the Pixies the other night. Great show. Best I’ve been to in quite a while. As with any good show, I came home inspired, and not just musically. Also hardware-ily. Or something. See, they had these cool bass pedals I have long lusted after. I wish it was as easy as shopping Moog at Musicians Friend, but unfortunately it ain’t. Yeah, Moog is the primary maker of these crazy awesome bass pedals, though I have seen one or two knockoffs. They’re just so super cool and they let a simple dude like me create his own bass lines with one agile foot while rockin’ out on the guitar and mic. The Pixies bassist used them on one song while playing a counterpoint high bassline on her actual ax, but I know I could do so much more!
In these days of Facebook and email and Google+ and even MySpace (yup, it’s still out there) it’s hard to believe how important a mailing list was for a touring band 15 years ago. Every micro-tour required mailings. Every major gig or even minor shows a distance from our home turf was preceded by a trip to the post office. I don’t know if you can even affordably print postcards in NYC or Boston or… well anywhere anymore. I mean sure, there are always the online quick print places, but the shipping alone could cripple a start up band. I miss the old days of postcards and handwritten personal messages. Those were good times.
A week before Christmas I had a great request – some friends wanted to buy a starter guitar for their son. Expecting a simple two line response, they had no idea… I wrote a book in response. a veritable tome of introductory guitar shopping delight. I included everything from local shops to options for a kids guitar at Musicians Friend. Thorough? Hells yeah. Could I do any less? After all, the very future of rock and roll could be at stake!
And the first lesson is free.
How have your holidays been? Can’t top mine. Best Christmas gift ever…
The wife is taking me to see the Pixies.
Simultaneous Rock & Roll AND Christmas miracles.
Gigantic!
Ever since the Traveling Wilburys hit the scene in the 80s, I’ve sort of wanted a Danelectro Bass. Do you remember that super cool double horn bass Tom Petty played? That was a sweet Danelectro. I think it was called a longhorn. Something like that. It kind of looked like it was made out of cardboard, but man, it looked pretty sweet. Of course, when you’re Tom Petty’s bass in a band with 80s Roy Orbison, Bob Dylan, and George Harrison, you’re going to look pretty good no matter what. And seriously, anything next to Jeff Lynne in those days would look like a super model. And that includes a paper bag full of marshmallow fluff.
Earlier tonight I dropped my 8 year old off at a “Kids’ Night Out” fundraiser. These are relatively common in our school district. A bunch of adults with a cause set up the event, usually with the help of a good number of high schoolers who need community service hours. Elementary school kids go and play games, run around in the gym, and eat hot dogs and pizza purchased in advance.
It’s a fun Friday night sort of thing, and I am all in favor of this as a fundraising tactic. Of course, the mindless enthusiasm of the parents who’ve just dropped off one of these Elementary schoolers? Not so cool.
I was nearly sideswiped three times driving that last miracle mile to the school to drop off my guy. I know it’s nighttime and all, but 50 in a school zone is acceptable exactly NEVER.
I’m thinking I should run a crowdfunding campaign for the best best vocal mic for 200 bucks and a good set of external speakers for the car to preach the message of peaceable speed within a 2 mile radius of the school. Makes sense, right?
Me, I’m always on the lookout for affordable guitar effects pedals at musician’s friend and similar places, but I have this buddy in a whole other world. He’s all about the custom made boxes. clones and stomp boxes and kit pedals you can tweak tweak tweak to your heart’s content. He’s a man’s man when it comes to tone crafting one chunky little box at a time. Not that there’s anything wrong with that.
All my recent ruminations about keyboards and digital pianos and such have me thinking about my amazing new guitar. Well, new to me. It’s a Starfire Special from the short-live but amazingly high-quality Dearmond line put out by Fender right after they acquired Guild in the late 90s. I have several different Dearmond models, all that I love with great passion, but this new super hot and sweet Starfire Special is just awesome. Great action. Great sound. I’m so happy.
Now, pulling the perfect tone from this almost perfect tool is just so much freakin’ fun, but
I have to admit there are some add-ons that could help. Hey, I wouldn’t complain if someone threw a new Boss compressor my way. Sometimes everyone needs a little boost for their lead line jackin’.
Right?