SamuelBLupowitz
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Posts posted by SamuelBLupowitz
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I still think of these songs as pretty embedded in American culture, but maybe that's because I've spent so much of my life around theater people.Another example of songs that were popular with a whole generation, and now very few of those songs are known to the general public. -
"One! One gruesome death! Ah, ah, ah!"
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A Vintage Vibe 64 Active showed up on my doorstep yesterday. Yeah, it's all that!
Agreed. I MUST know more. Man, I love electric pianos.
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If nothing else, the pairing of Chris Thile and Dave Koz is worth everyone's time.
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Anxiety-inducing is the word. I'm definitely one of the younger folks on this forum; I grew up before everyone had smartphones but AOL Instant Messenger was a huge part of my teen years. As something of an introvert, who preferred writing to speaking (it's part of why I'm a performer, if that makes sense). I felt liberated (and still do) by being able to initiate communication thoughtfully and informally (way easier than going out of my way to approach a girl in the hallway or god forbid call her house, right?). So in that sense, I appreciate the evolution into texting that's become a part of all of our lives.
But it also means I'm given the opportunity to constantly review and over-analyze wording and delayed response time ALL THE TIME.
O Brave New World...
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My wife and I have listened to the "Rock of Ages" live album dozens and dozens of times (I think the summer of 2012 it was pretty much all that we listened to), and it remains one of our favorite records of all time.
But every time we have it on the car and the eight minute organ solo comes up, we look at each other and wonder if we should just skip ahead to Chest Fever already.
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Yeah, he preferred the Lowrey, I think because of its pitch-bend capabilities, but also I think it had some idiosyncrasies that were closer to the church and parlor organs he grew up playing. The Band is one of my favorite, er, bands, and Garth is a virtuoso for sure, but his organ playing isn't always to my taste. Amazing, just doesn't always speak to me.Didn't Garth just not like Hammonds. I thought I read that somewhere or someone mentioned that here years ago?He was doing some really crazy synth and effects processing on keyboards in a way that I think was really ahead of its time, though, especially when you realize that Big Pink came out in 1968! Maybe the Beatles were doing that, but in the studio, not onstage.
Anyway, sorry to semi-derail the thread. I'll look over the gear lists shared here with great enthusiasm.
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I know there were slightly different rigs in the studio footage and the concert footage, too, so I forget what I saw where. I think there was some combo organ action too. As much as I'm willing to haul vintage gear around, I've heard too many Mellotron horror stories to ever want to do that... but getting to at least check out the real thing would be cool. One of the studios near me has a Chamberlin, but that's the closest I've gotten.
If it's in a modern environment, it's could be the current digital version, whose back panel looks something like this,,,Was this the movie where I saw a Chamberlin?I remain a bit baffled when anyone takes a real Mellotron out live.
It's so true. I love that doc; just rewatched it myself. I think my favorite moment is the rehearsal footage when Benmont yells at the band to "play your ^&%*ing guitars! We're in the rock and roll hall of bloody fame!"And yes, my biggest takeaway is how endlessly I can watch Tom Petty talk about anything. It prompted a dip back into Running Down a Dream (the doc). -
The house band on Live from Here just tackled it, and it was great, but even Mike Elizondo and co play too many extra notes in the B section!Another song most bands don't play well.That said, I've been wanting an excuse to tackle it in a band for awhile, even if just as an exercise, or an intro to one of the Meters-influenced originals.
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Also saw it in the theater. If I'm going to watch an infomercial for Jakob Dylan's covers album, it might as well have interviews with Tom Petty, David Crosby, and Ringo Starr! I thought the Michelle Phillips interviews were especially interesting, too; glad she was included.
I mostly agree about the contemporary performances not quite measuring up to the historical footage and interviews with the people who were there, but what a lineup -- Regina Spektor! Norah Jones! Fiona Apple! Was that Rami Jaffee on keys, or someone else? Either way, some cool Mellotron and other vintage instruments.
Two takeaways: I'm psyched to see the Cameron Crowe-produced David Crosby documentary, and man, do I miss Tom Petty.
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It's a good thing I got myself so deep into software this year, because that's the only thing keeping me from blowing a ton of money on all these inexpensive little Behringer modules.
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Domo arigato. :wink:
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Thanks for the share!
Re: Cryin': It's been a long time since I listened to that tune, too long ago to have really been listening for specific keyboard instruments... but man, this song, along with a lot of other post-rehab Aerosmith tracks (particularly on "Big Ones") logged a great many spins in my walkman during my teenage years.
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But she was still drinking between and during songs; the drunker she got, the farther the mike drifted from her face (I guess her arm got tired?), and she had to practically scream to make herself heard. I made the mistake of suggesting that she wouldn't have to sing so hard if she held the mike a little closer to her mouth. As her drunken eyes leveled at me, the words filtered out of her haze: "You don't like me, do you?"
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Boogie boogie boogie. :wink:As we were packing up, a short, round, balding gentleman in glasses and most of his suit and tie (no coat) came up to us and said "For just a little while, you made us feel like we weren't librarians!"I had another good one at the same venue as my last story. This wasn't an all-day festival, just a 5pm-8pm live gig at the taproom in rural New York, so people were in and out, and not necessarily expecting live music. It's also not my cover band, it's my 7-piece mostly-original prog-funk band. One of our favorite compliments we've ever received is "it's not exactly easy listening music!" But we can control our volume, as best as a 7-piece band with horns and shreddy guitar can be expected to. I've heard many a four-piece band, often at the same venue, play MUCH louder than us. Please keep that in mind as I continue...
So we're powering through, dealing with the fact that there's never more than a handful of people all night, and they're mostly ignoring the band, when a group of slightly inebriated 50-somethings come in and get REALLY excited about the music. So we start engaging with them, and we're having a good time as we approach the end of our set, so during one song I decide to have some fun with them. I grab my Seaboard, hop off the stage, and sit myself down at their table while I keep playing. One of the gentlemen at the table leans over to me.
"The music's really great," he says, with that tone where you just KNOW some unwanted "advice" is coming your way, "but it's a little loud for the room."
What, you mean the room with the tin ceiling where they booked a 7-piece horn band?
But then he followed it up with my favorite qualifier:
"I know what I'm talking about -- I'm a sound guy."
Everyone's a $%#&ing sound guy.
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I'm not here to open a big ol' can of worms with this statement, but I usually feel about Scary Pockets the way I feel about Postmodern Jukebox. Like, it's great, and SP in particular has a lot of stylistic elements that really jive with my personal taste and aesthetic. But cumulatively I get a little too used to the gimmick: you take familiar pop songs and play them funky (or music hall-y or whatever). It's arranged well and played well, but it feels a little predictable for me, no matter how much I like the song or the genre or the musicianship.
But I couldn't help but love this, not just because I love Ben Folds, but because I love to hear an artist approach one of their own songs in a completely different way. What a treat! I'm sure the credit for Ben's appearance goes to Scary Pockets co-founder and guitarist Ryan Lehrman, a great songwriter in his own right, who played bass in Ben's band for a couple of tours back in the early 2010s.
Oh, the singer's good too.
[video:youtube]
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I love the challenge of full-band recording with limited tracks. Really forces you to think about the ensemble sound, rather than individual performances!
Sometimes I butt heads with bandmates about this sort of thing. :wink:
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I have a pretty low-tech solution for my Roland PK-5 pedals: a small padded suitcase with a moving blanket inside to wrap the pedals in. If the Hammond pedals are radial rather than Taurus-style, it may be trickier to find a case with the right proportions, but it's worth a shot.
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Zombie thread alert (happy Halloween) -- I just watched this video again and it drove home what a North star Benmont is as a musician and as a person. In a different interview of his I've heard, he said "make human music for human beings." Full of down-to-earth wisdom, that man.
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Another vote for the Minimoog Model D app. I'd have completely abandoned my iPad for Mainstage except that app just scratches that Moog itch so much better than any of the other synth offerings I've found at that price point. Apple's Retro Synth and others are fine, but I feel like with the Model D app the sound is just there.
There are a few solid apps for Mellotron as well, if that's your bag. Mellowsound, Mellotronics Streetlytron Pro (that's the one that King Crimson uses), and others.
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An Attack of the Clones reference -- now THAT's scary!"Master Syfodias had ordered these ten years ago"
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This says it all, doesn't it?
Hilarious!
Now, I don't want to detract or be pedantic, because I found that very, very funny (especially thinking about George Lucas with little action figures). It just made me think a bit and I wanted to discuss the differences between the two franchise's philosophies. We all know Star Wars has its share of elevated philosophy, too (I mean, some of Yoda's monologues in Empire are just classic, and move me to this day). It's just that Trek is absolutely about the human race as it could be, and what we could aspire to. Star Wars isn't that, because as much as it's always been first and foremost a fun adventure serial in space, its stories are rooted in contemporary human conflicts. The original film was a Vietnam allegory, the prequels were trying to be a War on Terror allegory, and I argue that the new films examine the rebirth of fascism in the latter days of the generation that grew up during the Vietnam War. That's my crackpot theory, anyway.
Personally, I need both kinds of stories. It's good to watch stories where heroes you see yourself in triumph over villains that seem beyond defeat.
But I also need to hope we can transcend the "destructive conflict" that marks all the Star Wars stories, and prize knowledge and truth, and explore peacefully.
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There's also the clearly-influenced-by-Take-5 "Everything's Alright" from Jesus Christ Superstar.
In my high school jazz band, we played a Stan Kenton chart called "Decoupage" that was in 5/4, and it was gorgeous. It helped that we had a stellar trombone section.
There's also a tune on my first solo album that goes in and out of 5/4 (might be more accurate to call it 5/8) from 4/4, and then into 6/8 at the end.
The thing these all have in common? They all swing. I'm sure I've heard tunes that are in 5 (3+2 or 2+3) that don't swing, but that meter seems to really lend itself to swing... maybe it's just because we've all heard Take 5 so much!
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Here's the full list of nominees to save other folks the Svengle:
Pat Benatar
Dave Matthews Band
Depeche Mode
The Doobie Brothers
Whitney Houston
Judas Priest
Kraftwerk
MC5
Motörhead
Nine Inch Nails
The Notorious B.I.G.
Rufus featuring Chaka Khan
Todd Rundgren
Soundgarden
T.Rex
Thin Lizzy
A diverse list, to be sure, and all have been influential. I know it's been a few years since Nirvana got in, but I'm still not used to seeing those 90s bands on those lists... time waits for no one.
Keys on "The Last Waltz" ?
in The Keyboard Corner
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What you"re sort of saying is that Garth did for The Band what The Band did for the rest of the music community when they came on the scene!